Oh my gosh! This was so good! I’ve spent my week binge-reading the Heartbreaker Bay Series and I’ve had the best time. I’ve read them all except for one book (Accidentally On Purpose, featuring Elle and Archer), and Chasing Christmas Eve is definitely my favorite so far.

Spence is part of the original core group of friends Jill Shalvis created in this series. In the previous books, I’ve always felt like he has had a bit of mystery about him: why he has so much money, what exactly he does for a living. His friends know a little bit about how he started an app and then sold it for a lot of money, but Spence is really very private about the rest of his life and they all respect that about him. Colbie is a famous young-adult author with a bestselling series released under a pen name. She has traveled to San Francisco temporarily because she has recently lost her inspiration for writing, and she wants a change of scenery while she is writing her next book. The two have a great meet-cute scenes: Spence is walking a dog that bumps into  Colbie when he tries to chase a cat, which makes her fall into a water fountain, soaking her and nearly freezing her. Spence feels a responsibility to make this up to her so he helps her into a short-term lease on one of the apartments in the same building where he lives. It just keeps getting better from there.

The chemistry between these two is apparent immediately. Both are extremely likable and have great banter with one another and with all of the secondary cast. They have some similarities that  make relationship-building easy, like their need/desire for privacy and trust because of their high-profile careers and this driving urge to take care of their families, albeit for different reasons. I love that these two spend the time exploring these similarities and differences, and helping one another become more independent and also more dependent on the right people/things in their lives. Their shifting of responsibilities is awesome and I think I felt my own shoulders get lighter as I read, particularly in Colbie’s case.

This secondary cast remains one of my favorites in contemporary romance, I think. They’re all so great.

A little bit of a sidenote, but I love love love their shared disdain for phones, but I also understand that they feel that they still need them to stay connected with their far-away family members. This seems like a small detail, but it made me feel connected to these two characters in a big way.

The books in this series can be read in any order because they are all standalone stories. I’ll keep shouting about my love for Jill Shalvis books from the rooftops because they’re perfect “anytime” reads. I find that I tend to reach for them when I can’t figure out what I want to read or when life gets hard or when I’m just sick of so much negative news in the world, which is how I ended up binge-reading the entire series this week. They always make me happy.

I loved Chasing Christmas Eve. I have no idea how, but this series somehow keeps getting better and better!

 

Check out my other reviews in the Heartbreaker Bay Series:

Sweet Little Lies | The Trouble with Mistletoe | One Snowy Night | Accidentally On Purpose
Chasing Christmas Eve | Holiday Wishes | About That Kiss
Hot Winter Nights | Playing For Keeps | Wrapped Up In You | Twist Of Fate