From the publisher:
What better way to unwind from the stress of a family Thanksgiving, than escaping with an armload of Christmas cookies?
Hannah Christy was eager to head home and devour her treats in solitude, while doing some prep work for the promotion she was vying for. Those plans came to a screeching halt… along with the elevator…. trapping her inside with her sexy neighbor.
After being trapped with his match-making family over Thanksgiving, getting stuck in an elevator was a welcome reprieve for Gage Lawson.
If it was up to him, he would gladly stay stranded well into the new year. Especially since his neighbor has a whole treasure trove of ideas on how to pass the time. The best Christmas cookies he’s ever tasted. Delicious spiced wine. Fun getting-to-know-you games. It’s the most holiday merriment he’s had in a long while.
Somewhere in the midst of it all, Gage comes up with the perfect plan. A fake romance to help make both their family get-togethers more jolly! To his surprise, Hannah agrees to be his for the holidays. Yet with the mistletoe in full bloom, and her on his arm, Gage soon realizes their little Christmas show isn’t enough. He wants her for real… and forever.
Roast the chestnuts and hang the stockings, Gage has a plan! With the help of the 55 and over residents, magical flurries, and a never-ending supply of hot cocoa with extra marshmallows, he’s determined to show Hannah that Christmas is the most wonderful time of year to fall in love.
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A delicious new holiday romance!
I’ve read a few books by Chase and enjoyed them all, but I have issues with their covers. I really hate them, this one included. It just looks like an old, cheesy romance from the 80’s or something. Reading advance review copies on a Kindle often eliminates the cover image so I don’t see it until I go to post the review. For this author, I have learned to just ignore the cover and enjoy the book – and I did!
These characters had interesting backgrounds, and we get to know them fairly well for such a short book. Chase does a really good job with building her characters, and I especially liked Hannah. She is a strong woman, dedicated to her career, but not without some issues. Her career is in commercial interior design, but the rest of her family are in the medical profession – her parents and both sisters. She often feels like a failure around them.
We don’t know quite as much about Gage, at least not at first. I’m still not clear on what he does for a living, but who cares. He dresses nice, he’s employed, and he’s good to his family. He is the youngest and the only boy, and his sisters and mom are all on the hunt for a wife for him, to the point where he is considering not going home for Christmas. Their matchmaking is stressing him out.
Gage and Hannah are neighbors who don’t really know each other at all. Until they get stuck in the elevator together, for hours. By the time they get out, they are on very friendly terms. Hannah had suggested a way for Gage to avoid the matchmaking this Christmas by getting one of his female friends to fake date him. He isn’t comfortable lying to his family, but he likes Hannah so he asks her to do it.
At first she says no but circumstances change and she heads out to the small town where his mom lives with Gage. And shockingly, has a fantastic time. She loves his mom and his sisters and all his nieces and nephews and she is falling in love with Gage, too. But she knows this relationship has an expiration date. It looks like she is going to be moving out of state for work, so she doesn’t want to get too involved. But the heart wants what the heart wants.
There are hurdles to Hannah and Gage reaching their happily ever after, but it is so much fun getting there. I am definitely stealing the idea of a hot cocoa tasting (like a wine tasting but with cocoa! And I would love the recipe for the hot cocoa cookies!) I also really liked how their relationship was depicted. We know they are having sex, but it is not explicit and is mostly out of sight of the reader so it actually felt more real to me, if that makes sense? This was a charming, sweet romance just perfect for the holidays, and I loved it.
12/2021 Stacy Alesi, AKA the BookBitch
HIS FOR THE HOLIDAYS by Samantha Chase. Independently published (December 14, 2021). ISBN: 979-8784305725. 234 pages.
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