Christmas on the Beach by Tori L. Wilson

Well I’ll be a son of a gun! We have a male lead with the name Erik, ending in a ‘k’. Just like my brother! It’s such a rarity to find an Erik that doesn’t end in a ‘c’. Oh boy, and now I’m thinking of my brother in reference to the male lead of a romance novel. Great, can’t wait to see how long it takes me to separate that concept!

What’s it About?

Aria spends her days living in a small one bedroom apartment on Jekyll Island with her adorable cat, Salem. Every day, she lives out her dream creating new paintings and selling them to customers online. Despite all of this, however, she still feels as though she is missing something. One crisp December morning, she meets a man on the beach by chance. Erik, a handsome Korean man, is visiting the island for Christmas. Will their love blossom regardless of the freezing weather or will tragedy grip Erik’s heart in its icy clutches?

First Impressions

Now I know what you’re thinking. It’s May, why the hell am I featuring a romance novel set during Christmas?! I can’t even use the whole excuse of it being Christmas in July, or something silly like that. Well, what can I say? This is what happens when you host a romance novel blog, and you get severely behind on reading through your author review requests! Only 26 more to get through and I’ll be officially caught up. Which means…yeah I’ll probably never get caught up, and next thing you know I”ll be reviewing a book set around Halloween in June. Anywho, let’s get down to the nitty gritty details of this little novella, shall we?

First things first, “little novella” is about as accurate as a description as we can have here, seeing as this tale is just 49 pages in length. That miiiiiight just be a record of the shortest story I’ve ever featured. Although we are dealing with a short novella, this story incorporates quite a lot of heavy subject matter involving the feeling of loneliness which can surround the holidays. Aria is experiencing Christmas alone in her beach house, and we are reminded that during winter the beach can be a cold and foreboding place. For Erik, it’s an extremely sad and solitary family Christmas vacation by the beach seeing as the rest of his family isn’t actually present. His parents both met an untimely death the week before during a home invasion gone wrong, and the rest of his family is all back in Korea for the funeral. Man, I feel like I need a shot of tequila to make it through this one! Despite the sad premise, these two lonely souls are able to come together to find a moment of happiness, and maybe even love during the holidays.

Finding Love on the Beach

This novel starts off very strong! I always get worried when we have a romance set in such a limited number of pages, as it usually feels like our lead couple comes together way too quickly for my liking. However, when it came to this tale of woe, you really are rooting for Erik and Aria to come together so that they can provide comfort for each other during such a difficult time. The setting of the beach also provided some very interesting symbolism towards the beginning, as we open on the cold gray of the ocean which surrounds our characters during their lonely holiday, but as their time together progresses they are able to rediscover the beauty of the island. They also spend a delectable amount of time together drinking hot chocolate, and cuddling under blankets on the couch whilst watching Christmas movies. Honestly, I see nothing wrong with this.

Tapering Off at the End

Unfortunately, there is one crucial scene in this novella which wasn’t my favorite, and it surrounds the discussion we all knew was coming: Erik’s inevitable return to Korea. Erik admits the day after he and Aria first have sex that he’ll be headed home within 24 hours. In my humble opinion, Aria gets a bit overly emotional when he reveals this little detail. She accuses him of just using her for sex, and proceeds to kick him out of her apartment. And he just leaves. Mkay, a few issues here. First of all. The dude’s parents were just murdered! He’s heading home to be with his family. Give the guy a break!

Now, to be fair, Aria quickly realizes her mistaken overreaction later that evening, but my goodness in the moment it just made me cringe. And then there’s Erik. When Aria told him to leave, he just put his head down in sadness and left. Again, to be fair, I can’t really blame the guy. He’s got other more worrisome things on his mind right now than to argue with a woman he just met two days ago who is upset he has to go home to grieve with his family. I just wish that he would have fought just a bit more for their relationship. Yes, they came together very quickly, but if he had stayed back to try and make any kind of argument for why she shouldn’t throw him out in the cold, I think I would have warmed to this relationship even more.

*A copy of this book was provided for an honest review*

Series: Part of the Snowman Anthology.

Should you read it? I just love that we have a male lead who can make bibimbap. I’ll take him for myself if you don’t mind! Would have preferred a Korean male for the cover art, but what can ya do? This novella has a strong start, but as the story goes on there is quite a lot left unexplored. For example, we never really learn why Aria was alone for Christmas, seeing as she mentions her parents and sister at multiple points throughout the story. Also, even though I was rooting for these two to get together, I couldn’t help but wonder how much of their emotional connection was based on true love, and how much was because Aria happened to be there to comfort Erik at a difficult time in his life. Will this be a forever romance? I’m not 100% sure as of right now, but I would absolutely love to get a follow-up to this tale. I’d definitely read it, no question.

Smut Level: We don’t really have any explicit detail when it comes to the sex scenes in this one. There’s several kisses, waking up the morning after tangled together in the sheets, and even the discussion of whether or not to take a shower together. Nice!

Get it on Amazon: Click Here. $1.99 Kindle Price. Books to Go Now. 49 Pages.