Oh dear. I’m so sorry to report that I didn’t like this book. The characters are extremely unlikable and I simply couldn’t root for any of them. I found the dialogue to be unrealistic and everyone is just so full of angst and despair that I couldn’t connect with it. Some portions were also tricky to follow and I realized later that perhaps reading the first book in the series would have been helpful.

I very much appreciate the ARC and wish everyone who worked on this book good luck with its release! I think it will find its fans, especially in readers who are already familiar with the story through the first book.

2.5 ⭐️ - 3 ⭐️

I don’t believe I’ve quite read a couple that felt less suited for one another. The entire book it felt like the relationship was one sided with Hannah saying that she didn’t want to let Levi go while simultaneously doing everything in her power to make things go wrong. Also, she was just plain mean at some points. I certainly did not hold any lover for her, nor did I for Levi honestly. Both characters just felt selfish.

The romance itself felt rather dull in that there was a lot of pushing together only for someone (Hannah) to argue an issue as to why they couldn’t be together. Towards the end, it didn’t feel as though that was a good compromise or plan on how they were going to work on their relationship.

I wanted to like this book. The cover is cute and the plot itself seemed interesting. Unfortunately, that wasn’t really the case.

I really enjoyed Helena Greer’s last book, Season of Love, a romance centering on Hannah Rosenstein’s cousin, Miriam. It was so much fun to revisit Carrigan’s and all of its crew in For Never and Always.

Levi and Hannah’s relationship provides a lot of good lessons about marriage. They love each other, but life has pulled them apart. They are granted a second chance in this book, and Hannah is a little hesistant about the idea of remaining married to Levi. As the story continues, they realize that the key to successful marriage is choosing to priortize one another, and they find ways to compromise so they can be together and each get what they want. That realization absolutely matches with my own life experience, and I found it very moving.

For Never and Always mentions so many different Jewish holidays, which made me so happy. Hannah and the team and Carrigan’s host a big Passover seder. There is even a brief mention of Tu B’Shevat, the Jewish holiday that celebrates trees. The representation made me really happy. The world could certainly use some Jewish joy right now, and For Never and Always provides exactly that.

Levi discusses with Hannah that he identifies as demisexual, meaning that he can only experience sexual attraction to someone after forming a deep emotional bond with them. He cannot see himself feeling attracted to anyone but Hannah. There is so little representation of the asexual spectrum in books in general, especially in romance. I am so glad that Greer told Levi’s story, and I can only imagine how much it will mean to people.

There is also a nonbinary rabbi, Ruth, who Levi and Hannah ask for advice. I was thrilled to read this representation as well. It is so important to have nonbinary characters in all kinds of roles and stories. I also absolutely love portrayals of rabbis that disrupt the idea that they have to be old men with big beards like in Fiddler on the Roof. My only complaint is that I wanted more of Rabbi Ruth in this story.

Greer’s books have brought me so much joy, and I am already looking forward to the next one. I would also love to see Season of Love or For Never and Always made into a Hallmark movie.

"He smirked. “I can see your evil wheels turning. I love your evil wheels.”
_
Love our favorite Christmas tree farm. This book is set during Passover and it's the second in the series centered around Blue and Hannah's relationship. OMG I love a childhood love/lifelong friends/soulmates story but they are on a rough patch after time apart. But absence makes the heart grow fonder and trying to go out and make something of themselves and such.
Love this series and this group of friends, family, ok found family. So much growth and self discovery. Both want different lives but still love each other and just don't know how it will work.
Love the sound of how Levi looks. He's so mysterious with his black eyeliner, leggings and scarves.

Thank you readforeverpub for the e-ARC for my honest and voluntary review.

I wanted to like For Never and Always a lot more than I did. I really think you need to read Greer's previous book Season of Love prior because this really felt like a sequel and not two stand-alone books in the same universe.

The Jewish and queer representation was strong but unfortunately, I didn't really like any of the characters. I found them insufferable and too focused on their past with too much therapy speak. I saw a review that described this as a vibes book and honestly that's the best way to describe it.

I did like Greer's writing and I will read other books from her but I think if I had read Seasons of Love first I would have liked this more.

“You’re my favorite person I’ve ever met in my whole life, and the best thing that’s ever happened to me.”

After really enjoying Season of Love, I was excited to go back to Carrigan’s and get into Hannah and Levi’s story.

When Levi “Blue” returns to Carrigan’s after being away, Hannah’s world is upended. He’d broken her heart by leaving when she couldn’t. But he’s back after Cass left him part ownership of Carrigan’s. He wants to make amends but a lot of his relationships are broken and Hannah is still furious at him, Levi agrees to stay and help during a high-profile wedding and Hannah can’t help but notice they still carry deep feelings for each other.

