Review: "Any Girl but You" by Dana Hawkins

Any Girl but You by Dana Hawkins
Published October 2025 via Storm Publishing
★★★★

Quinn has gone all in on a reset—packed up her high-powered NYC life, moved back to Minnesota, and bought a Christmas tree farm. She wouldn't mind a hookup or two, but she's not looking for anything serious...which is inconvenient, because the only woman who interests her is Zoey, a local bakery owner who doesn't do casual.

I approach most romance novels with a certain degree of caution, because although there's plenty of good stuff out there, it's a huge genre, and there's also plenty of tosh...and one has to be in the right mindset to happily read tosh. But Any Girl but You exceeded my expectations, and I ended up loving the ways in which it subverted expectations for a fairly trope-heavy holiday romance.

Plenty to like here: Although Quinn and Zoey get off on the wrong foot, neither of them is happy with the first impression they made, and they set out quickly to make amends; Quinn in particular uses the experience to take a closer look at what made her fly off the handle in the first place and, well, work on that. Because they're also very clear about what they do and don't want (that is: Zoey wants a relationship, and Quinn doesn't), they spend a big chunk of the book building a friendship without the pressure of romance, and I'm here for that. And in a sea of grumpy/sunshine Christmas books where one character is a Christmas elf come to life and the other is a wannabe grinch, both characters here are in favor of the holidays; they both have some work-related stressors throughout the book, but they're generally on the same page.

A few things I would have liked to see: First, although Quinn makes inroads into understanding herself and her reactions better, and she learns that struggles are valid even if someone else has worse struggles, that part of her story loses traction midway and never really picks back up again. I'd have liked to see a bit more from it. Zoey is sweet, but her contradictions remind me a bit of high school. And...when characters in a lesbian romance do a U-Haul move-in, then gosh darn it I want a U-Haul joke.

Overall, though, a satisfying holiday read—I'm curious to see where the author will go next.

Thanks to the author and publisher for providing a review copy through NetGalley.