Event planner Julia Fernández is in Chicago for an internship that she hopes to turn into a full-time job. She’s ready to live on her own, out from under her familia’s expectations that she take over their catering business in Puerto Rico and away from their year-round baseball fever thanks to her three ball-playing brothers. Ex-MLB pitcher Ben Thomas knows what it’s like to have different dreams than your family intends for you, but since his injury-caused early retirement, he’s been struggling to find the sense of family baseball once brought him. When he volunteers as the emcee for Julia’s big holiday fundraiser for a local youth center, he finally begins to find a sense of purpose working with the kids and alongside Julia.

She’s focused on organizing the best holiday event the youth center has ever seen, not on romance. But Ben…he’s got a game plan for them that includes both.

This was super Cute, fun short story that will transport you out of our quarantined state for a few peaceful hours. Not necessary to read the prior books in this series, but certainly makes it more fun.

Looking for a fun, quick holiday read to get you in the mood for the upcoming winter months?  Priscilla Oliveras comes through with a sweet novella filled with charm and spirit, Holiday Home Run.

Party planner Julia Fernández (Julia is a cousin to the three Fern ández sisters from Oliveras’ Matched to Perfection series, who all appear in the novella)  is a level-headed member on a committee putting together the annual holiday soirée and fundraiser for the Chicago Youth Association.  She’s hoping to turn this gig into a full-time job working with the CYA helping with their fundraising division; it’s her first gesture toward independence, away from a family she loves but who still expect her to return to Puerto Rico, take over their successful catering business and “find a good man and settle down already.”  She’s not particularly impressed with the fame of the emcee of this year’s event – ex-baseball player Benjamin Thomas - though everyone else involved with the event is fawning all over him.  It helps that her family’s obsessed with the sport – in Puerto Rico, it’s close to being a national religion – and because three of her brothers play, Julia is thus sick of hearing about it.

Ben has been looking for a sense of purpose ever since an injury ended his career far too quickly.  Helping out the CYA has given his life fresh meaning and allowed him to connect to people who need his help and advice.  Julia is a breath of fresh air for Ben – not only because she doesn’t care that he’s Chicago’s most eligible bachelor or because he’s famous, but because she’s take-charge and no-nonsense, just the type of woman he likes.  And in spite of herself, Julia finds herself attracted to Ben’s sexy, twinkly charm.  They quickly fall for one another and begin a romance.  But when Ben surprises Julia with an appearance from her mami at the benefit with news that she’s planning on making her Chicago stay a permanent one – and she’s planning on doing it during a holiday visit… gulp!

The ride is a delightful one.  Holiday Homerun gives us a beautiful peek into the vibrant lives of Puerto Ricans celebrating the holiday season, a memorably strong and smart heroine, and a hero who is charming and sexy.  What more can you ask for from a holiday romance?  There’s the pretty city atmosphere of Chicago, with its twinkling lights and giant firs, and there’s family drama and a cute romance to boot.

Oliveras has always done such a good job bringing to life the worlds in which her characters live, and this book is no exception. Chicago springs to life here with its skating rinks and snowy nights.

Ben and Julia are both wonderful - if flawed - people, and we get to know them as best we can in under ninety pages.  The compressed length of the novella made me yearn for a little more, which is why this is a DIK but not a flat-out A.

The book’s addressing of tradition versus new ground and Julia’s pursuit of her own independent way through life is beautifully handled, and I really adored her relationship with her mother, which is loving but difficult and labored by expectations.

Holiday Home Run is a beautiful holiday story, and a sweet romance that will please folks who like the Matched to Perfection series as well as anyone who needs a sweet holiday pick me up.

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This was a short and sweet holiday novella.
I am very intrigued and interested in the rest of the Fernandez family.

Two different people are trying to find their purpose and prove people their worth crossed each other's path at the most unexpected time. Will they love to prosper? I love The Island Affair, and so it was not that hard to pick up this book. It is a quick read but a charming and romantic read. Priscilla did it again, fantastic story setting, beautiful characters, and a very relatable holiday read. I highly recommend it!

Thank you to Netgalley, Priscilla Oliveras , and Kensington/Zebra Books for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

What a cute story! I’ve never read any of this authors work, but I enjoyed it! I have also never read a sporty Christmas book and I liked that aspect of the story! The romance was cute and fun to follow, and the characters were likeable.

I really loved the Puerto Rican aspects to the story. Spanish throughout with the author hinting at what was said rather than explicitly writing in the English, the talk of the family and culture. I would love to read more of the authors work to get more of the cultural experience!

Recommend for anyone looking for a cute, short romance!

