Such a sweet lovely Christmas novel - I devoured this on my couch, perfectly cozy one weekend around the holidays -- I would highly recommend the exact same vibe to any readers interested in this novel.

"A Merry Little Meet Cute" was my first book by either author; overall it was a bit of a mixed bag for me.

I loved how sex and body positive the story was and it was a super fun premise. It was so fun to have all of the porn industry people "hiding" on the set and that led to some genuinely funny moments.

There was some super great chemistry but I didn't end up buying the deeper connection between our MCs - we only saw a couple deeper conversations (and this was after they've already said how much they feel for each other), so I didn't feel like that was paced out very well.

Additionally, there were a few too many subplots going on to keep my interest totally engaged, but overall this was a quick fun read!

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

This was pretty fun! Porn star gets cast in a hallmark Christmas duke movie with a washed up boyband star looking for his comeback. As always, good bisexual rep; generally believable drama with real issues. Not too tidy resolution.

I wasn't quite connecting with this one and I had to DNF with the possibility of picking up in the future. Bahhhh, I hate doing this. Thank you for the opportunity to read the book and I apologize for the inconvenience.

The cover of this book is A++. That's unfortunately the only thing I really loved about it. It was fine, but as soon as i finished it I couldn't tell you what it was about. Nothing for it or against it.

I had heard this book was spicy but WOW I was still caught off guard! However, I really enjoyed it (as I do everything I've read by Julie Murphy) and I'll definitely be looking into Sierra Simone's titles now as well.

I was excited to read this author duo for the first time and I was so put off by the first 10% of this book. I can see the appeal to a very specific group of readers but unfortunately I am not in that percentage so I decided to DNF.

Love. Love love. A quick and quaint read. Was a joy to read and a page turner. Thank you.

I read each book in the series and they were awesome

I always love when Murphy and Simone team up because they blend so well together. Their stories are the perfect blend of dirty and rom-com vibes. They're always a winning team and I look forward to their books.

A Merry Little Meet Cute is a decidedly more spicy and sexy read than the typical holiday fare. It's like if the adult film star couple from The Holiday had a storyline. And, it's by a dynamic duo of authors. It's definitely worth checking out if you want something a little more naughty that still has a lot of heart.

Many thanks to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for sharing this book with me. All thoughts are my own.

3.5 stars. Hmm, this holiday romance between pornstar Bee and former boy band star Nolan meeting on the set of a Hallmark-style Christmas movie was cute enough and certainly spicy, but maybe 100 ish pages too long?

I liked that the authors had a clear intention of sex positivity and showing sex work as real work. I liked the juxtaposition of a porn star and a crew of porn staff pulling off the chaste holiday romance (even though the plot of Duke the Halls sounded truly bonkers). I liked Bee and Nolan and their chemistry. I think Nolan's mom's bipolar disorder was not entirely done well-- a sensitivity reader may have helped.

Honestly, it made no sense that Bee didn't have a plan for when the porn cat got out of the bag with the Hope Channel. Assuming viewers of holiday romance movies and porn viewers are two circles of viewers that don't overlap is naive at best.

Read if you enjoy:
- fat woman rep
- Bi for Bi 😍
- small town Vermont Christmas town setting
- Christmas movie setting
- medium to high spice
- a cast of chaotic porn support staff trying to pull off a cutesy Christmas movie
- sex work as real work
- grappling with purity culture

This is a cute story about a sex worker and a former pop-star filming what is basically a fictional version of a Hallmark movie.

Yes, the story is sex positive, sex worker positive, sex industry positive. Fat positive. Features two bisexual main characters.

But the subtle commentary on how expensive health care/health insurance is, and how the characters try to deny themselves what for themselves to keep jobs so that they can afford health insurance for themselves or family.

It's really not more than a few throwaway lines, but it might cause a person to think what jobs they might take to keep/afford health insurance.

I'm going to go download the ebook between two of the secondary characters, and hope I read that before next year. And I look forward to book 2 in the series which comes out in about two weeks. Hopefully I'll read it before it's a year out.

A MERRY LITTLE MEET CUTE just recently came out in paperback, so if you didn't want to lug around a hardcover book, now would be a good time to get the book.

I requested this ARC because I loved Julie Murphy’s If the Shoe Fits last year. I’ve never read anything by Sierra Simone before, but I know from BookTok that her writing is ✨spicy✨ so I had to see how their two styles worked together. It did not disappoint.
I absolutely loved the Christmas town setting and holiday references. You would think a holiday-themed strip club or gingerbread line would be a little over the top, but it worked so well. I also loved how positive this book was about body and sex. Bee was completely comfortable with her size and career choice. Her size was just one aspect of who she was, not her entire person, and although she kept her job secret for the majority of the book, she never felt shame for working in adult film. More importantly, her love interest never made her feel shame for either of these things either, which was a major green flag.
Bee and Nolan’s relationship was the perfect mix of sweet and spicy. The fact that they were both each other’s celebrity crushes was adorable, and their chemistry and banter were off the charts. Also, they were both bisexual disasters, which I am a total sucker for.
If you’re looking for something that captures the spirit of a Hallmark Christmas movie but is smutty as hell, A Merry Little Meet Cute is a must-read. Simone and Murphy’s writing flowed so seamlessly that I honestly couldn’t tell it was written by two people. I loved the world they created and can’t wait for more in this series.

I was so excited for this book due to the unique holiday premise. However, the execution was just not there and I'm sad to say it!  


I do appreciate NetGalley and publishers for this ebook for an honest review.

This book was not at all what I was expecting, but in a good way! From looking at this cover, I was expecting a cute and warm holiday read, and then I read the excerpt and loved how completely wrong I was and how the premise of this book is nothing like any other holiday romance I've read! This book is jam packed with SPICE and dives into a positive narrative about sex workers and some of the ins and outs of those in that field. This was a refreshing holiday romance and I'm looking forward to reading Julie and Sierra's next book!

