I’m dreaming.. of a bookish Christmas..!
Of course you can read Christmas books any time of year (no judgment!), but you may be particularly in the mood for one of these right now. And if you’re in the market for a Christmas romance novel, I’ve got some great choices for you. These are all adult romance novels, and if none of them is for you, remember you can always reach out to our library staff for help finding exactly what you want to read! (All plot summaries are grabbed from our catalog – did you know the library catalog provides plot summaries for almost everything in our collection?)
The Christmas Swap by Talia Samuels. 2023. 328 pages. Margot Murray is a newly single, successful businesswoman with no interest in a cutesy seasonal romance after her breakup with her long-term girlfriend. Ben Gibson is an unlucky-in-love sweetheart in need of a woman to bring home for the holidays. Together, they make a pact: Margot gets two blissful weeks away from London in a picture-perfect manor, and Ben gets a fake girlfriend for his holiday at home with his family. Upon arriving to the manor, Margot meets Ben’s sister, Ellie, who is suspicious of the supposed relationship right from the start. Ellie intends to get to the bottom of their relationship, not being able to see how the two of them work as a couple. As Ellie and Margot grow closer, will Ben and Margot be able to keep the charade up, or will Margot and Ellie risk the chance at something real?
The Holiday Trap by Roan Parrish. 2022. 440 pages. Greta Russakoff loves her tight-knit family and tiny Maine hometown, even if they don’t always understand what it’s like to be a lesbian living in such a small world. She desperately needs space to figure out who she is. Truman Belvedere has just had his heart crushed into a million pieces when he learned that his boyfriend of almost a year has a secret life that includes a husband and a daughter. Reeling from this discovery, all he wants is a place to lick his wounds far, far away from New Orleans. Enter Greta and Truman’s mutual friend, Ramona, who facilitates a month-long house swap. Over the winter holidays, each of them will have a chance to try on a new life…and maybe fall in love with the perfect partner of their dreams. But all holidays must come to an end, and eventually Greta and Truman will have to decide whether the love they each found so far from home is worth fighting for.
In the Event of Love by Courtney Kae. 2022. 312 pages. With her career as a Los Angeles event planner imploding after a tabloid blowup, Morgan Ross isn’t headed home for the holidays so much as in strategic retreat. Breathtaking mountain vistas, quirky townsfolk, and charming small businesses aside, her hometown of Fern Falls is built of one heartbreak on top of another… Take her one-time best friend turned crush, Rachel Reed. The memory of their perfect, doomed first kiss is still fresh as new-fallen snow. Way fresher than the freezing mud Morgan ends up sprawled in on her very first day back, only to be hauled out via Rachel’s sexy new lumberjane muscles acquired from running her family tree farm. When Morgan discovers that the Reeds’ struggling tree farm is the only thing standing between Fern Falls and corporate greed destroying the whole town’s livelihood, she decides she can put heartbreak aside to save the farm by planning her best fundraiser yet. She has all the inspiration for a spectacular event: delicious vanilla lattes, acoustic guitars under majestic pines, a cozy barn surrounded by brilliant stars. But she and Rachel will ABSOLUTELY NOT have a heartwarming holiday happy ending. That would be as unprofessional as it is unlikely. Right?
Kiss Her Once for Me by Alison Cochrun. 2022. 351 pages. One year ago, recent Portland transplant Ellie Oliver had her dream job in animation and a Christmas Eve meet-cute with a woman at a bookstore that led her to fall in love over the course of a single night. But after a betrayal the next morning and the loss of her job soon after, she finds herself adrift, alone, and desperate for money. Finding work at a local coffee shop, she’s just getting through the days-until Andrew, the shop’s landlord, proposes a shocking, drunken plan: a marriage of convenience that will give him his recent inheritance and alleviate Ellie’s financial woes and isolation. They make a plan to spend the holidays together at his family cabin to keep up the ruse. But when Andrew introduces his new fianceĢe to his sister, Ellie is shocked to discover it’s Jack-the mysterious woman she fell for over the course of one magical Christmas Eve the year before. Now, Ellie must choose between the safety of a fake relationship and the risk of something real.
Season of Love by Helena Greer. 2022. 368 pages. Artist Miriam Blum has her decoupaged glitter ducks perfectly lined up. Only for one phone call to bring her whole life all crashing down. Her beloved and eccentric great-aunt has just died-leaving her part-owner of the only Jewish-owned Christmas tree farm in the country. Facing the family Miriam abandoned terrifies her. But facing the farm’s unbelievably sexy zaftig manager is another complication entirely… Noelle Northwood is horrified that the first woman she’s been attracted to in years is the same careless virago whose absence devastated the people Noelle considers family. She hates, even more, the thought of working alongside Miriam to save Carrigan’s Christmas Tree Farmland. Only Miriam decides to give working at the farm a trial run, and Noelle must find a way to keep the peace-and their undeniable chemistry at bay. At least until the end of the holiday season. But when the ghosts of the past endanger the farmland, both Miriam and Noelle will need to put aside their misconceptions… and discover if what they’ve been looking for has been right in front of them all along.
Written in the Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur. 2020. 320 pages. After a disastrous blind date, Darcy Lowell is desperate to stop her well-meaning brother from playing matchmaker ever again. Love–and the inevitable heartbreak–is the last thing she wants. So she fibs and says her latest set up was a success. Darcy doesn’t expect her lie to bite her in the ass. Elle Jones, one of the astrologers behind the popular Twitter account Oh My Stars, dreams of finding her soul mate. But she knows it is most assuredly not Darcy… a no-nonsense stick-in-the-mud, who is way too analytical, punctual, and skeptical for someone as free-spirited as Elle. When Darcy’s brother–and Elle’s new business partner–expresses how happy he is that they hit it off, Elle is baffled. Was Darcy on the same date? Because… awkward begs Elle to play along and she agrees to pretend they’re dating. But with a few conditions: Darcy must help Elle navigate her own overbearing family during the holidays and their arrangement expires on New Year’s Eve. The last thing they expect is to develop real feelings during a faux relationship. But maybe opposites can attract when true love is written in the stars?
You’re a Mean One, Matthew Prince by Timothy Janovsky. 2022. 309 pages. Matthew Prince is young, rich, and thoroughly spoiled. So what if his parents barely remember he exists and the press is totally obsessed with him? He’s on top of the world. But one major PR misstep later, and Matthew is cut off and shipped away to spend the holidays in his grandparents’ charming small town hellscape. Population- who cares? It’s bad enough he’s stuck in some festive winter wonderland-it’s even worse that he has to share space with Hector Martinez, an obnoxiously attractive local who’s unimpressed with anything and everything Matthew does. Just when it looks like the holiday season is bringing nothing but heated squabbles, the charity gala loses its coordinator and Matthew steps in as a saintly act to get home early on good behavior…with Hector as his maddening plus-one. But even a Grinch can’t resist the unexpected joy of found family, and in the end, the forced proximity and infectious holiday cheer might be enough to make a lonely Prince’s heart grow three sizes this year.
