Review: Window Shopping by Tessa Bailey

WINDOW SHOPPING
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Author: Tessa Bailey
Release Date: October 19, 2021

A sizzling, standalone, feel-good holiday romance from Tessa Bailey, New York Times bestselling author of It Happened One Summer.

Two weeks before Christmas and all through Manhattan, shop windows are decorated in red and green satin.

I’m standing alone in front of the famous Vivant department store, when a charming man named

Aiden asks my opinion of the décor.

It’s a tragedy in tinsel, I say, unable to lie.
He asks for a better idea with a twinkle in his eye.
Did I know he owned the place? No. He put me on the spot.

Now I’m working for that man, trying to ignore that he’s hot.
But as a down on her luck girl with a difficult past, I know an opportunity when I see one—and I have to make it last.

I’ll put my heart and soul into dressing his holiday windows.

I’ll work without stopping. And when we lose the battle with temptation, I’ll try and remember I’m just window shopping.

AMAZON

I’m not what one would refer to as approachable. In fact, I’m fluent in Fuck Off. Hopefully he speaks it, too. Or at least knows how to read body language.

This is the story I never knew I needed but now I have no idea how I lived without it.

A reverse sunshine/grump trope with a grumpy with an ex convict heroine and a sunshine, Christmas loving and bow tie wearing hero? I. Am. PUTTEH.

I really thought I had a read on this man. He’s a wholesome rule follower who believes the best in people. A man who has a few demons lurking but is innately good at his core. Now we’re throwing a dirty streak into the mix? Good grief.

Oh did I forget to mention that he still has Tessa’s signature dirty talking side? Because holy ovaries, batman! I’m obsessed!

This was one of the cutest holiday romances I’ve read and the perfect book to cuddle up on the couch with on a cold and snowy night. But we’re still in fall, and I made due with a nice cup of tea and a blanket that I enjoyed with a giant goofy grin on my face, because THIS BOOK.

Stella nods, letting her head tip back and hit the wall. “Yes. Anything. Yes.”
Anything.
Permission granted, I reach down and yank up her skirt.

Stella recently moved to NY after serving her sentence and stumbles upon an atrocious holiday window display. Naturally, she tells the bow tie wearing handsome stranger making idle small talk with her on the street how she feels. And naturally he invites her to interview for the window design job. Oh and he may have forgotten to mention that he happens to be the namesake and owner of the store. Whoopsy.

Aiden is the quintessential nice guy I never knew I wanted. I am not generally a reader that likes nice guys. Wow, that sounds bad. What I mean is I want a nice guy in real life, and I love them toxic in fiction. But Aiden? He was just impossible not to love. He’s a sweet man with a dirty streak who is already picking out china patterns in his head the minute he and Stella get together. It takes Stella a hot minute to come to terms of her feelings for her boss, but once she does, it’s all in.

This was one of those feel good type of romances that will put a smile on your face and keep it there. It wasn’t angsty. It wasn’t full of drama. It was opposites attract in the perfectly cute holiday romance with plenty of dirty talk thrown in and all of the warm and fuzzies. The warm blanket of romances that is cozy, comforting, and heart warming.