Lucy Diamond is an author I always look out for and I was super excited when I heard about Christmas At The Beach Café. Why? You might ask, well firstly CHRISTMAS and secondly, a follow up to The Beach Café! What more could you want?! (oh and a gorgeous cover too!)We re-join Evie and Ed at The Beach Café in the last few weeks leading up to Christmas. They’ve closed the café down for the winter months and are enjoying lovely romantic walks along the beach, cosy fires and cooked breakfasts. Evie has a vision of the most romantic Christmas, just her and Ed, but her vision is about to be shattered when Ed’s brother Jake turns up on the doorstep and so does Evie’s friend Amber. Maybe Evie won’t get the perfect romantic Christmas she wanted after all…It was wonderful to re-join the characters from The Beach Café, it felt like a long time since I’d last been in their world and it was lovely to be with them for Christmas. The descriptions of the snowy beach and Cornwall in the winter transported me there and I wanted to run around in the snow and take walks on the beach with Evie and Ed! However, if you’ve never read The Beach Café (where have you been!?) then you can still read this as a standalone novella and understand what is happening, which is perfect! It will probably make you desperate to go and read The Beach Café though! The talk of Christmas food also made my mouth water and it has made me so incredibly excited for Christmas day now. I was salivating at the mention of a bronzed turkey and mince pies. Mmmm yummy!Evie and Ed were just as lovely as they were in The Beach Café and I loved seeing their relationship blossom and grow even if at times it seemed as though there might be a few obstacles in their way. It was interesting to see how Jake affected their dynamic and how the addition of Amber also caused some tension but everything is solved by some Christmas love and magic! Lucy writes extremely well and I constantly feel myself smiling as I read. The descriptions are tangible, the characters are perfectly formed and the pacing of the novella is just right. I just wanted to keep on reading (I couldn’t put it down so read it in one sitting!) This is a novella which is around 100 pages long. It is the perfect bite sized story which will mean you can read it in one afternoon, snuggled in front of the fire. I hope that in the future we may have another return to The Beach Café because I would love to see where all the characters go to next. You’ll also be please to know that at the back of this novella there are some gorgeous Christmas recipes, plus an extract from Lucy’s new novel (coming in 2014) called One Summer In Italy! Completely and utterly brilliant!Lucy’s latest festive offering will fill you with joy, Christmas cheer and have you desperate for a mince pie!
I have always loved the beach cafe, when recently asked what character i would like to be, i wanted to be Evie, i wanted to run a little cafe with a close knit community, so when i spied this on the kindle store for about 50p i knew it was fate. This book takes us back to the coast just in time for the season of goodwill. Whilst this is a short book there is plenty of drama throughout. Throw in some recipes for good measure and you have the perfect winter evenings read. What i love with this book, nothing much has changed its like i could just pick off where i left off with Evie and the gang and still amongst them. The characters were brilliant and the new introductions were just as grand, some aggravating, some not so - but all individual and likeable by the end, i am so glad i read this.
Do You like book Christmas At The Beach Cafe (2013)?
I loved this. It’s the perfect snuggle-up-on-the-sofa-with-a-cup-of-tea (and a few choc biscuits) kind of read and excellent for getting you through a gloomy evening.Unfortunately I hadn’t read The Beach Café, the main novel from which this is a spin-off, but that didn’t dampen my enjoyment at all. I slipped straight into the festivities with Evie and Ed, enjoying the run up to Christmas day as their plans ran amok.Cornwall is one of my favourite places, so the fact that this is the book’s setting pleased me enormously. I would have loved to of read more about the place Evie now calls home but that is not the point of this novella. For this reason, along with many others, I will definitely be grabbing myself a copy of The Beach Café asap.Reviewed by Charlotte Foreman on behalf of BestChickLit.com
—BestChickLit.com
So I came to this story a bit blind as I didn't read The Beach Cafe before I read this. The writing good though and I was able to pick up the story easy enough which was good. All in all, this was a sweet little tale, but at the same time it could've done with being much longer as it felt like it was trying to cram in too many plot threads - the brother's return, the best friend's break up, the perfect Christmas, the calender, the recipe book - into one small novella. It was all a bit muddled. I enjoyed it though and I'd love to read more Lucy Diamond in the future so this was a great introduction to her books.3 stars.
—Tali
WoW. Really loved this. Love Evie. Love that she is a massive kid at heart and everyone loves her for it. How she loves Christmas and wants everything to be special. Makes you want to go to Cornwall, go to their Beach Cafe, experience the Cornwall magic. Totally hooked on everything from Lucy Diamond. Can't wait for more ❤️
—Michelle
