Holiday Romance is one of those books where you read first 10 pages and then say to yourself ‘ooooh this is going to be good.’ I LOVED this story. The grumpy sunshine + friends to lovers tropes are two of my favourites and are so well written in this book. And the banter was 10/10! Now I must go read everything else Catherine Walsh!

Such a good book. Interesting mix of past and present with some great humor. Friends to lovers with an amazing male mc you'll swoon for.

The holiday book to add to your reading list this season!!!

For the past nine years, Molly and Andrew took the same flight from Chicago to Ireland for the holidays. Through these flights, they have become the best of friends. When their tenth and current flight gets canceled due to a storm, the two decide that they will do anything to get back home for Christmas and what follows is one long and unexpected travel journey.

I read Catherine Walsh's The Rebound earlier this year and loved the Ireland set romance, but her upcoming release totally exceeded my expectations and ticked all the boxes. It's hilarious, lighthearted, uplifting in every way and has only a tiny conflict at the end, which was refreshing. I loved Molly and Andrew's friendship and how open and honest they were with each other throughout the book. Plus, all of their adventures as they traveled led to some great shenanigans, banter and humor.

Read if you like:
-Holiday adventures
-Best friends to lovers
-Irish wit and humor
-Low conflict and lighthearted stories
-Family bonding moments
-Hallmark movies

Pub date 10/4!!

Five twinkling Christmas stars for this happy lil Christmas gift in a book that made me feel all kinds of happy! Catherine Walsh has such a way of creating realistic worlds that keep me hooked without any unrealistic or infuriating drama. Her characters actually… communicate?? Work through their issues as adults?? Don't create more problems for themselves for the sake of a good story?? Weird, I know. But Walsh doesn't need it. She takes us into a world where all we need is to watch these two friends/airplane buddies fall in love. Even the promised travel shenanigans to get Andrew home to Ireland for Christmas never cross over into the unrealistic or absurd (something I was dreading, if I'm honest).

I love both Molly and Andrew and their mature and realistic confrontation of their issues. It's so refreshing when you finish a book and actually believe the pair is going to make it because they can communicate properly! Their banter and comebacks had me actually laughing out loud more times than my husband appreciated at 1am, for some reason. Walsh also knows how to write the best secondary characters; Andrew's family, in particular, reminded me of the crazy family in While You Were Sleeping (which is, dare I say, a top romcom of all time?) and that just made me even happier.

Anyway. Please do yourself a solid and indulge in this cup of holiday cheer. You won't regret it.

I absolutely devoured this. It’s 3 am. We’re in the midst of another terrible heatwave, and sleep seems utterly out of the question. The solution? A Holiday Romance novel! Literally. Very fitting and very aptly named indeed. Needless to say I stayed up till 7 am reading this and the birds are now chirping outside my window as I type up this review.

Molly and Andrew are two unlikely friends who have a longstanding tradition that started by accident of flying from Chicago to Ireland every Christmas. Due to a cancelled flight they have to race around multiple countries and different connecting flights to get home to their families before Christmas. These two were a delight to read. I loveeee the ‘friends-to-lovers, mutual-pining-but-neither-wants-to-ruin-the-friendship’ trope. And this one was done extremely well. The banter between Molly and Andrew really give off the impression that these two are good friends who genuinely enjoy each other’s company. The chemistry is also great, and I love that we get to see snippets of what each flight together over the 10 years was like.

Overall, I can’t recommend this book enough if you are in the mood for a swoony, funny (lil bit steamy) romance novel! 5 stars!

Molly and Andrew have a long standing tradition of sharing a flight from Chicago back to Ireland and on their 10th anniversary a freak snowstorm derails their plans. What follows is a dual timeline tale, chronically both their previous flights as well as as today.

A friends to lovers story that is full of friendship, comedy and a good dose of Christmas - perfect for the festive season!

Removing a star for a personal pet peeve of mine which is Irish (or British) characters using American English, I find it incredibly jarring and kept pulling me out of the story at random points.

