Book Review: Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor by Lisa Kleypas

I am not new to Lisa Kleypas, nor to her Friday Harbor series. I started with Book 2, Rainshadow Road and read Dream Lake before I back tracked to read Friday Harbor (this seems to be a habit with me lately!) so I was familiar (and madly in love with) the Nolan Family already. I felt like this quick read was a delicious flashback.

Tragedy is no stranger to the Nolan Brothers – their parents were Alcoholics, their sister was killed in a car accident (orphaning her child, Holly) and the baby brother is trapped in a marriage going nowhere. And this is all in the first few pages of the book!

This first book is about Mark, the oldest brother who has become the Guardian of his niece, Holly. To me, the love story in this one is really secondary – it’s a story about Mark finding his groove as a parent – something most of us get YEARS to build up to, and he was thrust into overnight. And I always swoon when a hero can put behind his tragic past and find out that love (and possibly Fairies!) are real!

Christmas Eve at Friday Harbor introduces us to a sneak peak of the magical realism that Lisa Kleypas really lets loose in her next few books, and is a beautiful foundation for this series. I would recommend the Friday Harbor series to fans of Sarah Addison Allen as well as Barbara O’Neal! (You won’t regret picking this one up, I promise!)