Hannah and Levi’s story is just beautiful. They’ve never moved on from each other in all the time they’ve been apart, and you can feel their chemistry and love for each other through the pages. They have these intense, vulnerable conversations to determine if and how they can salvage their relationship. It takes them time, but their love for each other runs so deep that they desperately what to figure it out. There’s a lot of baggage they carry from their childhoods and early adulthoods, and it’s great to get that backstory. The addition of past moments really helped in understanding their relationship.

They both carry trauma from childhood, though very opposite. Hannah wanted to plant roots and Levi wanted to travel and explore the world. But I think that time apart really served to let each of them settle into their lives and figure out what they want. And when they finally discuss their issues, really great.

“We all grow anxieties of the soil in which we were planted.”

I loved seeing more of Noelle and Miriam, and those friendships feel so genuine. My only complaint is that the book feels a bit too long. There were some things I could have done without and would have preferred to continue focusing on Hannah and Levi. I think this could have benefited from some trimming and focus. The characters are well-developed so they’re interesting to read about, but there are some moments I could have done without,

*I received a free ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review*

3.5/5 stars rounded up

I really enjoyed "For Never & Always". There were some really great elements that kept me engaged and invested as a reader. First and foremost, the character development from the beginning to the end was great. We really saw Levi and Hannah grow and change. This was aided by the flashbacks, which contrasted a lot of the development we saw with where they started from. The Jewish and Queer representation was also excellent, as can be expected from this author.

Read this book if you want:
- grumpy x sunshine
- second chance romance/marriage in crisis
- mental health rep
- complex characters who behave like real people

At times, I did find the melodrama a bit exhausting, especially since these characters are in their mid to late thirties. I would also highly recommend to anyone picking up this book that they read "Season of Love" first, I think someone jumping straight into this book might find some context lacking and may end up confused. But hey, "Season of Love" was one of my favourite books last year, so I'm happy to recommend it to anyone interested in reading "For Never & Always"!

2.5 stars
I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley and am voluntarily posting a review. All opinions are my own.
I really liked Helena Greer’s debut last year, focusing on a Christmas tree farm run by Jewish people, and a romance blooming amid tensions over transfer of ownership. But unfortunately, the follow-up, For Never & Always, failed to capture that same magic, being rather dull by comparison.
I do like that the book continues to highlight the complex relationships among the people who live and work at Carrigan’s, from friendships to romance to the more complicated relationships, And to see Carrigan’s transform into an establishment for various holidays throughout the year is a wonderful way to subvert expectations, and highlight not just some other Jewish traditions, but also explore how Carrigan’s might help in celebrating secular holidays, like the Fourth of July.
And I do like the friendships between the core cast, Noelle and Miriam from the last book, and their respective relationships with both Hannah and Levi.
But I didn’t care much for either Hannah or Levi as characters, and I found their romance rather underwhelming too. They had no chemistry, so it was so weird seeing them interact with what was meant to elicit tension or make these romantic declarations.
This book also suffered from a similar issue to a book like People We Meet on Vacation in its excessive use of flashbacks, and apart from the subheading telling you it is a flashback, there’s not much material difference in the text giving you cues that it is one. Their behavior in the present still feels very juvenile, and doesn’t feel like they’ve grown and learned, something I like to see in a second chance romance, so it made it hard to root for them.
While this book was a miss for me, I am excited to see what’s next for this cast of characters, based on the teaser at the end! And I’d still recommend checking out other reviews for other opinions, and possibly giving it a chance if you’re looking to read more Jewish holiday-centric romance, and you’re open to a second chance romance that heavily utilizes flashbacks.

This book was very frustrating for me because I was fighting to finish it. I wanted a cute holiday romance, but instead I got way too many commas and characters I didn't fully connect with or care about. The pacing on this book was off from the beginning for me and I think that messed with my head while reading it.

For Never & Always took me a little while to get into the story, but I enjoyed it when everything was said and done. Unlike other stories where it's easy to read any story in the series out of order, I think I missed some things within this series by not reading Season of Love first. I enjoyed the LGBTQIA+ representation in the story and the fact it's a Jewish family who owns a Christmas tree farm and business.

Thank you to Forever and Netgalley for a copy in exchange for review consideration.

This writer's style just isn't for me, unfortunately. It feels like it explains things overly and doesn't create the sense of urgency or passion I need when I read a romance. Still, I can appreciate that there is an audience for this style of writing. It also irks me as someone from the Adirondacks that a lot of the place-specific details are wrong, which is, again, a very personal thing.

3.5 stars

This was a good second chance romance between two childhood best friends. I liked the relationship between Hannah and Levi and how we got to see it develop from friends to lovers to exes to lovers again between two time periods. They definitely were meant to be and are each others people and just got each other. But I felt like there was just too much of a lack of communication between the two that ended up being repetitive and made me yell at them to just talk already. I feel like they had too many issues to due this that made it unbelievable that they would work out. Although once they did actually talk in the end then I could see their relationship working out and them having their happily ever after together.