This is the story of Molly and Andrew and how they find love in each other during a very long journey to home for Christmas. The story switches between present and past 10 Christmas holidays. Initially I was a little wary of the plot because I don’t like the idea of MCs pining for so long. But this two only had platonic feelings for each other(most of the time!!). This actually made the story very realistic because they don’t put their lives on pause for each other.
At present, the flight to their hometown is canceled and as Andrew loves his family, Molly thinks of every way for them to reach home. She also gets confuse about her feelings for Andrew because of their first kiss!
The only complain I have is that I did find a good enough grasp on Andrew’s personality. I know he is funny, sarcastic and loves his family. But that’s it. I would have liked a little more insight on his side of story but sadly the book is only in Molly’s POV.
This is a short friends to lovers holiday rom com with witty banter!
Thanks to Net Galley for the opportunity to read this ARC.

Holiday Romance was every magical bit of banter, lovable characters, and romance I could’ve hoped for. Catherine Walsh has won my heart yet again with these genuine main characters. Her balance of present and flashbacks to previous flights set up a beautiful narration to really understand and get to know Andrew and Molly. This is a book with light spice and more of the wholesome holiday “Hallmark movie” feel.

Molly is so relatable and I really saw some of myself in her decisions and hesitancy of change. Risk, whether a job or relationship, is a difficult thing to navigate. Andrew and his entire family was so pure and funny. They are the golden retrievers, the cinnamon rolls, the wholesome Brady bunch of the book. The character growth for Molly and Andrew is both astounding and believable. The romance flowed naturally and didn’t feel forced. Friends to lovers has never been my go-to trope but Walsh might have set the bar pretty high for all following books with how well this was done.

This was a cute and firmly grounded holiday romcom! I really loved both Molly and Andrew, and they naturally worked so well together to make a believable romance. Their families were fun, as was seeing Molly grow into someone who could aim for happiness. This romcom is full of hope. Highly recommend!

Holiday Romance is a charming Christmas rom com that I absolutely adored! Molly and Andrew are friends that travel home to Ireland for Christmas every year on the same flight, and we meet them on their 10th flight home. We get small flashbacks for each of their previous flights and get to see how their friendship has developed over time. On their tenth year, their flight is canceled and Molly decides she has to help Andrew get home for Christmas no matter how far out of the way they have to travel.

If you like a good friends to lovers romance, you will love this book! The characters are written realistically and their friendship and bond is well established. Their families are great supporting characters that I loved reading about. This was such a feel good book that I will need to buy and have a copy of so that I can read it every winter! I loved the author’s writing style, with great banter and Christmas descriptions that made me ready for the holidays to begin.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture for this fantastic ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

Thank you to Net Galley and the publisher for providing me with a free copy of the novel in return for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This is a sweet romance to curl up with on a winter’s night. The plot is charming and the protagonists don’t feel overly Christmassy/saccharine which is sometimes the case with books set at Christmas.

I liked that Molly was faced with decisions about her career and whether this made her happy. I think this was done in a realistic fashion including her fear of what-ifs of leaving and not knowing her next steps in life without the career she is familiar with.

Andrew is also a great ‘hero’ - he’s not just the ‘sunshine’ or ‘grumpy’ hero - his moods change and are impacted by events like anyones would be (again not always the case in romances where people are sometimes defined by one trait/emotion).

The flashbacks gave an important insight into the relationship the characters have developed over years. However, I would have enjoyed at least on chapter (or an epilogue) from Andrew’s perspective.

The travel time could have been delved into more (rather than the plans) just to see more interaction between Molly and Andrew.

I really enjoyed the introduction of Oliver as a brief supporting character, but hoped that the parallel between his friendship with Lara and the relationship between Andrew and Molly could have been explored more.

Overall, a great festive read - easy reading and sweet!

I absolutely loved this book. I could not put it down and read it in one day. It was the perfect Christmas book that I’ve been looking for. I loved the tradition of Molly and Andrew flying from Chicago back to Ireland for the last 10 years for Christmas, I thought that it was super cute premise.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

"Google career options for tired girls who still want to afford their nice apartment."
...Well, that's alarmingly relatable.

"Holiday Romance" comes out in early October. It's the 1st of September as I'm writing this, which is to say, not a time of year that I typically reach for a Christmas romance, but I liked "The Rebound" and "One Night Only" so much that I requested this ARC as soon as it popped up.

