Review: What It Takes by Willow Aster (Windy Harbor #2)

Note: An advance reader copy (ARC) was provided by the author via Valentine PR.

Back to Minnesota I go with the second novel in Willow Aster's eponymous small-town series, Windy Harbor, featuring the Whitman siblings and their respective journeys as they make their way back home to be with their beloved father as he battles a health crisis. The author offers up an friends-to-enemies-to-lovers, falling-for-your-best-friend's-sibling romance between Juliana Fair and Camden Whitman. She's twenty-six, a talented baker, and the owner of The Kitty-Corner Café; he's twenty-eight, a renowned chef and the owner of Michelin-starred Whitman's in Denver, Colorado, with Elm & Echo, his new restaurant in Windy Springs, Minnesota. There was a time that they were actually friends, having met when she was five and he was seven. Over the years, however, Jules became besties with Goldie, Cam's younger sister, and he and Jackson, Jules's older brother, became the closest of friends. She stopped being his Juju, and while she admired him for his culinary achievements, she made it clear that she didn't think highly of him as a former friend. But now, Cam is in town full-time, making it difficult to avoid each other. What will it take for them to mend fences and get back to being friends again, and could it possibly lead to far more?

I've been wondering what kind of history Juliana and Camden have ever since the end of the Windy Harbor series starter, Take This Heart. It isn't just a matter of too many cooks in the kitchen, although Jules's prowess is in baking, but theirs is a story of two people who had the building blocks of a friendship when they met as kids--she was five, and he was seven--until stereotypical hurdles get in the way, i.e. she's younger than him, he becomes besties with her brother, she becomes besties with his sister, etc. While it was clear that sitting down and openly discussing any issues they had between would  have been the obvious course of action, that's easier said than done, especially since it feels like Cam had pushed Jules away on numerous occasions for years. The flashbacks provided more context to the hows and whys of all those starts and stops, and I did empathize with these two while also being rather frustrated. When they finally navigated through those obstacles, though, it was a beautiful thing. I was also quite happy with the update on Cam's dad and what was happening with Grandma Donna's and Grandma Nancy's own love lives. I'm giving What It Takes four stars, and I look forward to the next book!

Release Date: 15 January 2026

Date Read: 14 January 2026

Learn more about Willow Aster.

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