The story of long nights in a wintry mountain hotel, a baking show with secrets, a snowman called Jeremy, and finding the greatest love of all.
After winning season four of ratings hit the World’s Best Baking Show, Brody Thomas had become a sought-after cake maker to the stars. Happily married, he dreamed of a bright future, but his perfect life imploded when he discovered that his husband had done nothing but lie to him. A year later, Brody is mid-divorce, and his life has been turned upside down, so being part of the WBBS charity event is excellent timing. He’s sure it will give him time away from home and space to get his head straight, only he never expected to meet the man of his dreams in a snowy Alberta.
Winning season one of WBBS gave Justin Mallory a chance to outrun the demons of a childhood lost in the foster system. He’s a social media influencer, with millions of followers, and works every hour to make money that equals security for the rest of his life. His marketing team signs him up for the WBBS Christmas charity show, but he’s convinced he’ll fall at the first hurdle. Only, after a few days in the competition, his worry isn’t that he’ll be the first to leave, it’s that he’ll lose his heart to a rival baker, Brody.
Cupcakes & Christmas may be RJ Scott's 2020 holiday romance but I'm sure there are those who have yet to discover this holiday gem so I don't want to spoil it by giving too much detail in this audiobook review. What I will say is it's just as fun and jampacked with holiday spirit so if you aren't already in the Christmastime zone, you will be once you ride along on Justin and Brody's journey. And as always, Sean Crisden's narration adds a special level of WOW in bringing RJ Scott's words to life. So whether you read this last year and just revisiting in audio or discovering Cupcakes & Christmas for the first time, it's a delicious treat that will leave you smiling and more than a little hungry😉😉.
Original Review January 2021:
RATING:
Author Bio:
I've been a fan of the Great British Baking Show(as it's called here in the US because of copyright conflicting with the Pillsbury Bake-Off) for a few years now ever since I stumbled across it on our local PBS station so when I read the setting for RJ Scott's newest holiday romance I thought "Ooooo, this could be fun" and boy was it ever!
I don't think I want to say too much to the plot, in some regards it's a typical holiday romance and that's not a bad thing. Just because something might be "typical" when it comes to holidays stories doesn't mean it isn't great. Every author has their own nuances even with "typical" and long as a story is well written with intriguing characters that you love to support and want to see succeed than it's a story worth reading. Let's be honest, when it comes to holiday romances after all these years it is hard to find one that is not "typical". So when you find one that is as fun as Cupcakes and Christmas, it is definitely worth reading. From the main characters, Justin and Brody, to their family and friends, their inner monologues, their jobs, and of course all their baking glory, this holiday romance is not to be missed. Just keep in mind you might be left hankering for more than one sweet treat.
Yumminess, yumminess, yumminess from beginning to end. Certainly a holiday treat to make you smile.
RATING:
Chapter One
Save the planet! It’s the only one with cupcakes!
Justin
“Hey, Mallys! It’s stunning here.” I grinned at the camera, panning the phone to take in the entirety of the space, along with distant views of Sulphur Mountain. Up to now, each season of the World’s Best Baking Show had been filmed in California, but for this Christmas special, they explained they wanted authenticity. This meant filming had been moved to a beautiful convention center on the grounds of the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel in snowy Alberta. It was certainly a step up from a dressed sound stage and I was going to be sharing a ton of photos and videos. In fact, I’d sat down with my social media team and carefully planned most of them. There was always room for impromptu shots but for now I was sticking to the carefully considered script.
“It’s a bit different to the studio back in Cali.” I crossed my eyes to the camera, a trademark of mine whenever I was being self-deprecating, and then I panned back to the mansion. I took my audience with me, and my screen was already filled with hearts and messages. “I was so nervous when I started the show, but I’m such a different person since I took part in season one. I’m not the nineteen-year-old kid who wanted to take the baking world by storm. I was lucky to win, and my life has changed.” I smiled and then dropped the smile a little. “I think I’m still as nervous this time as I was then.” I paused dramatically and looked wistfully in the distance at the snow-covered vista. “I hope I do okay,” I added for good measure. “Until next time, Mallys!” I gave them all a thumbs up, cut the feed, and pocketed my cell.
