When a friend loaned me her copy of A Season of Second Chances by Jenny Bayliss, I was skeptical at best. Despite the saccharine description of a chef hosting a book club in a coastal British town (all things that are near & dear to my heart) and a promise that there wouldn’t be too much spice, I expected to roll my eyes the entire way through the book (if I even finished it). By nature, I avoid modern fiction. But at the end of a long, weird year, my natural tendencies needed an escapist reset. So, at the beginning of a bleak December, I finally tucked into what ended up being a sweet little treat of a novel.

I doubt that I will read this book again, but I have no regrets in taking myself on a little journey across the pond to save a small business in danger as I fell in love with a brooding Scottish gentleman. It was worth the main page turns to have a cozy coastal adventure while stuck in the dreary doldrums of a Midwestern winter.

My main critique was that this book was much longer than it probably needed to be. In the acknowledgements, the author admitted to turning in a War & Peace length first draft, so I guess the published version had been condensed. Still, the story dragged a bit longer than it needed to. Despite a strong aversion to Hallmark-movie type predictability in stories, I did find the characters to be developed enough to garner my attention. So perhaps, the length was necessary.

This book may be for you if you also like: England; travel; Hallmark movies; coffee shops; hulking Scottish men; small coastal towns; celebrating minor holidays; comeback stories; book clubs; baking; a cuppa tea; kind neighbors; daring rescues; some good-natured folk lore.

SDG