This book had sort of a "People We Meet on Vacation" vibe, in that the two MCs have been traveling together for years. The difference is that Molly and Andrew specifically meet up every year to fly home from Chicago to Dublin for Christmas, and have done so for the past decade. When we meet, Molly is facing the sad fact that she's unhappy with her life-consuming career, and oh yeah, a gigantic storm means they basically have to fly around the world for 3 straight days to make it home.

Molly and Andrew had great banter and, while I'm not going to go down with this ship, I thought they were very cute and was cheering for them to get together the whole time. This was pretty low angst and pretty low spice, both of which I'd expect from a Christmas romance. There was a bit of manufactured conflict about 90% of the way in, which we definitely could've done without, but it (obviously) got resolved pretty quickly.

One of the things I really like about Walsh's writing is how well she depicts sister relationships. I've seen this dynamic in 2 of her 3 books (plus the 3rd had a friendship that was close to sisterhood) and I understand why because she freaking nails it. I have two sisters myself, and the way the characters love each other but don't always get along - plus the constantly talking shit - is really accurate. I honestly think Walsh nails this dynamic better than a lot of authors I've read, even outside the romance genre.

All in all, a solid read for anyone looking for a little holiday magic or just some solid banter.

Holiday Romance is such a cute Christmas romance! It was a sweet book that shared the history of two friends who travel back home to Ireland on the same flight for the past 10 years. Between flashbacks and current travel the reader really what a sense of the history between these two opposites and watch their relationship grow into romance.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC and for letting me get to read it so early. I am no ready for Hallmark Christmas movies and need to get started on my shopping!

This was a really christmasy novel. I enjoyed the story and how it unfolded. I liked the ideea of flight-to-home-for -Christmas and how the author interchanged past with present.
On the end of the book I felt the book dragged a little and I couldn’t wait for Molly and Andrew to get the “real discussion”, to get back.
On certain replies, Andrew called Molly “you, idiot”, in a loving/familiar way if you can say, but I wish that wasn’t part of his discours.
Now, I can’t wait for Christmas and will place this book on top of my christmas booklist.

Thank you for an advanced copy.
This is my first book by Catherine Walsh and I can gladly say I am a fan. 'Holiday Romance' is cozy, laugh-out-loud funny, sweet Christmassy love story about a decade of friendship and the gradual way of falling in love.
The main characters were phenomenal and so real with Molly being extremely relatable, down to earth and very likable and Andrew, a sarcastic af, hilarious, adorable and sexy. The book is not very spicy but the tension (even after their first two kisses) was palpable, I couldn't stop reading and rooting for them.
Undoubtedly, the side characters deserve a mention too. Both families were so special, showing different sides of holiday spirit, with obvious understanding that Christmas is about coming together and dedicating these few sacred days every year to show just how much they miss each other and care for one another. (Lowkey hoping there's a universe where Christian and Zoe fall madly in love and spend their lives together)

Loved the flashbacks to previous yearly flights and unique way that the author did not put some meaningless argument or a miscommunication before their reunion in the present chapters.

I'm usually a fan of dual POV book but there was nothing I didn't like about this book and I read it in one sitting. Definitely goes in my top 3 holiday romances and my TBR to read again during the Christmas holiday.

Andrew and Molly filled me up with joy. This novel has taken a special place in my heart. From the characters to the story to the writing, it has succedeed in making me cry.
I will now proceed to re-read because I may have read it too fast for my liking and I need to process it again, because I need to feel happiness again.

I was given a copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion. This book was everything for a Christmas lover. I am well aware that it is August but I'm Canadian so it will basically be winter in like a month anyway. I loved the characters, I loved the plot, I loved everything about it. I have always said that the best romance books focus on more than romance and this one does a great job of incorporating elements like work, family and personal growth. I think I spent about 60% of it grinning and the other 40% laughing. I loved that the third act twist avoided the same pitfall that most romance novels pull. It kept the story organic and fun. This book is perfect for Christmas lovers and I would specifically recommend it for fans of Beth O'Leary's the Flatshare.

I absolutely loved this Christmas love story. Leaping back and forth through the years kept it interesting and I read it in one sitting. It was wonderful to see the dynamics of families who only get to see each other each Christmas due to living so far apart as well as the relationships between siblings. I will definitely check out more from this author now. Thank you netgalley.

A wonderful cosy Christmas read 🎄grab a blanket a hot chocolate and snuggle down with this!
It has got me in the festive mood in Aug!!