“And that’s a wrap,” Erin Lister shouted from her hiding place behind the tree and scurried toward me. “Two hundred likes so far and climbing. You hit all the main points.” Erin was part of the team I’d hired to look after my brand, although the contract was due for renewal and I was already getting itchy feet to move on. I’d allowed the team, and more particularly Erin, to control my output so far, and it had worked, but I knew what I needed to do was to get a hold of everything myself. I couldn’t carry on letting other people tell me what to do just for money—hell, I could work for the money by myself.
I could fail. Lose everything.
I stiffened slightly—who said I was going to fail anything at all. I should think more of myself.
As usual, Erin looked harried and tense, but that was her job. All I had to do, in her words, was look pretty and say my lines. I’m not sure when my genuine organic rise in social media became something else, which meant other people calling the shots, but my bank account was healthy, so I wasn’t going to argue. Money was my main objective in life. When I had enough, I could do what I really wanted to do, which was not having to worry about money.
“Great.” I could see she had something to add though and waited to find out what I’d done wrong.
“Apart from the fact you didn’t mention the KlecksoCream.”
“There’s a reason for that,” I muttered. “It’s shit.”
KlecksoCream may be perfectly white and smooth, kind of like the whipped cream sprayed out of a can which also tastes good, but this cream tastes like shit.
She heard me and tutted. “It’s also adding twenty-thousand to your already heavy bank account, Juss.”
“Justin,” I reminded her. My name was already short, why did people think they had to shorten it even more.
“So let’s do a segment where you say you’ve forgotten and that you have something to add.”
I hate those. I can’t believe my followers don’t see right through the add-on advertising. I declare it on all my posts, but my fan base grows every day, and sometimes things slip through. Still, I try to respect the people who follow me and see them as more than numbers, even if everything had blurred together since the old days when I knew the names of a lot of the people who contacted me.
“It’s not the right time.”
“Juss-tin, please, we need a KlecksoCream mention to hit your feeds by seven p.m.—”
“So it’s in the public’s conscience when the ad during prime time airs,” I sing-songed as she glared at me. “I know all that.” I sighed inwardly. “Remind me why I agreed to promote a cream brand that tastes like ass?”
She tilted her head and stared at me as if I’d just asked her what two plus two was. There was an unspoken duh in her that she was holding back. It didn’t matter why I signed a contract with a company that made fake cream which tasted like ass, it just mattered that I had. As usual, I’d signed it on a day when I felt my life was spiraling and when my constant companion, impostor syndrome, kicked in.
What if the money ran out? What would I do? How much money is enough?
Still, she had a point. I had commitments, and I would see them through. “Okay, jeez, I’m doing it.”
She nodded, and I waited for her to move, but evidently, she needed to witness this small humiliation so she could cross it off her list. I pulled out my cell then turned a full three-sixty in the snow to search for inspiration. At least a couple of inches of new snow fell overnight. When the beautiful, virgin white snowfall that was smoothed over a large bush with some of the greenery exposed caught my eye, I headed down the steps, passed Erin, and crossed the large lawn. I stood next to the bush with the fresh snow, making sure it was in my shot, ruffled my hair a little so it was casually tousled then connected again.
“Hello, Mallys, look what I just found. This snow is white and smooth and looks exactly like the KlecksoCream I used in last week’s episode of Baking with Mallory. Kinda cool, right? Links in my bio! Later, guys!” I ended the connection and got a thumbs up from Erin. Kleckso got their mention, and I didn’t even have to add that it tasted like shit because I stayed true to myself. KlecksoCream was smooth, and it was white. Neither of those things were lies.
