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Holiday Romances: Cozy Vibes, Chaotic Choices & Ghostly Shenanigans
Holiday romances promise cozy vibes, twinkle lights and just enough emotional whiplash to keep us awake between sips of our candy cane cocktails. They also reveal what we really want from love stories: joy but with a little bite.
In Season 2 Episode 28: A Spirited Christmas on the podcast, we tackled two wildly different winter romances — one featuring a rule-breaking Christmas ghost with soft-boy tendencies, the other featuring a small-town second chance that somehow manages to make career ambition the villain. Between charcuterie, cackling and a few “wait … WHAT?” moments, we unpacked why Christmas stories can be both extra magical and extra messy.
Book 1: Good Spirits by B.K. Borison
Good Spirits gives us a paranormal holiday romance filled with sparkle, sass and a ghost who truly needs HR.
Harriet York, 27, is minding her antique shop and dodging her image-obsessed family when Nolan Callahan — dead since 1902 but still annoyingly hot — arrives as her personal Ghost of Christmas Past. He says he’s here to “save her soul” … she says that sounds “a little murdery” and, honestly?, the chemistry snaps like peppermint bark.
Borison’s worldbuilding shines: ghosts barely taste or feel (except when Hot Tamales are involved) and the banter is top-tier. Nolan knits, feeds stray cats and radiates soft-boy off-season energy. And yes — the snow-globe spice scene absolutely delivers.
But toward the end, things wobble. For a world with cosmic paperwork, we get almost none of it when Nolan becomes mortal. Where’s the identity crisis? The logistics? The HR memo? The nine-month epilogue offers vibes not answers — yet Borison’s prose and emotional warmth still hit.
Book 2: A Christmas Kind of Perfect
Door County Nostalgia Meets … Questionable Choices
Then we slid over to A Christmas Kind of Perfect, a small-town second-chance romance that really wanted to work but got tangled in its own tinsel.
Lila returns home with writer’s block. Conrad is about to propose to his long-term girlfriend, Suzanne. And somehow the story expects us to cheer for some pre-breakup kissing under the guise of “fate.”
The setting is rich — winter events, scones, cozy spots — but the dialogue often reads like a tourist brochure (“May I help?” GIRL.) and the brand-dropping is relentless.
More concerning is the moral math:
- Suzanne’s ambition and childfree choice = “bad.”
- Lila’s decade of career success = “hollow” once romance shows up.
- Conrad flirting while attached = apparently fine? Because Christmas??
This framing shrinks the heroine instead of letting her shine — and the whole “cheating is fine if it’s festive” vibe did not pass our mulled-wine test.
What These Stories Reveal About Holiday Romance
Romance can celebrate home without punishing women for ambition.
It can challenge hustle culture without demonizing competence.
And if you’re going to write cheating? Bring accountability not destiny.
Compared to Good Spirits’ tender thesis — apologies mean you want to try again — the Door County novel ends up feeling cramped.
But both books sparked great conversation:
- Where does ambition belong in a love story?
- What counts as betrayal?
- Who gets to be the heroine when life is messy?
Final Sip
This season, pour something festive, slip into your buttery-soft Christmas pjs, and reach for holiday romances that warm you up without shrinking anyone to fit inside a snow-globe.
Cheers to love stories that actually feel loving. ❄️❤️🍸
Have you read either of these holiday romances? What did you think of them? Comment below! We’d love to hear from you. Interested in reading these Christmas novels yourself? You can purchase Good Spirits from The Ripped Bodice here or from Amazon here. Good Spirits is also available on Kindle, Audible, and Libro.fm. And you can get A Christmas Kind of Perfect on Amazon here. (It’s also available on Kindle.)
And to learn more about author B.K. Borison (one of Nicole’s all-time faves), click here. To learn more about Christine Schimpf, click here. Want to listen to the podcast episode? We’re available on pretty much all your favorite podcast streaming services. Or you can visit our podcast player page here.
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