Knopf Doubleday, Belletristik, A Home for the Holidays (Englisch, Taylor Hahn, 2024)

A witty, warmhearted novel about coming to terms with grief, taking a chance on unexpected connections, and finding family in time for the holidays. For wedding singer Mel Hart, the holidays have always retained a certain magic. Her mother, Connie, always managed to pull off spectacular Santa hijinx that convinced Mel to keep believing in Santa way longer than other kids. Those moments meant everything to Mel because the rest of the year, life was unpredictable because of her mother&rsquo s alcohol use. But two weeks before Christmas, Mel gets a call from the hospital: her mother has died. Then a woman shows up on Mel's doorstep, claiming to be Connie's estranged best friend, promising to tell Mel a different narrative&mdash one in which Connie was almost a famous country music star, if only a man hadn't gotten in the way. Instead of spending Christmas alone in her dead mother's lonely house, Mel agrees to stay with Barb for the holidays, finding herself in the middle of Barb's lovely but complicated family, uncovering secrets from the present and the past, while fighting an attraction to Barb&rsquo s handsome but in-the-middle-of-a-divorce son. As the countdown to Christmas Eve ensues, Mel reckons with how little she knew about her mother's past while re-examining her own future. A Home for the Holidays is a moving exploration of complicated grief, mother-daughter relationships, loving someone with addiction, and the redemptive power of opening one's heart to love in all its forms.