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A review by outofoffice_reading
Christmas at the Cat Café by Jessica Redland
3.0
A low 3⭐️ and really only getting 3 because of the cats.
This was such a weird book. I run hot & cold with Jessica Redland, but this is the first I’ve read of hers where I’m pretty much indifferent. It was a nice, easy, quick read, but honestly there was nothing remarkable.
I expected a feel good festive story, but it was seriously lacking in anything close to a Christmas book, other than it taking place in November / December, and to be honest there wasn’t much about the cat cafe really either. I think the book tried to handle far too many things and ended up a bit of a mess.
The first half of the book is like a completely separate story to the second half, like 2 novellas, one about opening a cat cafe & one about falling in love with your best friend. It didn’t run smoothly at all and a lot of the characters actions were at odds with what you come to expect from them. I did like the chronic illness element, you don’t see it often enough and it worked well with the overarching story.
But the story as a whole was just underwhelming and odd. The bit where her brother says it would be gross for them to date simply highlighted the fact that actually it WAS a bit weird to fall in love with effectively your foster uncle?! But then everyone was ok with it and always saw it coming?! Even though she refers to him as a second brother for most of the first half. Like I said, weird book.
The ultimate weirdness was that rather than a lovely successful cat cafe Christmas, she decides on Christmas Eve she doesn’t want the cafe afterall and sells it…
I really didn’t get much from this, 3⭐️ is being generous.
This was such a weird book. I run hot & cold with Jessica Redland, but this is the first I’ve read of hers where I’m pretty much indifferent. It was a nice, easy, quick read, but honestly there was nothing remarkable.
I expected a feel good festive story, but it was seriously lacking in anything close to a Christmas book, other than it taking place in November / December, and to be honest there wasn’t much about the cat cafe really either. I think the book tried to handle far too many things and ended up a bit of a mess.
The first half of the book is like a completely separate story to the second half, like 2 novellas, one about opening a cat cafe & one about falling in love with your best friend. It didn’t run smoothly at all and a lot of the characters actions were at odds with what you come to expect from them. I did like the chronic illness element, you don’t see it often enough and it worked well with the overarching story.
But the story as a whole was just underwhelming and odd. The bit where her brother says it would be gross for them to date simply highlighted the fact that actually it WAS a bit weird to fall in love with effectively your foster uncle?! But then everyone was ok with it and always saw it coming?! Even though she refers to him as a second brother for most of the first half. Like I said, weird book.
The ultimate weirdness was that rather than a lovely successful cat cafe Christmas, she decides on Christmas Eve she doesn’t want the cafe afterall and sells it…
I really didn’t get much from this, 3⭐️ is being generous.