4★

A fantasy Christmas magical story. Joy Faith Candellaro is a recently divorced woman. I didn't connect with her divorce as I've never been married. But I had a lot of empathy for her. Her husband cheating on her sister is bizarre and cruel as far as my family's "sister code" rule goes. So I even cheered for her when she chose to run away from all that family drama and having to face the Christmas holidays alone. The first ticket she can grab is on a little plane heading to a little place up north called Hope. While on the plane she thinks of what it would be like, which had me thinking of my ideal vacation spots. Then the plane crashes. And things get odd from there. She some how survives. And then walks away from the survivors and rescuers. For miles she walks. And then she finds her ideal cabin in the woods by a river. The question I kept asking was was that all real. And I was just a little surprised with the twist at the end.

This was a slow reading start for me because I didn't connect to well with Joy. After the strange and dramatic plane crash, the story picked up. I loved the ending. And the character development was good. There was even a few tear jerker moments because of how much I felt empathy for them. Daniel grew on me. I didn't like him at first because of how cold and distant he behaved to Bobby and Joy. I liked the Christmas miracles touch to the story. And I really liked the idea of having a fresh start to life. A new beginning