My Rating for The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice
Genre: Romance ; Length 368 pages
The Bakeshop at Pumpkin by Spice by Donna Kauffman, Kate Angell, and Allyson Charles was like a Hallmark movie in book form. This book – the second book in the Moonbright, Maine trilogy – gets 3 stars for its cheesy but good entertainment.
The Bakeshop at Pumpkin by Spice was on my Fall Book List for 2023. I basically picked this book for the title, and later found out it was part of a trilogy. However, you don’t need to read them in order. This compliation was made up of 3 novellas with totally different characters and a shared setting.
If you prefer to read them in order, here’s how it goes:
- Book 1: The Cottage on Pumpkin and Vine
- Book 2: The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice
- Book 3: The Cafe between Pumpkin and Pie
Literary Baking Adventures
Lucky for me, this The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice is a romance novel centered around a bakery. Food imagery is a big part of this novel, so foodie friends will enjoy it. The authors actually supply us with a baked good recipe based on each novella! I love it. Can all authors start doing this?
They provide recipes for Italian Lemon Cookies, Annie Cookies, and Pumpkin Sugar Cookies with pumpkin buttercream. I’m up for a challenge though, so I’m still going to create my own recipe inspired by the first novella – Pear & Anise Muffins.
Synopsis
Moonbright, Maine is a picturesque autumnal town, with a sprinkle of magic. This small town lights up for Halloween as all the residents dress up for the annual Halloween parade, enjoy warm pumpkin lattes, and enchanting tricks and treats.
“Sweet Magic”, the first novella, gives us some backstory on this unbelievably cute, magical town. It all starts at the bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice – Bellaluna’s Bakeshop. The owners, Sofia and Abriana, are not only skillful bakers, they also come from a long line of witches. HOWEVER, this is a romance novel, so the only magic they can do is love spells. Abriana gains her powers by putting a love spell on the hottie visiting chef, Caleb. You know what happens next.
The second novella, “Love Spells Disaster”, builds on the first. Cassandra is in love with her boss, Sam, and needs something special to get him to notice her. One trip to Bellaluna’s bakeshop, and Sofia has just the thing. But, when handyman Chip eats the enchanted cookie intended for Sam, a love spell disaster ensues. Cassandra must figure out who is really the right man for her.
Everything leads up to the final novella, “Sweet on You”, where we get to see the event that Moonbright, Maine can’t stop talking about – the Halloween parade!
Lara’s boyfriend abruptly breaks up with her, and to make matters worse, she’s on the brink of losing her job. Saving her day, Mayor Jack offers her the most important job in Moonbright – planning the annual Halloween parade. Working together brings Lara and Jack closer (in more ways than one) and they manage to pull off a delightful event for the whole town.
My take on The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice
Spoiler Alert!!!
I will be the first to say that the synopsis for this book sounds super cheesy. I know.
But, it was actually pretty well-written and well-timed. I liked that The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice featured three novellas that loosely built upon each other. Each was about 100-120 pages featuring different characters, but following an overall story arc.
Maybe it worked well because there’s only so long I can stand to read a Hallmark-type book and the authors hit the exact right page-length. Each romance was neatly formed, reached a climax, and a resolution all within about 100 pages.
The imagery was great! I loved all the descriptions of cinnamon spiced cookies, Italian cream icing, the leaves, pumpkins, and all the fall things. The pear & anise muffin scene was particularly sensual. This is well-packaged romance for fall-fanatics.
Critique of The Bakeshop at Pumpkin and Spice
So much critique.
Sweet on You
While the first two novellas were well-written, romantic, and entertaining, the last one, “Sweet on You” was boring. I found myself skipping pages to get to the juicy stuff. At that point, I just wanted to get to the end to see what the Halloween parade was like.
The Boss/Employee Trope
Do some people like this trope? It showed up in 2 out of 3 novellas in this book. That was a bit much for me and came off as uncreative.
It was especially annoying in “Love Spells Disaster” when Cassandra insists she is in love with her boss even though Chip is clearly so much better. It’s like the author was just bent on making the boss-employee trope work. Also, in “Sweet on You”, the Mayor, Jack, didn’t have much character development, yet Lara falls hard for him – for seemingly no reason.
The Book Cover
Ok, I know this isn’t relevant to the content of the book….but the COVER was TERRIBLE. I’m talking about the orange cover in the featured image of this blog post (not the purple version). The orange cover features a bakeshop display case in the background. In front of it is a table presenting baked goods with a pumpkin in the middle. It’s clear that these images don’t fit together. It looks like 4-5 stock photos amateurly stitched together in Microsoft Paint.
Conclusion
You will not find substance with this book. Still, I gave it 3 stars because it I liked it for was it was – simple, entertaining, fall-themed romantic fiction.
I could see the good in this book, like the food and fall imagery. I think it’s just a right-place-right-time book. If you need a cute fall book that doesn’t make you think very hard, this is it.
