The Eve That Finally Happened by Diane Lennox

For promising characters and the cool idea of using a Korean background. I’ll give two and a half stars for story idea, and an interesting beginning. It lacks warmth and comfort instead it is a poorly executed attempt at humor. But somehow the author missed the opportunity to make this a true Christmas romance. The ingredients of a wonderful story are there and the beginning is build up very nicely. Peter acts completely different than I’d expected he would with a shy employe, making is very unbelievable.

He invites Peter to his house for dinner. The author has tried to make it a funny read, but in my honest opinion failed… Jae is magically cured of his extreme shyness and his feelings of wrongfulness about being gay. The moment Jae wakes up and calls Peter, nothing is romantic or sweet. But after the ghost have done their job, showing Jae all that has happened in the past, present and future, it goes downhill. The shy boy from Korea, who is secretly in love with his hot boss. This short story sounded every sweet and romantic to me when I read the blurb. Finally Jae’s parents let him see his future, how he’ll end up alone and miserable, without a job and his family. How Peter is sitting alone on Christmas too. Then his sister shows up, showing him everything he missed when interacting with Peter. He’d lost his best friend that day, but more importently, he lost his confidence in himself.

The things he can’t even remember properly, but still have the biggest influence on his life today. His eight-year-old self shows him what happened when he was eleven and just figured out he liked boys. They show him what he has repressed all of those years. That night the ghosts of Christmas visit Jae, in the form of his eight-year-old self, his sister and his parents. This year, his sister is especially upset and hangs up. Every year Jae gets lectured about his lack of a love life and his attitude about asking his boss Peter Wei out. He’s been in Canada for six years without a real relationship. Every year on Christmas Eve, his sister calls from Korea to chat with him. Except, he’s too shy to approach a guy, let alone flirt with one.

He’s from Korea, but lives in Canada so he could have an openly gay reletionship. Jae-ho Kim is a shy, but very stubborn man. This year, Jae’s lack of effort concerning his love life comes back to haunt him in the form of Christmas Eve ghosts, showing him very vividly what will become of him if he refuses to take a chance and find a date for Christmas Eve. After seven years in Canada, Korean native Jae-ho Kim still hasn’t had the special Christmas Eve date night that he would have enjoyed back home-a fact that has his sister, Soon-kyu, very upset during their yearly phone conversation.

The Eve That Finally Happened by Diane Lennox