Katie Winters

A Vineyard Thanksgiving by Katie Winters is a 2020 publication.

This is the fourth book in the Vineyard Sunset series, but despite having missed the first three installments, I was given enough 'catch-up' information to keep me in the loop.

This installment is centered around Charlotte, a widow, who is a wedding planner living in Martha’s Vineyard. It’s the off season for weddings, but Thanksgiving is just around the corner, so maybe Charlotte can get some rest and enjoy the holiday- if only she could get a handle on her grief over the sudden loss of her husband of twenty years.

Things go from super quiet to crazy busy overnight when an Oscar winning actress calls Charlotte out of the blue begging her to plan a Thanksgiving wedding for her. With only three weeks to plan, and a self-absorbed actress turned Bridezilla to deal with, Charlotte hardly has time breath, must less grieve.

Things get even more interesting when a handsome photographer named Everett arrives to cover the celebrity wedding of the year. A small spark blooms between Everett and Charlotte- but Everett likes to roam around and travel, while Charlotte has never even left the island without her husband. Will they act on the chemistry they feel between them or go back to living their lives as before?

Poor Thanksgiving. It is completely overlooked these days, but I love Thanksgiving! It is one of my favorite holidays- but try finding Thanksgiving movies or books and it’s like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

This year, though, I was determined to find at least one book centered around Thanksgiving- and thankfully, my Overdrive library came through for me, as it often does. Not only did I find more books than I anticipated, but I also found a new author to love.

This book is a little busy at times, especially considering the brevity of it. There are lots of characters, and this is sometimes a pet peeve for me- but I managed to learn all the names, plus get a little feel for their back stories, and their relation to Charlotte.

The point of the story isn’t so much the insane wedding planning- or the OTT bride and groom- but the opportunity for Charlotte to feel a glimmer of hope, giving her a green light to begin moving on with her life.

Everett has some family issues he needed to resolve, but also knew that Charlotte could be a game changer for him, too.

The story is short, as I mentioned, so the characters and the storyline don’t get as much time to develop as I would like- but I went looking for a sweet, gentle holiday story, and Katie Winters delivered just that. She has a long list of books that have a holiday or seasonal theme, all of them seem to be around the same length as this one, and would be perfect books for a quick escape or a much need spirit boost. I will definitely check more of them out soon!

3.5 stars… (mehr)