A Family for Christmas
by Jay Northcote, published in 2016 by Jaybird Press.
I tend to shy away from holiday themed fiction. Why? Because
everything written surrounding holidays, such as Christmas for example, tend to
be very formulaic. Some moving thing happens to some character because of the
holiday, and love blooms from there. I guess this could be said for any setting
of romance fiction, but it just seems painfully obvious when it is set during a
holiday. But A Family for Christmas
was on my Kindle Unlimited suggestions, and the synopsis (from Goodreads.com
below) seemed interesting:
Shy, inexperienced
Rudy has a crush on Zac from the moment his new colleague walks through the
door. On an office night out before Christmas, Rudy finds the courage to make a
move, and they form a tentative bond. When he discovers Zac will be alone at
Christmas, he invites Zac to come home with him.
Zac prefers to keep
people at arm’s length. Yet when Rudy offers him a family Christmas it’s
impossible to resist. With no parents of his own, Zac is pleasantly surprised
to be welcomed by Rudy’s. The only drawback is that everyone assumes they’re a
couple. Unwilling to disappoint Rudy’s mum and make Christmas awkward, they
decide not to deny it.
It’s not a chore for
Zac to pose as Rudy’s boyfriend, but the pretense makes him want things that
scare him—things like a real relationship with Rudy. Zac’s suffered enough
rejection in his life already and is afraid to risk his heart. If he can get
over his past rejection and let Rudy inside his armor, he might get more for
Christmas than he ever imagined.
Characters
Rudy and Zac are obviously the main characters, and Rudy is
the most fleshed out of the pair. We see Rudy’s family, his interactions with
them, and more of his inner monologue than we do of Zac. And that’s where part
of my issue with this book resides. Zac is much more complicated than Rudy in
personality, yet we get almost no exposition on why he is that way. We do get
details about why he is a loner and why he shuts himself off from growing close
to anyone, but we don’t get much in the way of character development within
that. And for a story where one character changes the other’s life, you want to
know more about what that other’s life was really like.
Aside from Rudy and Zac, there are side characters at the
office and with Rudy’s family. The author seems to want to flesh out these side
characters more, because he gives us random details about these characters, yet
doesn’t take the time to make them fully formed characters. Yes, this is a gay
romance novel. Yes, that means that the focus should really be on the two main
characters. But, if you’re going to make Rudy’s family play such a big role in
shaping Zac, then we need more than just random tidbits here and there about
these characters.
Story
Overall, I liked the story. I felt it flowed naturally most
the time, and I believed that these characters did grow to care about each
other very quickly. That’s hard to do with me as I sometimes will stop reading
books all together if it seems like everything is too forced. Zac and Rudy’s
chemistry was radiating off my Kindle screen, and I enjoyed it very much. But
as I mentioned in the Characters section, some more backstory on Zac would have
contributed to me liking the story more than I did, and while Rudy only
seriously interacts with his mother out of his whole family, I would have liked
to see him have private conversations with other family members to get a sense
of where he came from as well. His family is “good,” but we don’t really get a
sense of why except that they love each other and are kind to one another
besides the usual family putdowns and jokes (at least usual in my family).
Favorite Part
My favorite part of the story was when Rudy’s insecurities
were touched on. I could completely relate to them, and that helped me connect
with the story more. It helped balance out the lack of backstory we received
about Zac, and made me like the characters more than I would have without some
flaws being shown in Rudy.
Least Favorite Part
Obviously Zac’s lack of backstory should rank at the top of
this list, but rather it’s the lack of development for Rudy’s family that does.
We are introduced to his parents, aunt, grandfather, and siblings, along with
his sister’s boyfriend. Yet we get almost no details about they like to play
games with each other, and that they all care about each other. Rudy’s aunt is
written in a way where you could tell the author wanted to do something more
with the character, but couldn’t find a way. So instead we get bits and pieces
of this character that feels larger than life, but has no life in her.
Overall
I gave this book a three star rating on Goodreads. I didn’t
hate it by any means, but I didn’t love it either. If I had to pay for this
book, I wouldn’t have rated it that high. Character development is big for me,
and the lack of it knocked off one star immediately. The other star was more
for the fact that the story seemed to drag on a bit, and while some of it was
necessary for the relationship of Zac and Rudy to be believable, a lot of it
felt like it could be devoted to character development instead of playing hide
and seek with the family. I would recommend this to anyone who likes a good holiday
read and a nice romance.
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