Meet Me at the Cupcake Café

Attention, I've found the best read of the holiday season. It's got cake recipes, a cute little romance, and it's set in London. What more could you want?

Summary

The story is not at all complicated. Issy is a young woman in her thirties who has a fairly ordinary office job. She doesn't particularly like her job, but she really likes her boss, who is so handsome that he could be a model for a razor ad. And miraculously, he seems to like her a lot too...

Actually, "a lot" is a big word. He likes that she cooks for him, because she cooks wonderfully, and thinks she's nice, but he still doesn't want to show off with her, even after eight months of dating. And when he has to fire a quarter of the staff on a good day, he doesn't want to play favorites, so he fires Issy. Without warning her.

At first she is absolutely furious that he dared to treat her like that, but then she has an idea: why wouldn't she open a small café? Her talent as a pastry chef is unquestionable, everyone who tastes one of her cupcakes confirms it. And then, you have to follow your dreams.

This is the birth of the Cupcake Café and the beginning of a great adventure in which she will be helped by a kind (and sexy) banker and all sorts of other wonderful people she would never have met otherwise. The only catch: her ex, who, like a shark, is lurking around looking for an opportunity...

Impressions

At nearly 500 pages, it's not a small book, but I took every bit of time available to finally finish it in one day. It was great. It's not the most stunning story, but it's very well written. The characters are realistic: they have a good sense of humor, Issy is very endearing, her ex is really hateful and the sexy banker is really adorable. Her café really takes shape, and we want to eat there. And most of all, the recipes and baked goods inside... They are so appetizing that you want to eat them right away, but at the same time you don't want to let go of the book to go make some. This dilemma is delicious.

Comforting, appetizing, entertaining: I can't imagine a more appropriate read for the holiday season. Well okay, ideally it would have been at Christmas. You can't have everything. But almost.