Member Reviews

It took me a while to get into Nell as she first appears as a very meek and timid person. However, in the spirit of the holiday, the book evolved to a point where I took pleasure in reading it and exploring the character development. It ended positively and made me want to further explore her future path.

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Great holiday read Light and full of holiday spirit.

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I am normally a big fan of this author's books, but I was disappointed in this one. The characters and their storylines were all so negative, the entire book except for the very end was just depressing. Not at all what I would expect from a Christmas-themed book.

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Cute story, a lot of jumping to conclusions but it all worked out in the end. Nell, Molly and Felicity make a great family and when others are thrown into the mix everything comes out ok.

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Holly Chamberlin tells one of the sweetest, gentlest Christmas romance stories in this book, something certain to please those of us who think that Hallmark's Christmas movies are the highlight of the year.

Nell and her two daughters live in a cozy farmhouse in a small Maine seaside town, where Nell works part time as an office manager for a veterinarian, older daughter Molly is a senior in college, and younger daughter Felicity is a senior in high school. Nell knows she is facing an empty nest: Molly is certain to get engaged to her solid, steady boyfriend Mick, and Felicity is headed to Michigan for college. Nell's life is not where she thought it would be, but that is due less to her divorce than to decisions she made - decisions she allowed to be made for her - years earlier.

When Molly announces that she doesn't think she wants to marry Mick and thinks it's best to break up with him, Nell is shocked. She feels unable to help her oldest daughter avoid certain heartache. Felicity, on the other hand, has attached herself to the fame and globetrotting of her glamorous stepmother. This causes a different sort of pain to Nell, who begins to think that she has lost herself in being a mother and homemaker. When she reconnects with a past love, she can't help but question how she got where she is.

Holly Chamberlin offsets the occasional melodrama with an ongoing subplot involving Nell's determination to bake her way into the greatest Christmas ever. It is hilarious, and it also made me start thinking about what I will bake this Christmas.

Back to the story.

Felicity is just an awful person. Her insensitivity to her mother is horrifying, yet it is also real. She's seventeen. What seventeen-year-old wouldn't want a Rolex and to spend Christmas skiing in Switzerland? The problem isn't so much Felicity's self-involvement as her abrupt change. It doesn't work well and feels forced. The same with Molly's second thoughts.

The one thing that works is Nell's renewed relationship with her first love. If you're going to write a Christmas romance, you want to have something like that.

This is a sweet, clean romance. There is nothing even the tiniest bit sexy. It's like a Christmas cookie in that way: sweet, clean, and impossible to resist.

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This is a nice book loaded with Christmas tempered by dismay. Best intentions are thwarted by the actions of others and cause hurt feelings and confusion.
All Nell intends to do is create the best Christmas ever for her two nest leaving daughters, Molly and Felicity. But, Molly is determined to end her six year relationship with Mick and Felicity is planning to spend the holidays in Switzerland with her father and step-mother. Nell reconnects with her first love, Eric, which adds some romance to the plot.

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Home for Christmas by Holly Chamberlin
Have read other works by this author and have found the books enjoyable as I know this one will be.
Nell is decorating for the holidays-love hearing everything that is involved as we would do that at our family house every year as well.
Loved hearing of all the memories of the ornaments.
She thinks this could be the last Christmas holiday she and the girls spend together in Yorktide, Maine. Molly is about to be married and Felicity will be traveling with her father and step mother to England countries.
Her ex Joel had younger female interests. She had once was going to be a poet and marry Eric but she broke it off in college.
She wants to make this year the best the girls ever experienced in Maine and might go to Eric's reading at the store...
Lots of twists and turns for all. Liked all the baking as that's what I do starting in Nov so I can mail them out in time.
Loved hearing of Nell's knitting and other hand made crafts and ornaments for the girls. Love that she will give them each something of importance. I do similar when we visit my daughter and granddaughter. They get a piece of jewelry I am wearing as it will then belong to them. Why hold it til you die and then others may fight over it.
After extensive talks with one another about the important things, doorbell ringing all day, outcome is phenomenal.
Received this review copy via Kensington Books via Netgalley and this is my honest opinion.

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I enjoy Holly Chamberlin's books. I have excited to read this for months when I saw it was coming.
I look forward to one of her books. I was excited to read this ARC.

I adore Christmas time.
I become a child again.
I treasure Christmas books.

The descriptions of Christmas and the decorations for Nell and her family made me envision them.
I could see it all around me.
The feelings of attempting to keep children close to home and heart; especially during Holidays will ring true for any mother. The feelings of being an integral part of child's lives are good/bad.

I want more of this family- I want to know what comes next!!
This was a wonderful read! I recommend

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I liked this book. Nell is a single mother that is anticipating soon having an empty nest, and she is going overboard trying to make the "last Christmas" at home before her girls move on to other things in life as memorable as possible. She spends a lot of time doing special crafts, baking, and doing other things that seem to be lost on her daughters. As a mother, I definitely identify with Nell - how many times have I stayed up late before a holiday or a big day to try to make things "perfect" - yet the efforts are barely, if at all, noticed by your child.

Throughout the story, while Nell is desperately trying to hold on to her daughters and her identity as a mother, she is also working toward finding herself again. As her oldest daughter struggles in a relationship, she looks back at the choices she made when she was younger, and who she was before she was a mother.

Of course, a good Christmas read should be positive, fun, and have some surprises - this book delivers on all fronts!

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Nell weathered the storm after her husband left her and raised her daughters is a lovely little home in Yorktide, Maine. They have had a full and happy life, but now that Nell’s daughters are about to leave the nest, she’s unsure what’s next for her. If she’s not a mother, what is she? Meanwhile, her daughters, Molly and Felicity are having growing pains of their own. Torn between love and loyalty to their mother and the desire to strike out on their own is leaving the girls torn and confused. This was such a realistic portrait of a family, a really nice family, that it struck a chord in me, as I too face a daughter about to head off to college. Sincere and touching

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