Jingle Bell Romance (Holiday Harbor #2) by Mia Ross
Holiday Harbor is an amazing small town. It's everything people expect from one - close friends and nosy neighbors, a tight knit community that never forgets - whether it was a good thing you did or a bad. Unfortunately for the pastor's long lost son, Nick McHenry, a lot of it is bad. But Julia is new, she wasn't there for his history and she just may be one of the first ones to give him a chance.
The Holiday Harbor series is a clean romance, what many would consider inspirational. The other two books in the series have Christian overtone, but this book was very much a Christian romance. Perhaps it's because the pastor's family is a main role in the story. God was a much larger presence in this book than in the others, and my personal preference is for him to a bit more discreet in these type of books.
I did love seeing Julia Stanton's history of how she ended up in Holiday Harbor. She is such a sweet and intelligent person, it's hard to imagine anyone not loving her from the second they met. Nich was just enough bad boy without being a really "bad boy" to set her personality off just right.
The think I like most about this series is how the story concentrates so much on their relationship. As clean romances we don't get more than a few chaste kisses and some hand holding, so there is a lot going on emotionally. And it's not only between our two main characters, you can see it in everyone around them as well - slight changes in behavior and attitude as the story progresses. It's my favorite thing about this series - watching the entire town grow and change.