Book Review:: The Christmas Dog Sitters | Lucy Mitchell

Some books are hits, and some are just misses, and unfortunately, this one was the latter for me.

The Christmas Dog Sitters Lucy Mitchell Book Cover

When Rachel’s sister is going away with her new husband on a 3-week vacation, she asks her to come to their English manor to dog-sit their misbehaved dog Humphrey. Her family insists she takes her aging grandfather to care for while she’s there. She’s been struggling to cope with the death of her best friend and roommate, and her love life has been in shambles as well. This may just be the holiday season that will change everything.

I may have been in the wrong space to read this one, but it felt like a pretty bad Hallmark movie. A lot of the conflict was incredibly high drama, some of which was recycled several times, which bothered me (how many times are we supposed to be interested with the dog running away? Like, maybe two? Not four, five, six…I lost count). I was really looking forward to the romance, but that storyline might have been my least favorite of them all. I didn’t feel like there was a lot of support there to justify a lot of what happened. Ben seemed to do a 180 personality-wise, and why? Just so he could be the ‘grumpy’ half of grumpy/sunshine? That’s how it seemed to me. Her family was pretty wretched, except her grandfather. Also, the audiobook narrator didn’t help with the over-the-top drama. Some of the voices were exaggerated to the point of silliness in some cases (Fiona comes to mind).

I did like the grief plotlines. It integrated a lot of the characters together in a common feeling and tangle the relationships up a little bit. That was the part of this book that shined the brightest for me.

If you really like goofy high-drama stories, you might enjoy it. In my opinion, there are far better holiday stories to invest your time into.

I did get an advanced listening copy from netgalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest review.

Details

Title:: The Christmas Dog Sitters
Author:: Lucy Mitchell
Genre:: Holiday Romance
Publisher:: Bloodhound Books
Length:: 292 pages
Audio Length:: 9h 3m
Audiobook Narrator:: Charlie Albers
Audiobook Publisher:: Dreamscape Media
Published:: September 19th, 2024
The Litertarian Rating:: 2-Stars