By: Jackie Lau

Donut Fall in Love is a light, airy read that I very much enjoyed. It was a quick, vacation-type book filled with many likable characters and the description of delicious food. TRIGGER WARNING. One of the themes of the novel does include grief over losing a parent, but I did not find this to be a sad book. 

Lindsay McLeod is a co-owner of a trendy pastry and donut bakery called the Kensington Bake Shop. She is at a crossroad in her own life. Her best friend and co-owner of the bakery recently got married, and Lindsay is feeling a bit left behind. Her own father died several years ago, and her mother is starting to date again. Lindsay feels adrift as other friends are getting married, and she has been unable to have a serious relationship since the devastating death of her father. 

Ryan Kwok is an up and coming heartthrob actor. He is the type of actor that takes photos of his abs and posts said photos to social media. Ryan recently starred in a romantic comedy, and while it did not bomb at the box office, it did not do as well as he had hoped. As an actor of Asian descent, he worries that the movie’s underperformance will hurt other future Asian-lead acting projects. His mom also died unexpectedly a few months ago, so he took a sabbatical from acting to help both his sister, as she gives birth to her first child, and his distant and often disapproving father. One of Ryan’s last memories of his mother is their shared, sad attempt to bake some chocolate brownies. 

While passing Kensington Bake Shop, Ryan becomes lost in the memory of baking with his mother, and bursts into Lindsay’s shop, inadvertently knocking into Lindsay and her fresh batch of matcha tiramisu donuts. Lindsay is unfamiliar with Ryan and his acting career and is incredibly put out by his actions. Ryan uses his good looks and charm to smooth over the encounter, and does pay for the ruined donuts. This interaction encourages Ryan to accept a celebrity position on a Canadian reality baking show called Baking Fail. His mother enjoyed the show and the winning celebrity receives money for the charity of their choice. He decides to hire Lindsay to teach him how to bake so that he can win the reality show in honor of his mother. 

The story navigates parental loss really well. Both Ryan and Lindsay are in different stages of their grief, but that connection allows them to open up to each other. I enjoyed the character of Ryan, who came across as a nice, “regular” guy, who apparently is very, very good looking. He clearly cared immensely for his sister, although felt very out of his depth with her situation as a new parent. His relationship with his father, although much rockier, showed his love for his dad, especially after his dad started a twitter account to respond to Ryan’s fame. Maybe this says more about me than the character of Ryan, but I was expecting him to be a little more “hollywood,” and became increasingly worried about whether or not his relationship with Linday would truly work in the long-term. 

The thing about Lindsay is that she had absolutely no chill. She would admit readily that she binge-watched Ryan’s show or a movie. It seemed slightly off to me. I totally believe that she WOULD do that (I would also do this), but she would repeatedly tell Ryan about it and it screamed a little cringe-worthy and fan-girling to me, which we were supposed to believe she was not. I did appreciate her bravery in admitting her feelings for Ryan, and when he was unable to reciprocate those feelings, I thought it said a lot about her character growth that she was able to recognize she deserved better (although, I am not a fan of the trope that a character will not express their feelings because the object of their love is “better off without knowing their love.”) 

I did enjoy this book and I do recommend it. The characters seemed pretty sweet and had the best of intentions, I am just not sure I buy that these characters would last long-term. 

Rating: 3/5