Tanya Goodwin, $0.99, ISBN 978-1311904898
Contemporary Romance, 2013

Oh my, An Evergreen Wedding is a direct sequel, the second entry in what seems like Tanya Goodwin’s three-part romance series Evergreen Holiday Books. I haven’t read the first entry, but come on, how hard can catching up blind be?

So, we have two surgeons, Dr Holly Green (she’s an “uber surgeon”, whatever that means; perhaps she operates on Uber drivers for a discount) and Dr Noel Shepard, falling in love previously. From what I can gather, she was cynical about love, didn’t care about Christmas and what not because her parents died and hence the world was dark and bleak. That is, until Noel came inside her… life, yes, that’s it, and showed her the true meaning of love and all that fun stuff.

So now they are getting married on Christmas eve. Wait, who marries on Christmas eve? Do they expect the people on their guest list to just drop their own Christmas preparations to attend to their big day? The food has better be great to be worth all that trouble, if you ask me.

At any rate, the synopsis of the story suggests that Holly will turn into a Bridezilla or something, but the story itself is all about the hospital staff being so excited about the two getting married, everything being so sweet and swimming for these two, and even Holly’s dead parents express their approval by causing bells in a box to tinkle (don’t ask). They go to a bar, and the whole crowd then ask him to kiss her, because I think these people all have nothing better to entertain themselves with.

Now, I normally have no issues with this kind of thing as it’s a Christmas season read and hey, it’s still that time of the year when being sappy isn’t a crime. Unfortunately, this one clocks in at over 130 pages, and I think that’s way too much for a story where nothing happens aside from the two main characters gushing about how much they love another while everyone around them cheers them on.

I don’t know Holly and Noel, and I suspect that not having read how they fall in love means that I have fewer reasons to care, but the fact remains: nothing interesting happens in this story. It’s just the two main characters and everyone around them beating me over and over in the head about how great their romance is and how amazing that these two are getting married. The people here already clapped, so all that is missing is the fellow marrying them being called Albert Einstein.

Perhaps if the length of the story had been cut by half, or if the author had introduced an interesting conflict or plot element here, there may be more reasons for me to care about this thing. As it is, I just keep turning the pages wondering when something, anything, will happen, only to realize by the last page that I have been setting my hopes up in vain.

I find the main characters to be bland and their constant gushing about how awesome their love is gets repetitive and boring pretty quickly.  The story itself is readable, but if you ask me, it doesn’t give people many good reasons to read it.

Maybe it’s geared towards folks that have read the first story and really, really, really love the main couple that they will be thrilled to read a sequel that only reinforces how perfect the main characters’ love is. If you’re that person, hey knock yourself out. Everyone else, well, this one’s alright for its price but just be aware of you will end up getting with your purchase!