This one was just kind of boring. I get that they had sexual attraction but the characters just had no actual romance or spark.

Fake dating for the holidays.
a fun book for anyone who loves small town and hallmark vibes.
i loved this and i cannot wait to read the rest of this series!!!

thank you to netgalley for the advanced reading copy. I really enjoyed this and will be getting copies for my shop.

I really enjoyed this book. I loved the friendship between Luka and Stella and the fact that everyone else was hoping one day they’d realize it was more than friendship. It felt like it gave their story a really strong foundation that developed really naturally after the catalyst of Stella lying on her application. I really liked the other characters as well and felt like they were well developed and made me want to know more, so I am looking forward to reading the other books in the series. The end of the book did feel a bit slow to me, like things started to drag out a bit compared to the pace of the initial 3/4 of the book, but it was still an enjoyable read.

I remember reading this story when it was independently published, and its just as good the second time around! Borison has made such a cute story in such a fun world! I'm looking forward to the rest of these books being released soon!

This was super cute! The thing I liked most was the atmosphere. I had no clue this was a Christmassy read. I enjoyed the Christmas tree farm aspect. Such a romantic setting for a relationship to blossom.

I loved the friends-to-lovers and fake dating tropes. Stella and Luka have been friends for a long time. Stella enters her Christmas tree business into a competition. She thought it would be romantic to say she owns the farm with her boyfriend. The issue is, she has no boyfriend. Her best friend Luka agrees to pretend to be her boyfriend for the competition. Things go up from there and they realize it's not as fake as they once thought.

I loved Stella and Luka. The MMC, Luka, was a dream!! He's so respectful, protective, and accommodating. Overall, he's a complete cinnamon roll! I didn't enjoy the third act miscommunication, thought it was really dumb, but it was resolved really quick.

Thank you so much for providing me with this arc, all opinions are my own.

Yes, I am one of those people who watches the Hallmark “Christmas in July” marathon. Although…since the book contains sexual situations, maybe a better comparison is Lifetime’s Christmas movies. For readers like me, Borison is completely valid in releasing her loosely Christmas themed Lovelight trilogy over the course of this summer, one a month starting in June 2023. Lovelight Farms is a Christmas tree farm in rural Maryland, a few-hours drive from Manhattan. Main character Stella Bloom purchased it out of sentimentality. Some of her best childhood memories were made there when she and her single mother would visit because it was free. Stella now has plans to update and expand it to make wonderful memories for a new generation of children…except since purchasing it, she’s having a lot of unexplained problems. Costly problems.

After Stella’s mother passed away, she literally ran into Luka Peters, coming out of a hardware store while he was home visiting his family in Stella’s little town. Luka is a first-generation Italian-American with a flock of fast-talking Italian aunts joined at the hip with his mother and grandmother, forever trying to feed the world and make his life difficult. After their cute-meet, Luka makes Stella a grilled cheese sandwich to cheer her up and they become best friends forever. Over the next ten years they become inseparable in the way that only the very best friends can be, thick with inside jokes, shared memories, and an intimacy that can speak volumes just with a look.

Stella enlists Luka to be her fake boyfriend to win a contest. She needs the prize money. It’s a role he falls willingly and whole-heartedly into since he’s been in love with Stella for most of those ten years. The book, told solely from Stella’s POV, is like their relationship, a slow burn. Honestly, the gradually building anticipation of their new coupledom completely overshadows the actual storyline. Like a good Hallmark movie, none of the mild conflict actually feels stressful. In fact, when it is finally resolved, it’s almost anticlimactic. All we really care about is if Stella can overcome her fears to embrace what has always been right in front of her.

My one criticism is that I would have loved this story in a he said/she said format, alternating POV’s. Borison did give us a bonus chapter where she goes back to a significant plot point and gives us that one chapter from Luka’s POV. We also get to know Stella’s staff, Beckett and Layla, who will be featured in the next two books. Borison has plenty of characters and settings to play with. I will enjoy each one as they come!

My Rating: B+ Liked It A Lot

lazy writing.

The majority of the book is just fillers. Also the "friends to lovers" trope is not well written. Honestly, this just wasn't good. I hope the writing improves as the series continues.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

𝙏𝙬𝙤 𝙗𝙚𝙨𝙩 𝙛𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙣𝙙𝙨 𝙛𝙖𝙠𝙚 𝙙𝙖𝙩𝙚 𝙩𝙤 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙘𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙚𝙞𝙧 𝙝𝙤𝙡𝙞𝙙𝙖𝙮 𝙝𝙖𝙥𝙥𝙞𝙡𝙮 𝙚𝙫𝙚𝙧 𝙖𝙛𝙩𝙚𝙧 𝙞𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙨 𝙛𝙞𝙧𝙨𝙩 𝙧𝙤𝙢𝙖𝙣𝙩𝙞𝙘 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚𝙙𝙮 𝙞𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙇𝙤𝙫𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙜𝙝𝙩 𝙨𝙚𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙨.

