Every year there are dozens of holiday romances that are published in late summer through fall, and all of the Bookstagrammers I follow struggle to keep up with reading all of them. I can only read a handful of them before I get Holiday romance-ed out, but this post lists some of the best ones I’ve read over the last few years. I usually try to read half a dozen new ones and re-read 2-3 of my old favorites each holiday season.

Fake Dating for the Holidays

Snowed In – Catherine Walsh

This is the second book Catherine Walsh wrote in this series, so it was fun to see the main characters from Holiday Romance return. I thought a lot of elements of this story were really creative, which is hard to do in a fake dating holiday romance since that’s become such a common plot.

Kiss Her Once for Me – Alison Cochrun

This was a clever and unique idea for a fake dating book – I enjoyed it. I also really liked The Charm Offensive (not a holiday book) by Alison Cochrun – it’s like a fairytale version of the Bachelor.

Faking Christmas – Cindy Steel

This is a combo of a fake dating and enemies to romance book, which was fun. I also liked that it takes place in Vermont since we spent a week there the summer before I read this one.

Hometown Romances

The Billionaire Scrooge Next Door – Olivia Hayle

I’ve re-read this one a few times now – something about it just makes me happy. It’s got some classic holiday scenes like Christmas markets and a rough past relationship with Christmas (hence the scrooge in the title).

The Mistletoe Bet – Maren Moore

This one doesn’t have great reviews for some reason – I really enjoyed it. There’s a very Christmassy challenge going on through the book that makes it incredibly festive.

Single All the Way – Portia MacIntosh

I discovered Portia MacIntosh books while I was looking for a holiday book to listen to on Hoopla. She has a fun way of putting her characters in both funny and stressful situations at the same time.

Books with a Little Christmas Magic

A Little Magic – Lindsey Lanza

I saw this one everywhere on Bookstagram this year so I had to grab it, and it was really unexpected. The story felt unique but also had similar vibes to Love & Other Words by Christina Lauren. It’s the first book in the series so I’m looking forward to the next one already.

Landline – Rainbow Rowell

This is an older book that I read back in college for the first time; I re-read it last year and it was just as good as I remembered. Rainbow Rowell is one of my favorite authors of all time and she did a great job weaving a little bit of Christmas magic into this very real-feeling story.

One Christmas Morning – Rachel Greenlaw

This one is a nice break from classic holiday rom-coms because it has A Christmas Carol vibes, and there’s a lot of sad / heavy emotions going on. It gave me a lot to think about.

More Holiday Romances

A Very Merry Bromance – Lyssa Kay Adams

I don’t know that this one is for everyone, but since I’d read the other four in the series, I went ahead and read this one and liked it. I would probably read at least the first or second book in the series first and then read this, so you have a better idea of what the Bromance Book Club is.

Holiday Romance – Catherine Walsh

This is the first holiday book in the Holiday Romance series by Catherine Walsh – the second one is Snowed In, up in the first section of this post. I gave this one 5 stars and had a friend (@paperbackmegan) say that she wished all holiday romances could be written by Catherine Walsh, so this is definitely one to read.

Just Date and See – Portia MacIntosh

This was the first Portia MacIntosh book I’d read and I have to say the biggest takeaway for me was that she’s clever in her writing. I never knew where things were going, who was the “good guy” or “bad guy”, etc. She also puts in tons of cringe moments that made me laugh a lot.

Duke, Actually – Jenny Holiday

I enjoyed this story and listened to it on audiobook – it’s actually the second in the series but had better reviews so I read it first, and I still haven’t made my way back to the first one (A Princess for Christmas).

Royal Holiday – Jasmine Guillory

This was one of the first books I read when I was getting into romance books in 2019. I can’t quite remember why I picked it up, but it’s a unique book because it’s about a couple later in life instead of the usual contemporary romance couple in their 20’s – 30’s. It’s another unique storyline that I was impressed with.

Holiday Novellas

If the Fates Allow – Rainbow Rowell

Rainbow Rowell can do no wrong in my eyes, so that’s probably something to keep in mind – I think what I really appreciated about this novella is that (whether you agreed with it or not) it captured the mindset so many of us had in COVID when there was so much uncertainty surrounding COVID during that first holiday season in 2021.