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It’s my 15th fake Christmas, and my first as a ghost.
Writer, I mean. It’s my first Christmas as a ghostwriter. I should probably have made that clear from the start, shouldn’t I? Honestly, this is the kind of thing that’s probably going to get me fired one day. Okay, let me try this again…
It’s my 15th fake Christmas here in Bramblebury — a village obsessed with two things:
Christmas itself.
My ex-boyfriend, Elliot Sinclair, who once wrote a bestselling book — which then became a blockbuster movie — set right here in the village, and based heavily on our 23-day relationship, which ended ten years ago: on Christmas Eve, no less.
No wonder I hate Christmas, rom-com movies, and Elliot Sinclair — although not necessarily in that order — right? It would be hardnotto hate all of those things when they’re practically forced down your throat every December, when Bramblebury is transformed from just your averagely picturesque village into The Most Christmassy Place on Earth.™?
(Yes, our village is really called ‘Bramblebury’, by the way, as if it’s in Middle Earth, rather than the middle of England. Sickening, isn’t it? Then again, my parents named me Holly Hart, like a plucky Victorian orphan who might one day get a job as a governess, so I can’t really talk…)
Bramblebury mightlookadorably festive, though, but, like I say, it’s all fake.
The snow on the window of the bookstore my dad owns, for instance, is fake; it’s this weird foamy stuff that comes in a spray can, and it’ll be absolute hell to scrape it off again in January, but Dad’s been on a mission to make the place look like a shop (or a ‘shoppe’ rather…) from Charles Dickens’ times, and the tourists have been lapping it up like Oliver Twist finally getting that second bowl of watery gruel, so who am I to argue?
I’m just the resident ghost —writer— who haunts the bookstore, desperately trying to divide her time between managing the shop and writing ‘motivational’ self-help books for people whose lives are evenmoreof a mess than mine is.
And trust me, that’s really saying something.
“They’ll be putting up the Christmas tree soon. And the snow globe.”
My assistant manager, Paris, appears from the storeroom — which also doubles as my office — balancing a large stack of paperbacks on one hip, and doing her best to sound like she’s too cool to be excited by the news she’s just shared, even though I know perfectly well she’s had a countdown to today on her phone for weeks now, and is planning to livestream most of it to her 18,000 followers on Bookstagram.
Although she’s technically supposed to be my assistant, Paris has been basically running the show ever since I started my ghostwriting side-gig, and had to take a step back. Even Edgar Allan Paw, our shop cat, treats her with something vaguely approaching respect, and Ed once pooped on Oscar Wilde — well, on one of hisbooks, anyway — so we all tend to do what she says.
“The globe? Is it here yet?” Levis’ head snaps up from his phone so quickly it’s a miracle he doesn’t have whiplash. It’s the quickest I’ve seen him move since the time Paris said she thought she’d seen J.D Salinger outside the shop, but it turned out to just be Billie the postman, who has a wild ginger beard and is — crucially — still alive: unlike Salinger, say, who isnot. Levis’ disappointment was palpable, because Levi is locked in a perpetual battle to get more views on his Booktok than Paris gets on Instagram, and an appearance by a reclusive — albeitdead— author would’ve definitely done it for him.
Now, however, he’s found the next best thing.
“Can we go out and get a photo in the snow globe once it’s up, Holly?” he says pleadingly. “Just you and me? Please?”
Paris rolls her eyes and tosses her braids over her shoulder. I’m about to copy her, then I remember that self-help book I wrote for a client last year, packed with top tips on how to be a more effective manager, and I twist my mouth into a reluctant smile instead.
“I’m not sure that would be appropriate, Levi,” I say, my jaw aching from the unfamiliar facial expression. “I’m your boss, remember?”
“Yeah, but you’realsothe inspiration forThe Snow Globe,” Levi points out, shrugging. “Which is only the best romantic movie of all time. Ofall time, Holly. You’re basically famous.”
“Book,” says Paris instantly. “The Snow Globewas a book before it was a movie. The book was better.Obviously. And we don’t knowfor surethe character of Evie is based on Holly. Elliot Sinclair has always refused to confirm whether the story is true or not. He probably just made it all up.”
She looks at me through narrowed eyes, as if she suspects some trickery is at play here, because it’s impossible to believe that someone like me could inspire anythingatall, let alone a bestselling novel and the subsequent blockbuster movie based on it. Which it blatantly, incontrovertiblyis. You can’t argue with obvious.
“Duh,” says Levi, who actuallycanargue with obvious, and does it at every possible opportunity. “Eve Snow isobviouslyher. I know Holly doesn’t look anything like Violet King in the movie version, but that’s because Violet is a famous actress — and, like,superhot — and Holly is… the exact opposite of ‘hot’. Sorry, Holly. No offense.”
I tug self-consciously at my cardigan, which I convinced myself had a ‘sexy librarian’ vibe when I put it on this morning, but which Paris — who actuallydoeslook like a sexy librarian, but in that completely effortless way women in their twenties have — informs me is ‘giving Coastal Grandmother’. Whatever that means.
“But the character issobased on her,” goes on Levi, who has no interest in either secretariesorgrandmothers. “Everyone knows that.Everyone. Well, everyone in Bramblebury, anyway. Or ‘Hollybrooke’, as Sinclair called it. See! He even named thevillageafter her! How many more clues do you need,Paris?”
