“‘Maybe Christmas,’ he thought, ‘doesn’t come from a store. Maybe Christmas… perhaps… means a little bit more!’” – Dr. Seuss
I know it’s a little early to be pushing holiday books. Or maybe, in this case, I’m a little late, seeing as how this book came out in December of 2010. Well, better late than never, as the saying goes, which is pretty much what this lovely little Christmas romance is all about. It’s about the one that got away; it’s about second chances and the fact that it’s better to be fifteen years late reconnecting with your first love than never to have reconnected with him at all. It’s about having everything to gain and nothing to lose and stripping away all the boundaries you’ve built around yourself and embracing the one from your past who will, from this day forward, be your future.
Caleb Black left Owen McKenzie when they were both just eighteen-years-old, but not by his own choice. Caleb was the kid whose father couldn’t stand the thought of having a gay son, so he sent Caleb away to military school to rid himself of the daily reminder of his son’s perceived shortcomings. Caleb couldn’t find it in himself to say goodbye to Owen, and as the weeks turned into months, the months to years, enough time passed that Caleb began to believe in the suggestion that maybe what he and Owen had shared was more fiction than fact in Caleb’s mind, and it was best to leave the past buried in the past.
Enter one meddlesome brother and a best friend who both know neither Owen nor Caleb have ever truly gotten over each other; mix that with an ex who shows up at a decidedly inopportune time, a huge measure of serendipity, a snowstorm, as well as a sprig of mistletoe, and you’ve got the makings of a full-circle romance between two men who’re meant to be, though it took some help to connect the dots, and a long time for them to come together and close that circle.
Mistletoe at Midnight is a story about a first love that’s ingrained so deeply inside that it feels as though it’s always been a part of you, a feeling that never faded but was there all along, and all it needed was for a spark to be lit in order for it to burn again. It’s that love that’s the true gift and the miracle that makes this novella a pretty wonderful and very feel-good sort of read.