Review: How Sweet it Is

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Holly Stanford is doing the best she can with the restaurant she inherited from her late uncle. But after her fiancé abandons her and the business, Holly regrets having given up her dream of becoming a pastry chef. Now a few bad financial decisions might cost her everything, including her hope for the future.

Jed Henning has done well with his new company despite his prodigal brother’s behavior. When Jed‘s father, the controlling member of the board of directors, temporarily suspends operations until his sons work out their differences, Jed resentfully chases his brother, Chris, to Boise. There Jed rents a basement apartment from Holly and hopes to convince Chris to get his act together before their company collapses.

Unaware that Holly is the one person who can help him get through to Chris, Jed starts the tough work of reconciliation armed with little more than a few family photographs, a stack of old letters, and a Bible that belonged to his great-grandfather, Andrew Henning. And as romance blossoms between Holly and Jed, the story of Jed’s great-grandfather highlights the power of God across the generations and the legacy of a family’s courageous faith.

Genre: contemporary romance

Publication date: July 2020

Mature content: no

Review: How Sweet It Is is, well, a very sweet romance story about two people who are torn between their faith and the real course of their lives. Holly gave up her dream of being a pastry chef to open a restaurant with her fiance, only for him to give her up instead. Now she's alone and feeling helpless, dealing with overwhelming debt and a less than successful business. Jed, on the other hand, has been very successful in his business but success has cost him the relationship with his brother and now, probably even the company he founded.

This is a book heavy on the Christian side, but somehow that blends very well the the flow of the story. There are only a few plot issues I felt were strange. I don't understand how Jed's father would shut a successful company for a month (or any other period of time, for that matter) waiting for Jed and his brother to reconcile. From the business perspective it makes zero sense, so I didn't think it was very realistic. And the flashbacks into Jed's family's past are a bit confusing, especially when they mix with Jed's own flashbacks to past situations and conversations with his brother.

Other than that, it's a very nice book for lovers of clean, Christian romance. And although it's book 3 in a series, I didn't feel I was missing out for not having read the previous stories.

 Happy readings!