Helen Hawkins: Why Christmas and romance are the perfect match
Read a romance novel and you know the protagonists will fall in love, but set that novel at Christmas time, and it’s somehow even more certain – and even more wonderful. There’s no better time of year to fall in love with the one than at Christmas. How can you not find your true love in the glow of fairy lights, the social opportunity of the office Christmas party or when you finally discover the true meaning of Christmas? Even the greatest of romance tropes and the most likely of couples stand a much better chance of realising their love for one other when it’s Christmas time.
The festive season offers a softly lit, ambient backdrop to even the angriest or most awkward of conversations. Who could help but fall in love with the warmth of a thousand fairy lights, the flickering flames of a hundred candles or a toasty log fire crackling in the background? Add the tuneful crooning of Bing Crosby or Michael Bublé to the mix, and even the coldest of hearts will thaw. A festive setting can’t help but lend itself to love and romance.
While the setting of Christmas oozes romance, it also affords our heroes the opportunity to let their hair down and attend more social events than usual. Throw your characters into the humble office Christmas party and even the most introverted of protagonists will find themselves mingling with old friends and new, along with exploring and developing those relationships in a relaxed – and sometimes alcohol fuelled – environment. With dark corners, loose tongues and an endless supply of mulled wine, relationships are given every opportunity to evolve, and our heroes will inevitably take their first steps towards love. What better place to relax, feel Christmassy and fall in love?
Christmas is a time for socialising, making new friends and developing relationships during a packed December calendar, but for the quieter ones among us, it is also a time for self-reflection and appraising your values – and your life – which is probably why so many of us make new year’s resolutions come January. People are looking for a change, a chance to upgrade their lives, find the things that have been missing. And perhaps this is why it is so easy to believe that two unlikely lovers will find the true meaning of Christmas and fall in love during the festive period. Between seasonal events and family time, love interests can see exactly what their lives together might look like, and who can resist that? Especially when it includes collecting and decorating the Christmas tree, or baking Christmas cookies.
Christmas and romance are the perfect partners. There is something so delicious about a couple realising they’re made for each other against the backdrop of snow or the twinkling of Christmas lights. Even better when you are snuggled up under a blanket, sipping a hot chocolate and enjoying the romance novel during the festive period yourself. There is something hopeful, something wonderful, and something inevitable about the prospect of love at Christmas time. Christmas and romance truly are the perfect match.
A Concert for Christmas by Helen Hawkins is published in hardback at £19.99 by Allison & Busby on 23 November 2023
Helen Hawkins is a writer, editor and English teacher. Her first novel was shortlisted for Penguin’s Christmas Love Story Competition and highly commended in last year’s I Am In Print Romance Competition. When she is not writing, Helen can be found editing, singing and dancing with her local operatic society in Oxfordshire.
