Midnight at the Christmas Bookshop: A Novel

Jenny Colgan’s Midnight at the Christmas Bookshop returns readers to Edinburgh and Carmen Hogan, who runs a local bookshop that is bleeding cash and may not survive the year. The bookshop’s owner, Mr. McCredie, has decided it is time to see the world, and his adventurous heart doesn’t have much room for innovation, and even Carmen’s ingenuity, and a film company that wants to use the store as the backdrop for a ridiculous Christmas movie, may not be enough to save the store.

While the bookshop struggles to hang on, Carmen is also navigating her living situation as her perfect and successful sister begins looking for a nanny. Carmen isn’t a candidate for the job, and when handsome Rudi is hired, Carmen must move out of her sister’s basement. She only has one option: to move in with Mr. McCredie. This change, coupled with her recent break up with Oke (pronounced Okay) nearly turns Carmen inside out. As she attempts to put her heart back together, she must also stave off the encroaching Jackson McClockerty, a businessman who wants to buy up all of Old Town Edinburgh and turn it in to a tourist trap.

Colgan’s books are like sweet tarts for the soul: the tangy exterior always gives way to sweetness at the center. Midnight at the Christmas Bookshop is a home run for people who love Hallmark movies, travel shows, and little hole in the wall bookstores that make everything seem possible.