When an avalanche destroys her career and her joy in mountain climbing, Ingrid Berg returns to her small Norwegian hometown to run the family inn, Glitter Peak Lodge so that Nana Borghild, who raised Ingrid, can retire. Ingrid hopes the lodge will take the place in her life that mountain climbing did. But in the days before Christmas, she must deal with leaky pipes and abrupt reservation cancellations. Also, Nana Borghild seems secretive and withdrawn. The normal December routine is disrupted by the arrival of a mysterious American and her husband, along with the long stay of a pregnant influencer. While Ingrid can’t forget the avalanche accident and the man who led the ill-fated expedition, Borghild’s secrets from the early 1980s still haunt the village where a young bride-to-be vanished on her wedding day. It’s the American woman who brings the past crashing back into the lodge’s story.
VERDICT Although the mystery (Johnsen’s first to be published in English) is slight, the atmospheric Hallmark-style book is set up as if it were an Advent calendar: 24 chapters, one for each day in December leading up to Christmas. The multiple storylines offer a little for everyone: mountain climbing, village secrets, romance, bullying. The Norwegian customs and recipes are an extra treat.
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