Audiobook Review: Grouch-ish by L.B. Dunbar

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

Grouch-ish by L.B. Dunbar
Series: Holiday Hotties #3
Narrator: Stella Hunter
on November 19, 2024
Genres: Adult Holiday Romance
Length: 05:37
Source: Home Cooked Books Tours
Format: Audiobook
My Rating:
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Blurb:

Let’s start here. The twelve days of Christmas are actually after the holiday.

And my dad, being the great guy he is, and the battalion chief of the fire department, signs up one of his rebellious firefighters for a retreat because of his bad behavior.

The guy is a total grouch.

But when he misses the bus for the adult redemption camp, Dad sticks the guy with me for twelve days. 

Alone.

So, on the dozen days some mysterious true love—which I have yet to experience—should be bringing me gifts, like French hens and golden rings, I’m in charge of this firebird on our pear farm. Being the city man he is, he doesn’t have a clue how to can fruit, mend fences, or milk cows.

But he knows how to kiss . . .

Not that we should be doing such a thing. Only his silver beard is sexy, and his crooked smile kind of sweet. He has this alpha energy vibrating around his well-honed body but underneath the grumpy exterior is a man lonely for something more in his life, like me.

And instead of gifting each other random birds, leaping lords and piping pipers, the gift we give one another is time . . . and our bodies.

But what about our hearts?

Maybe true love will strike after all.

A lot can happen in twelve days. 

+ + +

In a new tradition from L.B. Dunbar comes another holiday hottie certain to heat up your holidays.

My Review

This book was a short and sweet holiday read, with some steamy bits though! I definitely had the hots for our firefighter bad boy. Both Pear and Brock have things in their past that make their actions and hesitations totally make sense. The two of them getting together through all the 12 days of after Christmas actually is a nice progression of stages as each little task or event brings them closer together. Both have things to work through, and for the most part they do.

There is a bit of a 3rd act breakup that made me a little irritated at first at what the lie was. Such a little thing that it seemed like they got overly upset about it. However the story redeemed that for me in how it was handled. It was definitely realistic for me, in that yeah, there was anger, but the way it was resolved, and realizing it truly wasn’t that bad of a lie, and that maybe the other person had tried to tell them at one point, all of it trickled down to a perfect make up and moving on.

I’ve only read two of this books in this loosely connected series, but have enjoyed them both. And listening to this one was great because the narrators were wonderful. They totally made it come to life.