#1 NYT-bestselling author Stephanie Laurens brings you a
heartwarming tale of a long-ago country-village Christmas, a
grandmother, three eager grandchildren, one moody teenage
granddaughter, an earnest young lady, a gentleman in hiding,
and an elusive book of Christmas carols.
Therese, Lady Osbaldestone, and her household are quietly
delighted when her younger daughter’s three children, Jamie,
George, and Lottie, insist on returning to Therese’s house,
Hartington Manor in the village Little Moseley, to spend the
three weeks leading up to Christmas participating in the
village’s traditional events.
Then out of the blue, one of Therese’s older granddaughters,
Melissa, arrives on the doorstep. Her mother, Therese’s
older daughter, begs Therese to take Melissa in until the
family gathering at Christmas—otherwise, Melissa has nowhere
else to go.
Despite having no experience dealing with moody, reticent
teenagers like Melissa, Therese welcomes Melissa warmly. The
younger children are happy to include their cousin in their
plans—and despite her initial aloofness, Melissa discovers
she’s not too old to enjoy the simple delights of a village
Christmas.
The previous year, Therese learned the trick to keeping her
unexpected guests out of mischief. She casts around and
discovers that the new organist, who plays superbly, has a
strange failing. He requires the written music in front of
him before he can play a piece, and the church’s book of
Christmas carols has gone missing.
Therese immediately volunteers the services of her
grandchildren, who are only too happy to fling themselves
into the search to find the missing book of carols. Its
disappearance threatens one of the village’s most-valued
Christmas traditions—the Carol Service—yet as the book has
always been freely loaned within the village, no one
imagines that it won’t be found with a little application.
But as Therese’s intrepid four follow the trail of the book
from house to house, the mystery of where the book has
vanished to only deepens. Then the organist hears the
children singing and invites them to form a special guest
choir. The children love singing, and provided they find the
book in time, they’ll be able to put on an extra-special
service for the village.
While the urgency and their desire to find the missing book
escalates, the children—being Therese’s grandchildren—get
distracted by the potential for romance that buds, burgeons,
and blooms before them.
Yet as Christmas nears, the questions remain: Will the four
unravel the twisted trail of the missing book in time to
save the village’s Carol Service? And will they succeed in
nudging the organist and the harpist they’ve found to play
alongside him into seizing the happy-ever-after that hovers
before the pair’s noses?
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