Forget that it tasted a little cheesy, or that it was a long way past natural colored and right onto glow in the dark.
Ka-Ching, twenty-thousand in my happy-with-life pot and not one single lie told. All I had to do was ignore the guilt that some poor baker out there would buy that shit on my say-so. The guilt wasn’t new. It grew worse each day I was pretending to be something I wasn’t. In the last year, as I’d grown closer to the magic number of five million in my account, the guilt had turned to a self-hate, and it was consuming me. I have a few more commitments after the charity competition, then I was finished with all of this. I just hadn’t fired my advisor team yet or even given a hint I was done.
Anyway, what would I do instead?
Anything is better than peddling shit fake cream to innocent bystanders.
Erin consulted her list. “Okay, next up we need you to film yourself going inside. Remember your lighting, but we’re not live for that one so we can fix it if you mess up. I’m going back to the hotel. Don’t forget, I’m only staying two nights, then I need to head out. So I want video for the collection as back up, and we’d also like you to mention what you’re wearing. Hilfiger struck a deal with some big football star, so Klein wants you to one up them.”
Names like Hilfiger and Klein used to mean nothing more to me other than brands I aspired to own. Now both of them wanted me for endorsements, and they paid me good money to mention their casual wear. I took a few still photos of the venue, which was a pretty atrium to a plainer building, a pouting selfie for her to post, and hashtag Klein whenever needed, and then finally I headed up the steps and opened the door.
“Film it!” Erin called up from the bottom of the steps.
“Later,” I called back and before she could shout anything else, I slipped inside the big door and pulled it closed. She wouldn’t come inside, that was my freedom from all things Erin, with her lists and her marketing schedules, and the relief was instant.
I crossed the threshold into a tumble of decorations in tones of green and red for Christmas, with show banners and posters everywhere. Just seeing the show logo again, fancied up for Christmas with extra holly and berries, was a startling reminder of all the hopes and dreams I’d had when I got a place on season one.
I leaned against a pillar and took in the atrium, with its gleaming glass and show banners. The whole place had the feel of luxurious wealth. I closed my eyes for a minute just to listen to the absolute silence. I hadn’t slept properly for the last week and the same worries I carried with me from childhood were milling around in my head. Mostly about how the hell I was going to fit in with the other contestants.
It’s not like I’d know anyone here from meeting them before. We’d all been contestants on World’s Best Baking Show, but I’d missed the WBBS reunions, even though I’d been invited every time. Erin had doubted whether it was worth my time to look back, and she’d convinced me that my life was moving forward, reminding me of how much other people had to tidy up my bakes for my videos. However, that didn’t stop her from wanting me to connect to the show when it suited my profile, like being part of this charity show. I blame her for suggesting I shouldn’t go to the reunions, but deep down, I’d always been relieved. After all, what would I have said at these meet ups? I was better on-screen and Erin and her team agreed, so I’d never gone. Of course, now my association with WBBS was of utmost importance for as soon as news of the charity show was announced, five companies had approached me for endorsements.
Or approached Erin.
It meant that Kleckso was abruptly good for my brand income, and so here I was, out of my comfort zone, but with seriously heavy deposits into my already healthy bank account. Twenty-thousand to mention KlecksoCream was just the tip of the iceberg to what I would be earning if I made it to the finals on the show while sticking to Erin’s rules.
I just had to meet people who could actually bake and have conversations with them.
Embrace the fear, confront the fear. Learn from the fear.
That is what my therapist wanted me to live by, but what didn’t seem obvious to her was that I’d already used my fear as fuel to propel me into being a very rich man. I had my first hundred thousand from winning the show and now at twenty-five, I have almost five million beautiful, sexy dollars locked away. Right now, no one could send me away from anywhere or take anything from me. But the nagging doubt was there all the time, the one that said I should’ve stayed at home, and that I didn’t need to do this show. Yes, I’d pull in endorsement money, but I could do that through my various social media platforms, just at a slower rate. Being here meant possibly exposing me for the fraud I was, but maybe I needed that scandal to stop people from wanting a part of me.
