The Cotswold Christmas Bookshop – Jill Steeples

Published By: Boldwood
Pages: 264
Released On: 31/08/2026

Isla Stewart has a glittering publishing career in London, but when she’s unexpectedly made redundant, she faces an uncertain future.

Licking her wounds, Isla heads home to the Cotswolds. Keeping her devastating redundancy a secret from her proud parents, she seeks refuge at Finch’s, the enchanting bookshop she worked in as a teenager. With the owners struggling with their health, Isla steps in to manage the shop hoping to convince them that the business has a future.

Isla likes nothing more than chatting to people about books, but her safe haven is soon disturbed when she comes face-to-face with her first love, Charlie Brace, made worse by the arrival of Guy Madley, the incredibly handsome property consultant who has advice for owners Jon and Miriam.

As Christmas approaches, Isla has decisions to make. Does her future lie in London or can a whole heap of books and a sprinkling of festive magic offer a life that she could never even have dreamed of?

*****

Thanks to NetGalley and Boldwood for the advanced copy of this title in return for an honest review.

I am (unsurprisingly) a bibliophile and am so obsessed with Christmas I might as well be Mrs Claus, so Jill might as well have written this book for me.

It’s so warm and scrumptious. It’s been a while since I read one of Jill’s books but I’ve fallen straight back into the magical worlds she creates.

The descriptions of the weather, the festive scents, the Christmas decorations – oh everything was just gorgeous and even though I read it in July, it really got me into the Christmas spirit (no-one needs to know that I was also listening to Christmas music).

Every single character is wonderful. Our protagonist of Isla is fabulous and I really felt a kinship with her and was so happy to follow her story. Her parents were funny, the love interest sounds dashing, and the older characters that live in the village just tie it all together. There isn’t a bad one amongst them.

This little village she has created is idyllic, a perfect olde wolde English village, and the bookshop – oh it’s divine. She’s really captured everything I love about books, bookshops, reading, and Chrsitmas.

I just couldn’t put it down as it’s so beautiful.

Is it a bit predictable? Yeah sure. But that’s what makes it so wonderful. You know it’s going to be an uplifting, gorgeous story, with some hardships thrown in, with some sort of happily-ever-after ending, and that’s what I expected and what I wanted and what I needed. It means I can concentrate on the little aspects of the story and the characters a bit more deeply.

I was so sad when I finished it because I just loved it so much. And it’s only July (at time of writing) but I’m desperate to go and live in a little village, with a gorgeous bookshop, a handsome man, and beautiful snowfall. Is that too much to ask? Definitely her best book yet.