This is the first book in this series and I can’t wait to read the next ones. I was going to save this book for the Christmas season, but I decided to read it early - because it’s never too early for Christmas.

This one has a friends-to-lovers and fake dating trope, which I absolutely loved. There’s also a small-town setting, which I always end up enjoying. I just love the feeling it gives, especially with the Christmas vibes.

Stella Bloom has purchased a Christmas tree farm she named `Lovelight Farms’. However, when the farm isn’t going the way she wants it to, she ends up entering a contest run by a famous influencer - $100,000 prize!!

The only issue is she mentioned she owns the farm with her boyfriend because it sounds more romantic. Therefore, she ends up fake dating her best friend, Luka.

I honestly loved both characters and the small-town setting. It brought back so many memories with the farm and I honestly can’t wait for Christmas now.

This is one of those feel-good romances, but don’t let the cover fool you. This does have some steamy scenes.

I honestly want to reread this book during the holidays. It just brought so much joy and excitement. I adored the found family and friends aspect in the book, and I’m so glad this wasn’t one of those cheesy holiday romances.

This was such a delightful read - perfect for the Christmas season! I can’t wait to dive into the next books!

•𝗧𝗪/𝗖𝗪: Sexual Content, Death Of Parent, Grief, and Abandonment

In order to save her Christmas tree farm, Stella enters a contest hoping for publicity and $100,000 prize. To make the farm seem like a romantic holiday destination, she lies and says she owns the farm with her boyfriend. However, there is no boyfriend, so Stella asks her best friend Luka to be her (fake) boyfriend.

This had all the things I love: a small town, a fake relationship, Christmas, and sequels. This was so cute! My main complaint was that it wasn’t dual POV (but the other books are!). I loved the setting, I loved the side characters, I loved the romance. Five stars!

This review was originally posted on Books of My Heart


Review copy was received from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Lovelight Farms came along just in time for a July holiday readathon. It also has my favorite fake dating trope. But it's also a friends to lovers story. Stella and Luka have been best friends for a decade. They met when Luka's mother moves to the small town and Stella's mother has just died. Luka is often in town but lives in New York City. But they text, facetime, call, Skype and visit each other.

So other than the lack of sex, they ARE dating. Stella purchased a Christmas tree farm and things haven't gone well. There have been a number of incidents which she chalked up to bad luck and teen vandalism. She's worried about whether her beloved business will make it. Her two full-time employees are a farmer, Beckett and a baker, Layla. Stella is loathe to ask anyone for help but she enters the contest of a social media influencer where the prize is publicity and big bucks. She says on the application that she runs the farm with her boyfriend.

Luka immediately agrees to be her "fake" boyfriend, but really it's mostly not so different and what everyone else knows they both have wanted for years. Here's where I have a disconnect because 10 years is a LONG time. I'd think they would have addressed it by at least 5 years. Because it couldn't have been pleasant to watch the other date someone else.

So we have the setup of the relationship changes, the mystery saboteur, the contest and a lovely small town with lots of great characters and the business aspects of the Christmas tree farm. That's plenty of story and layers to make an interesting read. A sweet and sexy read which had wonderful holiday moments and small town kindnesses.

3 1/2 stars!
The Lovelight series focuses on three friends who've committed to creating an agro-tourism business together in idyllic Inglewood. Owner Stella is the visionary, Layla runs the cafe, and Beckett is the farmer. In the first book, Stella is trying to boost the business's signal and save her Christmas tree farm and enters a contest from a Instagram influencer who focuses on small businesses--winning guarantees her success. Everything has to be perfect for Evelyn St. James's visit, and sex sells, so Stella accidentally lists her best friend and crush Luka as her business partner and lover, and then has to fake-date her way through Evelyn's visit. To complicate matters, someone seems to be sabotaging them at every turn.

In book two, Beckett reveals that he and Evelyn had a fling at a conference, and she is the one who slipped out in the morning and ghosted him. He is shocked to discover that his unforgettable two-night stand is Internet famous. Beckett, who is a quiet, sensitive cinnamon roll type, suffers from a sensory disorder, and Evelyn is starting to yearn for a simpler life; are they more compatible than it seems?