Playing a little catch up in my backlog of holiday books this month. I was excited to pick this up as I have heard about how good & spicy this book is -more so lately as a second book by these authors has also just been released. I reallllly loved the concept of a porn star breaking into more traditional film rolls- and in the process, falling in love with her childhood celebrity crush. As a plus size woman myself, it was refreshing to read about main character who looks like me. And Nolan? Girl the way he talks about Bee and how beautiful her body is? Perfection. I enjoyed following their story. The spice was also 100%

One critique that I will give is that it did get kinda cheesy and I was frustrated with the lack of communication when it came to the conflict.

Teddy has a problem. He’s producing a movie for the pristine Hope Channel, a holiday movie that is being shot over Christmas. He has less than three weeks to complete filming in Christmas Notch, Vermont. And his leading actress has had to pull out of the film at the last minute. And when he was talking to his director Gretchen about a replacement, she noticed someone who caught her eye. Gretchen insisted on her, a voluptuous edgy actress she’d not seen in anything before. So he called up Bee Hobbes and asked her to star in the Hope Channel movie he was producing, Duke the Halls.

Technically, Bee worked for Teddy already. But she worked under for his Uncle Ray-Ray production company that also produced movies with a quick turnaround. But those were adult films, and she starred in them as Bianca von Honey. Now, she’s Bee Hobbes, a young actress with a squeaky clean reputation, or the whole project would be scrapped. And she really wanted to make this movie, especially since he costar is none other than Nolan Shaw.

Nolan Shaw was a member of the boy band INK, the bisexual bad boy who squandered a lot of his earnings before his sketchy manager took off with the rest. Now he’s living in Kansas City and working at a local theater. His mother struggles with her mental health, and he didn’t want to leave her alone with his younger sister Maddie, who is still in school, but filming Duke the Halls is his first step in rehabilitating his reputation and proving he can be a responsible performer. Plus, he could really use the money for his mother’s health care.

Nolan is committed to keeping his head down and his nose clean. But then he finds out that his costar, Bee Hobbes, is the same woman who haunts his fantasies as well as his phone. He is a subscriber to her ClosedDoors account, and meeting Bianca von Honey in person is almost enough for him to forget about why he’s there. Almost.

And then they kiss.

The first scene they film is toward the end of the movie, where the duke and the time-traveling runaway bride declare their love for each other and kiss. And the kiss is far hotter than either Bee or Nolan expects. Or maybe they did expect that, as Bee was a fan of Nolan back when he was in the boy band and she was in high school, and Nolan is a fan of Bianca.

Now all they have to do is keep filming this chaste film for a channel known for its modesty, with a producer who makes adult movies and a script with no ending (the screenwriter, Gretchen’s girlfriend, can’t seem to figure out that last line about what Christmas means), in a town that doubles as a set for holiday movies. Everything has to be by the book. Unsullied. Squeaky clean.

So no one can know when Bee and Nolan start hooking up in secret.

And that’s when Dominic Diamond, the reporter who destroyed Nolan’s career the first time, shows up to town.

Will Bee and Nolan be able to survive all the forces trying to keep them apart? Or will they find their own happily ever after after all?

A Merry Little Meet Cute is an extra spicy holiday rom com with lots of laughs and lots of very hot love scenes. The characters are likable, smart and compassionate and accepting. The juxtaposition of the adult film industry insiders working on the Hope Channel movie offers lots of room for hijinks, but there is also a respect for all lifestyles.

I listened to A Merry Little Meet Cute, with Bee’s chapters narrated by Joy Nash and Nolan’s chapters narrated by Sebastian York. I thought both of them were perfect in their roles, bringing these characters to life, with all their snark and intelligence. However, there were scenes that would make listening to this book awkward in public, so that’s something to keep in mind as you listen.

I loved A Merry Little Meet Cute. I thought it was engaging and charming, and it offers a different perspective on holiday shenanigans and those holiday movies on that greeting card channel. It is extra spicy, so prepare for those ghost pepper moments (or maybe I’m just used to vanilla rom coms). But this book is lots of fun and filled with life and laughter.

Egalleys for A Merry Little Meet Cute were provided by Avon through NetGalley, but I bought the audio book myself through Chirp.

I always go in blind on my reads and basically only know the title, genre, and cover for my reads! Do not let this cover make you think this is some sweet little Christmas story because it’s not! It’s a STEAMY Christmas read and I’m so here for it! Forbidden romance, workplace romance, and so much more in this one! I loved how inclusive this story was! Yay for a LGBTQ+ Christmas book!!

A wonderful wintertime romance with a plus size main character and a former member of a fictious boyband! This had great steamy romance scenes and an engaging story of dealing with life problems.

A Merry Little Meet Cute came out in 2022, but I finally got around to reading and reviewing it in October 2023, preparing for the authors’ second in the series. Many thanks to Avon and Harper Voyager for the NetGalley ARC in exchange for my honest opinion, and my apologies for not getting to it sooner!
I don’t know why I put it off for that long - it was a fun, spicy book! The premise is great - a producer of adult films wants to branch out from that indutry and gets hired to produce a Christmas movie for a religious channel. When one of the stars is forced to drop out because of a scandal, Teddy the producer accidentally shows the director a headshot for one of his female nude models. The director insists on hiring her, and Teddy ends up hiring other behind the scenes personnel from his adult film gigs. The male star, who needs to redeem his bad boy image, recognizes the female star, as he’s been a subscriber to her adult film videos for awhile, but he hides this knowledge from her. Many hijinks ensue, but all in all it was quite a fun read (which I partially listened to via audiobook, too).