If you’re creating your holiday reading list, Have Yourself a Merry Little Meltdown by Sheila Roberts needs to be considered. It hits all the rom-com highlights with quirky family drama, high school “friends,” quaint small town bookstore (with dreamy owner), and holiday hijinks galore.
I was fortunate to receive an advance reader’s edition, but Have Yourself a Merry Little Meltdown is now available! Just in time for your next book club pick!
The Summary
Jordan Frost had to do it. Her family was simply too perfectly eccentric not to put in a novel. Then reality set in. Her book about an oddball family’s holiday adventures is coming out in November. Just in time for her trip home to Holly Bay. She wrote the book under a pen name and wore a wig and glasses in her author photo. No one will know it was her, right?
Wrong. Charles Pine recognizes the woman he’s never gotten over as soon as he unpacks her book at his bookstore. Is this an opportunity to get Jordan to see him in a new light? She never thought of him as anything more than a shoulder to cry on in high school, but he needs her to see him as boyfriend material. Can he be her hero and help her get through the season in her family’s good graces? Or at least save her from a holiday meltdown?
With her family determined to read the trending new holiday novel, Jordan and Charles team up to keep her secret and rediscover their connection. Maybe coming home wasn’t a bad idea after all…
My Review
Sheila Roberts is a USA Today bestselling author for a reason. Her characters are fun, flawed, and you find yourself rooting for all of them just a few pages in. The love in the Frost family is evident and jumps off the pages, making you smile and chuckle because there’s always “that uncle” and the nephews really would say that!
This wasn’t my favorite holiday novel, but I think it was more the layout of the story than the story itself. The book is a mix of the present timeline as Jordan navigates keeping her family in the dark about her being the author of the trending holiday read, and the past which includes Jordan and Charles’ history as well as the antics that Jordan used to inspire her novel. The memories and anecdotes are helpful and add to the storyline, but for me personally, they slowed down the pace of the plot which already felt like it was dragging a bit.
That said, I have to return to the characters. Jordan and Charles are great, but comedic family dramas come down to the surrounding cast and these do not disappoint. From the moody cousin (think Wednesday Addams) to the charming grandparents to the folks around town, Have Yourself a Merry Little Meltdown has personalities in spades. I loved that I could put myself in Holly Bay and totally see these people and their behaviors happening!
Finally, for the romantics here, this is a slooooooooooow burn. The kind where you want to shake the main character and say “Really?! You really can’t see what’s happening?!” However, the payoff? Completely worth it! Sheila Roberts could have given us the standard Hallmark ending of a chaste kiss under the mistletoe and called it a day. (The woman has had novels turned into TV movies for many of the feel-good networks after all!) Instead, she gave us what felt like ending a decades long wait for “more” would really entail. In a family-friendly way of course!
I didn’t devour this book like I normally do, but it left me smiling, happy and satisfied. For that holiday rom-com experience, I would give it 3.5 stars out of 5. Not going to lie though…I would love a sequel that centers on Aurora…
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Oh, and I have Bachelors degree in Journalism and Masters' degrees in Business and Sports Administration that I like to flex via blogging here and handling digital content for a local yarn shop!
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