I got the irony. Selling myself and selling products made me rich, people wanted to be me, people wanted to bake like me, use my products, even my hair gel. But if they knew the real me, the scared kid who, more by luck than judgment, had made it to the final of season one and then won it by accident, then they’d run. When I signed up for it, I’d clearly been having an I can bake, I’m a good baker, I can do this kind of day. Or maybe the PR company signed me up for it? Erin and her team tend to over commit me, and I’ve yet to say no to anything they arrange.
Until the new year, when I was done—not that anyone knew it yet. And who would I tell? The marketing company I paid for? Or the next door cat that spent most of its time in my vast back yard?
Shake it off, Justin.
WBBS has six completed seasons so far and there’d be the six winners here, all fighting to be crowned the best of the best. With four rounds run over two weeks and handling various challenges, one person would be leaving each round until it was two people standing for the fifth and final round. Everything would be knit together in just the right way to capture the Christmas market. Some of how I felt was just the very real worry I wouldn’t make it past round one, but the rest of it was a mess of concerns about where I was going next, what I was doing. Nerves gripped tight and wouldn’t release me, and a familiar panic began to grow in my chest.
“Hi.”
I spun quickly to face the owner of the voice, coming face to face with someone stepping out of the shadows of a huge tree, and yelped.
Brody Thomas. Winner of season four, and just as sexy in real life as he had been on television. God, the crush I’d had on tall, dark, and seriously handsome was off the charts, but a proposal by his fiancé at his season finale put to rest any fantasy I may have had about getting anywhere near him.
“Shit! Sorry.” His nose wrinkled as he peered down at me from his lofty six inch advantage. I realized I had my hand over my heart, and that his frown was probably more like he was worried about me.
“No, it’s good. I’m really early, so I just wasn’t expecting anyone else to be here yet. It’s okay. Sorry.” Go me with the scintillating conversation.
“Brody Thomas, season four.” He held out a hand. With almost black hair, deep velvet brown eyes, and a voice smooth as whiskey, I could lose myself staring at him but instinct kicked in, and I shook his hand. Married. He’s married.
“Justin Mallory, season one.”
Brody grinned and there were dimples. Beautiful, sexy dimples. “I know. I watched your season.”
“I watched yours too.” Was I sounding too eager?
“Cool.”
Brody was wearing the softest cashmere sweater, decorated with a sprig of holly. He caught me staring and glanced down at his chest. “My brother’s idea, something about getting into the season. I just think he’s an idiot. I clearly got all the clever genes.”
“Right.” Way to kill the conversation.
Brody cleared his throat. “Anyway, I’m early as well. I just wanted to get in as soon as I could, to familiarize myself with the new place, get a sense of what it was like.” He was filling the quiet, and I was thankful for that as there was no way it would be me guiding a conversation. Not unless it was online—then I was fine. I’d been so lost in memories of the show and consumed with nerves, that I hadn’t had time to put my Brand Justin mask on, and I hated that he’d caught me off guard.
“It’s big,” I offered, even though he was standing right here so he could see how big the inside was.
“It’s very different in here compared to the soundstage we filmed on. Did you go into the back and see the kitchen yet?” he asked and stared at a crystal chandelier above us, suspended from the ceiling and implausibly not crashing to the floor. His lips parted, and abruptly I wasn’t checking out the opulent surroundings but was staring at Brody. Ever since I’d seen him step onto the WBBS kitchen, I’d had this interest in him. When he stayed in week after week, my interest was backed up by frequent views of him being sexy in so many ways.
