ARC Review: A Merry Little Meet Cute (A Christmas Notch #1) by Julie Murphy and Sierra Simone

Posted September 17, 2022 by Lisa Mandina in Review / 10 Comments

I received this book for free from the author in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

ARC Review:  A Merry Little Meet Cute (A Christmas Notch #1) by Julie Murphy and Sierra SimoneA Merry Little Meet Cute by Julie Murphy, Sierra Simone
Series: A Christmas Notch #1
Published by Avon on September 20, 2022
Genres: Adult Holiday Romance, Adult Rock Star Romance, Adult Romantic Comedy
Pages: 384
Source: the author
Format: ARC
My Rating: five-stars
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Blurb:

Cowritten by #1 New York Times bestselling author Julie Murphy and USA Todaybestselling author Sierra Simone—a steamy plus-size holiday rom-com about an adult film star who is semi-accidentally cast as a lead in a family-friendly Christmas movie, and the former bad-boy pop star she falls in love with.

Bee Hobbes (aka Bianca Von Honey) has a successful career as a plus-size adult film star. With a huge following and two supportive moms, Bee couldn’t ask for more. But when Bee’s favorite producer casts her to star in a Christmas movie he’s making for the squeaky-clean Hope Channel, Bee’s career is about to take a more family-friendly direction.

Forced to keep her work as Bianca under wraps, Bee quickly learns this is a task a lot easier said than done. Though it all becomes worthwhile when she discovers her co-star is none other than childhood crush Nolan Shaw, an ex-boy band member in desperate need of career rehab. Nolan’s promised his bulldog manager to keep it zipped up on set, and he will if it means he’ll be able to provide a more stable living situation for his sister and mom.

But things heat up quickly in Christmas Notch, Vermont, when Nolan recognizes his new co-star from her ClosedDoors account (oh yeah, he’s a member). Now Bee and Nolan are sneaking off for quickies on set, keeping their new relationship a secret from the Hope Channel’s execs. Things only get trickier when the reporter who torpedoed Nolan’s singing career comes snooping around—and takes an instant interest in mysterious newcomer Bee.

And if Bee and Nolan can’t keep their off-camera romance behind the scenes, then this merry little meet cute might end up on the cutting room floor.

My Review

I was so excited to listen to these authors talk about this book at Book Bonanza this summer. it only made me even more eager to get my hands on this book, which I was lucky enough to get an early copy at that event as well. I’ve been a big fan of Sierra Simone since I first read her YA book written under a different name, I believe Simone is her pseudonym. She also lives near where I do, on the Kansas side of the Kansas City metropolis. So it was a blast reading all the little Kansas City tidbits and details added to this story!

This book had me actually laughing out loud from the first time I started reading it, which was while sitting on my lunch break at work. I loved all the creative names of the places in the little town, the Dirty Snowball bar for one. Which I knew that was a comet, but don’t look up the urban dictionary definition of it. The stripper bar was fun, I mean here is a location where Hope (the Hallmark channel type of movies) films and yet they have one? The town characters were nice enough from what we got to see of them occasionally. But the supporting characters were a huge hit and added so much to the story. The authors used them in the perfect ways to keep from having to do any info dumps. So much better to get readers caught up on details we needed.

While the one of the main characters and several of the people working on the film came from the porn industry, really the only steamy bits that made the pages of the story had to do with the actual scenes between Nolan and Bee. I loved that their secrets were able to kind of stay hidden for as long as they did. And in the end the way the disastrous release of info was handled was done perfectly. Just the right amount of drama, with adults who were able to figure things out on their own (mostly) with just a little help from those who loved them.

The humor from both authors was expressed wonderfully and again, perfectly for this story. I loved it, and would love to see some future stories maybe of the other members of Nolan’s former boy band. Also, I really wish there was a pizza place in KC called Slice, Slice Baby, and that we had two former boy band members living here.

Here’s a picture of the cool special limited edition Book Beau that the authors gave away with the ARC at Book Bonanza.

And of course I had to get my picture with both authors together! So here is that picture!

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10 responses to “ARC Review: A Merry Little Meet Cute (A Christmas Notch #1) by Julie Murphy and Sierra Simone

    • Lisa Mandina

      Yeah, so strange! I forget how they said they got to know each other. Although both write romance, and actually Sierra Simone has YA books under her real name. But they are really good friends and do writing retreats together.

  1. Danielle Hammelef

    I adore Julie’s books and have had this one on my TBR since I first found out about it. I love that you got to meet the authors and the Book Beau is adorable!!! Cute photo of the three of you too–so happy for in person events 🙂

    • Lisa Mandina

      It was really cute! Sierra is the pen name of Bethany Hagen, and she wrote a couple YA books that I loved under her real name. That is how I found her in the first place.

    • Lisa Mandina

      The two main characters are bi and there are a lot of different representations in this book, I think you might like it as well!

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