Book Review: The Holiday Whoopie by Sarah L. Hudson

This is our book review for The Holiday Whoopie by Sarah L. Hudson, the third novel in the Hideaway Harbor series but which is a standalone story.

At the time of publishing this guide, this story is available on Kindle Unlimited.

If you’ll be reading this story for a book club, you can find our free printable book club discussion guide here.

Star rating

Pepper rating (find our Pepper scale here)

Book Review:

The Holiday Whoopie by Sarah L. Hudson was a book I had high hopes for initially. I listened to it on Hoopla and loved both the narrators, Ryan Dunlap and Kasi Hollowell, in this dual narration and dual POV story.

In the small town of Hideaway Harbor, Christmas-hating, grumpy Hollywood lawyer Jack Lourd meets sunshiney (yeah I said what I said, sunshiney), pastry-chef and entrepreneurial owner of Making Whoopie bakery Audrey Nouel. The usual grumpy x sunshine hijinks ensue with the help of nosey small town neighbors, “helpful” Hollywood A-listers plus animal companions, a sphynx cat named Mike Hunt and a loveable town stray with his own communal veterinary care bankrolled by the town residents.

I had such high hopes for this book. It started so well, it was all the things you want in a holiday rom-com. I was laughing out loud from chapter 1 and I loved the whole spicy pun-filled menu at the Making Whoopie bakery. Was it predictable? Absolutely; well except for the nakey cat, he was truly a delightful surprise from start to finish. But that’s what I want from my holiday reads – cozy, predictable, funny, and sweet.

What soured me on it was the complete overuse of similes. And I’m no English professor; I mean, I still have to regularly check the spelling of words like simile. But once I noticed them they became a major ick, like stepping on a slug in the dark. It felt like every other sentence had them, like laughing emojis in a text from a Millennial. And after a while I couldn’t hear anything else, like a twig breaking behind you on a solo hike in the woods. It grated on my nerves so much, like nails on a chalkboard that it quickly moved from a 5* read to a 4* read to a 3* read and finally a 2.5* read. Because I did finish it, but the exhale I gave at the end of it was like when you get off a particularly dicey carnival ride.

So, if you want a holiday read that’s a little predictable, funny (really laugh out loud funny) , full of adorable characters and can deal with what felt like an author who really wanted to paint a scene for the reader but went a little too far with it, like a person writing the same simile joke in a review of a book online, then this is the one for you.