Bubbling up with Helena

• Title: Four Weddings and a Puppy
• Author: Lizzie Shane
• Publisher: Forever
• Release Date: 11/21/23
• Genre: Fiction
• Age Range: Adult
• Rating: ★★★★
• Publisher’s Summary: When two childhood friends return home after their sports careers don’t go as planned, a puppy just may give them a second chance at happiness together. She’s always been the girl with the plan . . . until the plan crashed big time Kendall Walsh has exactly one second to save a fancy, five-tiered wedding cake and any possibility of being a wedding planner—not to mention her family’s struggling ski resort. All because of one very cute, very furry, golden menace of a retriever who has a serious thing for butter chiffon icing. Which is exactly when Olympic skier Brody James shows up and saves the day . . . and the cake. Brody makes Kendall feel about a million indecipherable things. He’s her brother’s bestie. Her first crush. And a ridiculously popular Olympic hero, which only reminds her of her own failed Olympic dreams. What Brody isn’t telling her is that he’s walked away from it all. The fame. The sponsorships. The celebrity girlfriend. Now he and Kendall are both lost somewhere between their past and a future they can’t yet see. But four weddings, one mischievous puppy, and a few steamy kisses later, these two might just realize that they are both exactly where they need to be…with each other. 

I read the last book in the Pine Hollow series, Pride and Puppies, last November and loved it. Dogs can bring out the best in people, and the concept of a romance novel series that prominently features dogs is such a brilliant concept.

As the parent of a destructive canine, I totally related to Kendall’s panic chasing Banner, a naughty golden retriever puppy, as he ran towards a wedding cake at the beginning of the book. It set the scene for the rest of the book so well and is such an entertaining way for Kendall and Brody to be reunited.

Banner is probably my favorite character in the book. He starts as a dog Kendall is fostering, but of course, both Kendall and Brody fall head over heels for him. I love the little details that Shane includes like Banner getting fur all over Brody’s vest and that Banner loves to chew on cell phones. Every reference to him made me smile.

I love a good romance novel where the two protagonists help each other heal from past hurts, and that’s definitely the case with Kendall and Brody. Kendall helps Brody change his relationship to skiing, and Brody helps Kendall address issues in her relationships with members of her family.

Jasmine Guillory’s Wedding Date series is a favorite of mine because I love a set of interconnected romance novels. It was fun to read the cameos from George and Charlotte after reading about their love story in Pride and Puppies. It makes the reader feel part of the community in a special way.

Four Weddings and a Puppy is a fun and charming novel, but I prefered Pride and Puppies. Charlotte and George are more compelling as protagonists, and I’m a sucker for a good Jane Austen reference. I definitely want to go back and read the rest of the Pine Hollow series as well. It certainly feels like the right season to pick up The Twelve Dogs of Christmas, the first book.

I enjoyed the two books in the Pine Hollow series I’ve read so far, and I look forward to returning to the town again soon.