In book three, unlucky in love Layla slowly let's her guard down with regular customer Caleb, who offers her a month of no-strings dating to help her get her groove back. Only thing is, it's not just her baked goods he is in love with. Layla is in the midst of entering a baking competition, and that adds to the level of stress.

These are solidly written, quick reads full of delicious little details of food, decor, and nature. Each has miscommunication, competition, a third act breakup and grand gesture resolution. The sex is sweet and hot and descriptive. I accidentally read them in the wrong order (2, then 3, then 1), which made it all the more compelling to figure out what was going on. The marketing feels a little discordant: the lovely cover art is all by the same artist and in a fall harvest palette of pumpkin and gold and sage and peach and orange; I'm not sure why these holiday-themed stories are getting released over the summer, but if you're a Hallmark movie or Christmas in July person, these will be very satisfying reads.

I received free advance reader's review copies of #LovelightFarms, #InTheWeeds, and #MixedSignals from #NetGalley.

okay, i super enjoyed this book!! it was such a fun time and i really hope that you pick it up when it comes out! and as always, thank you so much to netgalley for letting me read this book early! what a delight!!!!

I’m a sucker for Hallmark holiday movies, and this gave me all the vibes with a dose of spice.  It was lighthearted, sweet, and frustrating.  Why,  frustrating?   The slow burn between these two best friends despite the obvious love and attraction they have for each other.

Deep down this friends-to-lovers romance had an intriguing plot.  Stella is struggling to keep her tree farm open and applies for a contest run by a social media influencer.  The problem is, she lied on her application and said she runs the farm with her boyfriend.  It includes a lot of the day-to-day operations, and issues, at the tree farm.

Luka was perfect!  He was caring, sweet, and supportive.  Even though the book is written in Stella’s POV (with one chapter at the end in Luka’s POV), it was easy to see his true feelings for her, hence the frustration with the slow burn and Stella’s self-doubt and sabotage.

This is a great book to curl up with when you want to feel the holiday vibes. The pacing was a bit slow and I wish things moved along faster, but I loved the cuteness of the tree farm and the entire small town.

This can be read as a standalone, but it sets up the groundwork for the next book in the series.  I’m already enamored and crushing on Beckett and can’t wait to jump into his book.

This book is EVERYTHING that Friends-to-Lovers should be! The secret attraction, the sweet moments, the slowly simmering sexual tension. Their romance was had me swooning and was respectfully, everything!!

Fake dating, bestfriends to lovers AND the holidays all wrapped into one? Honestly, it was a lot of fun even if nothing new.

4.5⭐️
1.5🌶

Lovelight Farms is the sweetest friends-to-lovers holiday romance that'll have your smile lighting up like lights on a tree.

Stella and Luka are absolutely swoon-worthy. They are both so kind-hearted and gentle, and their little quirks compliment one another wonderfully. Throughout the story, their mutual pining, stolen moments, and only-for-you smiles gave me butterflies. Wishing I had my own hazelnut latte in hand, I smiled and laughed out loud at their silliness alongside their friends, feeling like a welcomed visitor at their quaint little farm.

Lovelight Farms is an excellent story for when you want a heartwarming story and a soft place to land. The plot is simple with a teeny splash of mystery, and most of the tension is saved for the emotions between the main characters. And while the characters have their soft moments, their own difficulties to process and overcome, it's a fun, gentle story for the holiday season, and totally worth the hype it receives.

Read if you like: grilled cheese sandwiches, small towns, hazelnut lattes, the comfort of a best friend, kittens, and poofball hats.

**Thank you to Berkley, BK Borison, and NetGalley for a copy of Lovelight Farms in exchange for my honest review!**

Stella Bloom owns Lovelight Farms. Her farm is in trouble so she enters a contest for cash to revitalize the farm. She talks her friend Luka Peters into posing as her boyfriend for the duration of the contest ... with romantic results!

I enjoyed the farm setting of this book, the holiday setting as well, and the sweet love story of Stella and Luka. I recommend this book for fans of contemporary romance, especially with a small town setting.

DNF. I really liked the premise but the writing did not work for me at all. It wouldn't be fair to the book if I finished reading and gave it a low rating.

I don't tend to enjoy friends to lovers. And fake dating is fine. So imagine my surprise when I gobbled this up like a Thanksgiving turkey?

I remain unsure about the Italianisms. That certainly isn't the Italian spelling of Luka. But nearly everything else was quite a delight, and I'll eagerly finish the rest of the series.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher.