Could a fake relationship with your ex over Christmas in Scotland be the perfect opportunity for revenge—or a second chance at love? One woman is about to find out in this charming holiday romance from the author of Always, in December and A Winter Wish.
Melanie hasn’t had a good year. Her work life isn’t what she dreamed it would be, her best friend has moved to the other side of the world, and Finn, the man she was sure was the love of her life, dumped her. In front of everyone. At his sister’s engagement party.
So when Finn shows up at Mel’s doorstep two weeks before Christmas, asking if she’ll help him, her first instinct is to slam the door in his face—or punch him.
But he has a proposal for her: Spend the week of Christmas with him and his family in a vacation cottage in the Scottish Highlands. His mother is obsessed with the idea of a perfect Christmas—and to make this dream come true Finn told his mother that he and Mel are dating again. All Mel has to do is come with him and pretend they’re back together.
Mel may hate Finn, but she loves his mom. So she agrees—on one condition. At the end of the week, Finn will allow Mel to publicly dump him so that she can get her dignity back and he can experience the same humiliation she felt.
It’s only a week. Mel can pretend to still be in love with Finn for one week, surely. Except as the festivities bring her closer than ever to Finn and his family, Mel starts to lose track of which feelings are fake and which are for real.
Purchase Link: Yours for the Season
Yours for the Season by Emily Stone
Christmas romance • fake dating • second chances
I chose Yours for the Season because Emily Stone is my favorite Christmas author, and I anxiously await her new book every single holiday season. Reading her Christmas novels has become one of my most anticipated traditions, and this one absolutely lived up to everything I hoped it would be.
My reading experience was exactly what I wanted it to be. The story was Christmassy, cozy, emotional, romantic, and quietly tragic in that very specific Emily Stone way. It felt like walking onto the set of a heartfelt Christmas movie, the kind where you become so emotionally invested in the characters and their story that you never want to leave. Finishing the book felt bittersweet, because closing it meant stepping away from a world I had completely settled into.
The story is built around a fake dating trope, which is always such a fun setup, but Emily Stone adds emotional weight and depth that makes it feel anything but shallow. The present-day storyline follows Melanie and Finn, who have broken up for reasons that are not immediately revealed. Finn has told his family that they are back together and convinces Melanie to join him for a Christmas getaway, pretending to still be a couple. His family loved her and never understood why they broke up, and he did not want to disappoint them during the holidays.
Alongside the present-day tension, we get flashbacks to when Melanie and Finn were actually together. Their relationship felt deeply connected, loving, and genuinely happy. Seeing how strong they once were made the present-day situation feel even more emotionally charged. As a reader, you are constantly trying to piece together what went wrong, why they broke up, and whether what they had is something that can be repaired. The dual timeline worked beautifully, building both romance and suspense as the story unfolded.
The characters were once again one of the strongest parts of the book. Emily Stone writes people with such warmth and empathy, even when they are flawed or make mistakes. Melanie and Finn felt incredibly real. Through the layered timelines, you truly fall in love with them as a couple and find yourself rooting for them, hoping that the reason for their breakup is not something that will keep them apart forever.
The side characters were equally compelling. This was not an easy Christmas for anyone. Nearly everyone was carrying something heavy, and the holiday felt strained beneath the surface cheer. Family members and friends were all dealing with their own struggles, and those emotional undercurrents gave the story a lot of depth. I felt genuinely connected to Finn’s family, and even though Melanie’s family was not as front and center, they still felt fully formed and important. By the end, it felt like I was part of this family, invested in all of them, not just the central couple.
Beyond the romance, the overarching theme of the book was communication, or rather, the lack of it. Almost every character was holding something back, not out of selfishness, but out of empathy. They did not want to disappoint anyone or cause pain. That lack of communication created distance, tension, and misunderstandings, and it made the story feel almost like a mystery at times. You are constantly trying to figure out what people are not saying and why. When those truths finally come to light, they are met with love, compassion, and support. It was a beautiful reminder that honesty, even when it is hard, does not diminish love. It deepens it.
My final thoughts are simple. I loved this book. Yours for the Season was another winner for me, and it only reaffirmed why Emily Stone remains my favorite Christmas author. I will be counting down the days until Christmas 2026 so I can read whatever she gives us next.
The following excerpt is quoted from Emily Stone’s Amazon profile:
“I write Christmas romances – most of which span a whole year or more. Yours for the Season is my newest novel and might just be my favourite yet. It’s a fun enemies to lovers, second chance romance. I love reading this trope, so I had so much fun writing this one!
My other four novels are A Winter Wish (or Home Again for Christmas in the UK), Love, Holly (or The Christmas Letter in the UK), One Last Gift, and Always, in December. In one way or another, my novels deal with love and grief, as I think the intersection of the two is so interesting. I think there is a part of me in each – as I’m sure every author feels!
Always, in December was my debut novel, and as such it will always be one close to my heart. Whilst very different from me, the protagonist, Josie is suffering with a grief that I know all too well – losing a parent/parents at a young age, and having to carry that grief into adulthood, long after it’s supposedly ‘gone away’. I lost my mum when I was seven, and I still think about her even now, in my thirties – and that’s something that Josie and I share. Max, too, is suffering his own kind of grief, and that’s something that he has to learn to deal with. But whilst the novel is about grief, and learning to live with that, it’s also about falling in love, and about learning to be brave, even when your life doesn’t feel quite right yet – even if it feels like it will never quite be right!
I wrote my first two novels in a glorious Victorian manor house in Wales, whilst living with my sister and my two nieces. My third book I wrote on the English coastline in Cornwall – so I consider myself very lucky! I now live in Bristol with a newly acquired rescue dog. I spend a lot of time at the stables with my two rescue ponies, as well as reading and writing – and the occasional pub trip!
Emily is a pseudonym – I also write speculative romance under my real name, Becky Hunter, and I am the co-author of fantasy romance BLOOD BOUND by Ellis Hunter. If you read any of my novels then thank you, and I really hope you enjoy! If you want to get in touch then I’d love to hear from you – I’m on Instagram under @EmStoneWrites.”
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