Reviewed by Ro
TITLE: Festive Trees and Mistletoe
SERIES: Hope Valley Christmas #3
AUTHOR: Annabelle Jacobs
PUBLISHER: Self Published
LENGTH: 219 pages
RELEASE DATE: December 9, 2025
BLURB:
Will this be the year Pete finally gets his kiss at midnight?
For the past two years on New Year’s Eve Pete Harbrook has watched his friends fall in love and share a kiss with their special someone. He’s happy for them, of course he is, but it’s hard always being the single guy.
Then Charlie Dunn comes back into his life.
The last time Pete saw Charlie he’d just been abandoned on New Year’s Eve by his boyfriend. That was almost a year ago. He never expected to see him again, yet here he is.
A holiday fling seems like such a bad idea, but there’s no denying the spark between them. When fate forces them together, it soon becomes a matter of when not if.
Surrounded by Christmas magic and festive cheer, it’s easy to forget that Charlie’s time in Charnwell will end soon. This New Year’s Eve could be the start of something special or yet another countdown that leaves Pete wanting to escape. Only time will tell.
Festive Trees & Mistletoe is a medium-spice MM holiday romance with awesome friends and family, and snuggly holiday feels. It’s the third book in the Hope Valley Christmas collection, but each book can be read as a standalone.
Expect : Friends-to-lovers, forced proximity, a teeny bit of angst and a little fluff. Oh and dogs, because it’s not a Christmas story without them.
REVIEW:
The book opens on last year’s New Year’s Eve, where Charlie was staying in at a B&B with pub in Hope Valley with his boyfriend, Dan. Dan is a jerk and breaks up with Charlie that day, leaving him there. “To be fair, he did try to get me to leave with him, but I told him I’d rather cover my bollocks in honey and let the bees have at them.” Pete is at the pub for NYE but can’t handle being the only single one again at midnight, so he takes a breather outside. Charlie does the same, and the two have a 20-minute meeting that gives them both butterflies. Can’t go anywhere as Charlie is leaving in the morning.
Dan is making it difficult to sell their shared flat (and wants Charlie back, so no thank you) and he keeps showing up to do the staging. Charlie is done with that. He’s an author who can write anywhere and has deadlines, so with the help of his BFF, Seb, decides to go back to Hope Valley for the writing retreat holiday. When it turns out Dan needs a place to say, and that means the flat, it’s a done deal. Charlie is headed to Hope Valley. Maybe he will see Pete, added bonus!
I am a sucker for holiday stories, and Pete owning a garden center and Christmas tree farm adds to the ambiance. Hope Valley sounds like such a Christmasy, sweet small town, and I loved the people. Annabelle Jacobs has written some of my favorite Christmas stories, including A Christmas Kiss, Magic and Mistletoe, and No Place Like Home. Somehow, I haven’t read any of the Hope Valley stories until this one.
Charlie and Pete have a meet-cute this time, involving no shirt and scalding tea. “ I thought I’d built up our New Year’s Eve encounter to more than it was, but if anything I’ve underestimated the effect he has on me.” They end up meeting up at the pub for a drink, and the attraction is there. But, and there’s always a but… “But I’m only here for two weeks and I have work to do. That was the whole point of coming here. I don’t have time to get involved with someone when it can never go anywhere.” They live four hours apart, and Charlie’s only here for two weeks. So I get it, two people who aren’t into casual but know this won’t work. “I know nothing about Charlie apart from the fact that his ex left him here last New Year’s Eve.”
They start to text, have lunches together, send each other pics (innocent ones with clothing on!).
The side characters are awesome, from Pete’s sister, Sadie, to the friend group. But I especially loved Charlie’s BFF, the lovely Seb. He works to protect Charlie from Dan, and encourages him to break out of the comfort zone. We all need a friend like Seb. And Sadie with her mistletoe.
“I know you don’t want to start anything. But I like you, Charlie. I like spending time with you. As friends,” he adds, when I open my mouth. “It’s not often I meet someone new living out here, and I’d like to see you again before you go back. If you’re up for it?” I felt bad for Pete at that point, because he’s already showing feelings, but, again, they live hours apart.
Pete wanted to read Charlie’s books but Charlie has had a bad experience with the stupid Dan and worries. “He said I wasn’t good enough to make it as a writer because no one would want to read my shit, and that either I accepted that or we were done.” So when he gives Pete a copy, you know it was a sign of how much he trusted Pete.
The B&B has a roof issue in Charlie’s room at one point. When Charlie calls his bestie, Seb, to tell him, Seb suggests he can stay and hang out with Pete or he could come back home. Charlie says he can’t go home because Dan is at his flat, so Pete steps up and offers the annex to his house. They wouldn’t be staying together, just staying close. Lucky for them, they decide to not fight their feelings quite so hard, even if it will make Charlie leaving suck that much more. And then there is an issue with Dan and the flat and oh, darn, Charlie has to stay in the annex even longer. And like the blurb says, there is an adorable scene with Cooper, the dog.
Charlie and Pete really go back and forth about it, “can’t be with him, it’s just temporary”. While the blurb says there is a little angst, there really isn’t. It’s more of them trying to fight what they are feeling because they don’t live in the same place. It is also pretty insta-love, as it all happens within a few weeks. I never mind that in holiday stories, but just an FYI for those who do.
RATING: 
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