Sexy as he bent over and stared into his oven with his cute pout when things weren’t looking as good as they should. Sexy with powdered sugar on his face. Sexy as he grinned in excitement when he won. Sexy, always smiling on the show, a little clumsy, funny, fucking gorgeous, and totally gay. I could deny that I’d watched every scene Brody had been in several times over, including the highlight reels on YouTube, but I’d be lying.
“I’ve not seen anyone else yet. I literally just got here.”
He smiled at me and stretched tall. “I’m considering this a vacation, and I was excited to start.”
“A vacation?” Maybe a holiday in hell.
“Yeah. You know, baking things I love. The Fairmont is quiet, so maybe I can get some time to think.” Brody shrugged.
Justin wondered why he’d had said that with such a serious tone. Was he having problems?
For a second, he looked as if he wanted to run, and suddenly I felt more confident. If he was nervous as well, then I wouldn’t be alone. “I want to visit Banff as well.”
The producers of WBBS were putting us up at the Fairmont Banff Springs Hotel since the show was being taped in the convention center. It was great because it was within walking distance of the town. I loved what I’d seen on the internet about the town of Banff, with its gorgeous shops and the mountains all around. I actually had a long list of things I wanted to do while we were here.
Anything to stop thinking about everything I needed to do all the freaking time. I’d imagined walking along the street, looking into the huge Christmas shop, doing the tourist thing, snow falling around me, totally anonymous. I could buy a coffee and people watch and hope there wasn’t any social media users in town.
“Banff is gorgeous, I saw some of it as I drove through,” I said.
“We should go. I mean the bakers. We should visit, and maybe go to the hot pool on Sulphur Mountain, and there’s a lookout point on the mountain with a crystal bear. We could do that as well.”
He was so animated that I wanted to touch him just to steal that spark of energy, but then he was staring at the chandelier again.
“That’s stunning,” Brody announced and pointed up at the huge display. I quickly took my stare from checking him out and instead looked at the crystals above us.
He makes cakes. He’s funny, cute, but he’s married, and Marc is a lucky guy.
He was standing close, and my mind was spinning too fast. I was getting hard in the middle of an expansive garden room with a definitely-not-single gorgeous baker who was my competition. I should be less worried about my libido and more concerned that I wasn’t going to make it past week one. The first season had been easy for me to win, not because I’m the most amazing baker ever, but because it was a test show, and I was lucky. I was up against other amateurs who were lost when asked to make choux pastry. Hell it was so bad that we’d muddled through together. No one had even really known about the show or watched it until the college kids found it, and abruptly it went viral. Every season had to have new and exciting challenges, so it got harder and trickier for the contestants. The level I’d managed compared to what Brody had to do to win his season was like the Wright brothers going up against Boeing.
They will see right through me. I can’t do this. I can’t do this. I can’t—
“Hey, you okay?” Hands gripped me, and I stared up at Brody, who peered down at me with a concerned expression. “You went all weird there for a moment.”
I blinked at him and then pointed up at the chandelier. “Vertigo,” I lied. I’m good at lying.
“Wow, okay then, no more staring at the pretty.” He sounded so damn serious, but all I could think about was that I would be very happy to stare at the pretty that was Brody Thomas.
Any day of the week.
Writing love stories with a happy ever after – cowboys, heroes, family, hockey, single dads, bodyguards
USA Today bestselling author RJ Scott has written over one hundred romance books. Emotional stories of complicated characters, cowboys, single dads, hockey players, millionaires, princes, bodyguards, Navy SEALs, soldiers, doctors, paramedics, firefighters, cops, and the men who get mixed up in their lives, always with a happy ever after.
She lives just outside London and spends every waking minute she isn’t with family either reading or writing. The last time she had a week’s break from writing, she didn’t like it one little bit, and she has yet to meet a box of chocolates she couldn’t defeat.
RJ Scott
BOOKBUB / KOBO / SMASHWORDS
EMAIL: rj@rjscott.co.uk
Sean Crisden(Narrator)
EMAIL: crisden@seancrisden.com