Overall, this was a good romance and recommend that you give it a try!

Read if you like…
•second chance
•small town
•queer romance

It’s back to the tree farm and drama galore!
Whew, Hannah’s anger emanates from the pages repeatedly. I wondered if she had ever been happy in her life.
A bombshell is dropped a few chapters in, that apparently, wasn’t that big of a secret anyway.
I felt for Levi because he kept delivering everything Hannah demanded of him and yet it still, wasn’t enough.
One of the lessons I took from the book is if there is something or someone you really want, go after it, give it your all, until all possibilities are exhausted.
Sometimes the person you’re with is just the right fit.

This was okay. It just felt like a book that should of taken place with people in their mid 20's, not a 35 and 36 year old. I enjoyed their romance but I just feel like the development wasn't really there. I liked all of the Noelle and Mariam that we got though.

I received an arc through netgalley.

DNF at 15%...

Part of this is my bad, in no way should I be picking up contemporary second chance romances but I was ready to give this one a try particularly because it's queer but woooo boy could I not handle their personalities in that first little bit.

The FMC invites the MMC to the Christmas Farm in order to get him to sell his portion to her. And then the first time she sees him essentially refuses to talk to him and says "I'm not sure why you're here" and wants him to leave without talking to him... and then in the next chapter they're having sex?? It just unfortunately felt incredibly immature and I just can't continue with it.

Apologies to the Publisher. All thoughts and opinions are my own and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I was drawn in by the adorable rom com cover, but this isn't a rom com. It's is a perfectly fine contemporary romance, but it's not for me. I like fun, upbeat books, and this one is kind of sad and depressing. DNF.

Thanks, NetGalley, for the ARC I received. This is my honest and voluntary review.

Thank you NetGalley and Forever Publishing for this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

As much as I wanted to get into the book, I couldn’t. I think there could have been more to the characters as I wasn’t drawn and invested into them. Maybe it’s me and I’m not the reader for this specific book.

This Jewish second chance romance hits in all the Holiday feels.

I had not read the first book in this standalone series, but that didn't make me love this book less. I loved Hannah. I loved Levi. I loved that even when they didn't agree with things they would have communicated. I loved how this whole story played out and I don't know how to express my love for this book.

I think I love their individual growth in this book. I'm gonna continue to cry and not talk in circles. Read this book, bye.

Thank you NetGalley for the e-arc version of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

For Never & Always (pub. date November 28, 2023) by Helena Greer was luckily in my NetGalley queue and immediately available for me to read after I read Greer's first romcom Season of Love (review coming in late December). The cover is gorgeous--a curvy, plus-sized woman looks from afar at a handsome, dark-haired man, so one might think it's a traditional hetero romance, with the slight twist of having a fat female love interest. It's so much more than that!! I'm hopeful the cover might draw some unsuspecting straight people into reading a romance that isn't . . straight.

Set at the fictional Christmas tree farm and hotel/resort called Carrigan's, run by a Jewish family, Hannah is a niece of the woman who started the farm (Cass) and died before the first book begins. Hannah is the general manager, helped by the handyman and cook Mr. and Mrs. Mathews, Noelle the tree farm manager, and Hannah's cousin Miriam, artist and creative director. Hannah and Miriam spent a lot of time at Carrigan's growing up, and were the same age as the Mathews' son Levi, who they nicknamed Blue.

As the book begins, we know that Hannah and Blue were together at some point, but it blew up spectacularly, and Blue left to pursue a career as a chef all around the world. Hannah stayed at Carrigan's to hold the place together during her Aunt Cass's final illness and death. But Blue has come back, and the two can't be in the same room together without screaming at each other, unless they find themselves in a hidden corner of the hotel and keep their mouths otherwise occupied.

Not just a comedy, Greer does a spectacular job of dealing with difficult subjects, such as anxiety that manifests similar to agoraphobia, past bullying due to homophobia, coming out when one's sexuality doesn't fit into a "gay or straight" box (Blue is demisexual), and dealing with complicated grief.

As Blue comes back home, now a celebrity chef from an Australian cooking show, how can he and Hannah work things out when he can't stay at Carrigan's, and she can't leave? Helped by their quirky family and friends, it's a sweet second chance romance. I loved it, and can't wait for Greer's third book with some of the same characters!

For Never or Always is fat positive in the best way--there are fat characters, like Hannah and Noelle, living their complicated lives without much thought of being fat. They are sexy, desired, uber-competent, vulnerable, and flawed in ways that have nothing to do with their body sizes. It's awesome to read a book with fat characters without a plot revolving around their or other people's conflicts about fatness. Kudos to Greer for writing this and her editor/ publishers for publishing it!

Such a cute story 😭 I will definitely be reading more from this author as soon as I can 🤭

Thank you so much for the Opportunity to read this early