Series Name: The Ever After Street Series, # 2
Like yesterday, there’s a mini rose plant waiting for me, yellow buds this time, sitting in a blue china pot. There’s another card on a stick out of it, written in Darcy’s gorgeous handwriting.
Yellow, the colour of Belle’s dress, because she was a woman who could do anything she set her mind too…
I turn it over
And so are you.
An Enchanted Moment on Ever After Street is charming and sweet and everything my Disney-obsessed heart could ever ask for.
A tale as old as time…
Since her mum’s death, Marnie Platt has shut herself away from everyone who cares about her. Worse, her beloved bookshop on Ever After Street is suffering too. With sales down and the shop’s garden falling into disrepair, Marnie risks losing the very last thing she loves. Until a chance encounter with her surly and reclusive neighbour….
Dark and brooding, Darcy O’Connell likes to keep himself to himself. But when he hears Marnie needs help, he can’t turn his back on her. Soon they are spending most evenings together in her enchanted garden and a friendship starts to bloom…
With the help of old and new friends on Ever After Street, Marnie’s bookshop begins to thrive again, and with Darcy’s kindness, she starts to get her sparkle back too. She just can’t understand why Darcy continues to shut himself away – especially from her. Can she convince him it isn’t too late to embrace life, and maybe love, again?
Because every story, even theirs, deserves a happy ending….
This book had me feeling so many glorious emotions. My heart was pitter-pattering, I had butterflies in my stomach, and I found myself holding my breath because I needed to know what would happen next. As you can probably imagine, I devoured this book in one sitting, and it was everything I could ever hope for. I love Beauty in the Beast; it’s one of my favourite Disney movies, and Jaimie has done a fantastic job taking this tale as old as time and making it her own. The story has all those fabulous qualities that I have come to expect from Jaimie’s storytelling. She is a master at creating those charming and heartwarming stories with a lot of depth. There are a lot of light and fluffy moments in this book, but also moments that have you feeling those deeper emotions. An Enchanted Moment on Ever After Street, is perfect for those bookworms who love Alison Sherlock or Maxine Morrey books.
This book is a retelling of Beauty and the Beast. We get to meet Marnie, a bookstore owner, in a bit of a rut. Since her mother’s passing, Marnie has lost her spark and drive to run her family bookstore. All she wants to do is get lost in a book and let the world disappear around her. The book begins with Marnie getting a letter from the landlord stating that if she doesn’t tidy up the store’s back garden and start bringing in more customers, he is going to terminate her lease. When Marnie attempts to tame the mini jungle in her shop’s backyard, she encounters Darcy, also known as Beast, by the locals. Marnie doesn’t know what to make of her prickly neighbour, who often goes from gruff to nice in the blink of an eye. The two begin an unusual friendship. The two communicate over a hedge because Darcy does not want Marnie to see him. They work together to clean up Marnie’s back garden and plan a book fair to help draw in more customers. I loved Jaimie’s modern twist on the tale of Beauty and the Beast. She was clever and thoughtful when it comes to making this tale relevant in today’s world. I loved all the little easter eggs she put into the story; they often had me smiling. Marnie is a bookworm, and her love for books just leaps from the pages. I lost count of the number of times I felt this connection with something Marnie said about why books are so important to her and the world. She is a kindred spirit to all those bookworms out there.
The theme of grief and how it can affect a person’s life is central to the story. Marnie is dealing with the grief of losing her mom and no longer feels like the person she used to be. She feels lost and knows she needs to move on but doesn’t know how. Darcy is dealing with a different form of grief. Without giving away any spoilers, his past has dictated how he is currently living his life. He is in this self-imposed exile and has shunned himself from the world. He is bitter and mean, but his behaviour is a product of the overwhelming grief he is trying to deal with. The journey that Marnie and Darcy go on is emotional and heartwarming. They create this wonderful support system for each other. Their growth in this story is remarkable and will definitely fill your heart with happiness.
The romance in this book is a delightful opposites attract, grumpy/sunshine, slow-burn love story. I adored Marnie and Darcy’s meet-cute and interactions. The majority of Marnie and Darcy’s relationship is spent with them talking to each other through a hedge that divides their backyards. I was worried at first that the lack of physical contact would hinder that sense of growing close or that their relationship wouldn’t feel intimate. But that was not the case with Marnie and Darcy’s relationship. Their conversations and the notes that Darcy left Marnie were meaningful and felt powerful. There was something deeper about the connection they formed through those conversations that felt right to me. I just ate up every one of their interactions and had to keep reading because I wanted to see what would happen next.
An Enchanted Moment on Ever After Street is an uplifting and unputdownable book, and I would recommend it to anyone who loves fairy tales.
Thank you, Boldwood Books and Rachel Random Resources, for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