Solid, sweet 3 stars! This was a delightful Holiday romance read! I adored the characters. Julia was a boss and the tensions with her family resonated a lot with me. I felt Ben was a little too mysterious, I would have liked to delve deeper into his backstory or just in his thoughts., but he was so soft and sweet! I also would have loved to get a little more time spent on developing those feelings between Julia and Ben, but overall I really enjoyed this novella! It's cute, it's Christmassy and I am so ready for posadas and parrandas!

Holiday Home Run, a single-title release reprinted from an anthology appearance in 2018, is short and sweet. The characters are nice, the romance moves along well and is believable. I liked enjoyed getting to know both Julia and Ben. The standout of the story was by leaps and bounds the Puerto Rican spin on the story. Sometimes holiday stories flirt with the reader, offering up seasonal tidbits like rare jewels. Holiday Home Run is not that kind of story. It runs riotous with the holidays, joyously celebrating and luxuriating in the various hallmarks of the season. Cultural details about the holidays are peppered throughout the story in informative and engaging ways, enhancing the depth of the characterization in the story and broadening the enjoyment factor of the romance itself. While I didn’t love the story to death – the romance was a bit quiet for my taste, and I felt at the end there were some conflicts between Julia and Ben that hadn’t been sufficiently addressed – for the length and seasonal nature of the story this is a fun read with a lot to recommend it. If you’ve enjoyed Oliveras’ other stories this should be a no-brainer, but if you’re a romance reader looking for a seasonal read I’d wholeheartedly offer this one up as a suggestion.

This novella makes Hallmark Christmas Movies look like The Godfather II. It's so sweet. Too sweet, in fact.

There is no conflict.
No character flaws.
No misunderstandings.
No character growth.
No bad weather. Nothing.

If you are looking for a truly fluffy holiday novella then this is a good one! There's nothing wrong with it, there's just not much to it.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This book was extremely bland. There is no conflict. Boy meets girl. Boy likes girl. Boy and girl go on a few dates. Girl tells boy they can continue dating. The end.

Every Priscilla Oliveras story is filled with heart, warmth, and the love of family. Holiday Home Run is no different. This great Christmas novella hits all the right notes. Julia and Ben are both charming characters, both feeling a little homesick and finding a piece of home together in Chicago. I love the bits of Puerto Rican Christmas that are shown and deftly explained to those unfamiliar with these traditions. And of course we have a HEA. The Fernandez sisters have roles here, as this is adjacent to Oliveras' Matched to Perfection series. Low steam, just enough to shine a light on the spark between Julia and Ben.
This is a re-release from a previous anthology. Anyone who missed the anthology and looking for a Christmas romance, will enjoy this quick read. Fans of Priscilla Oliveras will also love it. I definitely recommend it and will put it on my holiday reading rotation.

I’m a pretty big fan of Priscilla Oliveras’ books, so it’s no surprise that I’d actually already read this novella when it first came out in an anthology. But I jumped at the chance to revisit it because I had fond memories of it. And it still holds up as a sweet holiday romance.

Julia is an event planner and the cousin of the sisters from the Matched to Perfection series. She grew up in Puerto Rico helping her mom run her catering company and dealing with her baseball-obsessed brothers. While she loves her family, she, too, feels suffocated by their expectations that she take over the family business, so she’s looking at making the move to Chicago. The linchpin of her plan is pulling off the best holiday soiree fundraiser for the Chicago Youth Association that the town has ever seen in the hopes of landing a permanent job there. If only the fundraiser didn’t come with a certain handsome retired baseball player involved…

“Sometimes, a move away from the place where we’re the most comfortable allows for the best kind of growth.”


At first, Ben is seemingly only interested in Julia because she doesn’t seem starstruck around him. Gradually, though, as they work together on the fundraiser, the spark turns into something more. Julia, however, has zero interest in dating an athlete after spending her whole life submerged in baseball, even if Ben is kind, compassionate, a good listener, and did I mention handsome? The big problem, though, is that Ben doesn’t understand why she wants to move away from her family, when he’s so desperately missing the family he found in his baseball team. Watching the two of them work it out was so sweet and at times heart wrenching. I also loved the touches of Puerto Rican holiday traditions, though I did finish the story hungry for pernil and arroz con gandules! It’s definitely more of a HFN than an HEA, but with novellas, that’s perfectly fine for me.

Overall, another great story from Ms. Oliveras, and another sweet novella for Christmas!

I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

I’m not generally a fan of Insta love which can make finding a satisfying novella difficult. Often it requires a backstory of a second chance situation for me to truly believe the connection between the characters. In this case the author didn’t have that scenario and yet I still fully believed the connection in such a short number of pages. She did an amazing job of showing how their connection grew using anecdotes of things that happened over several weeks without spending the time to show each situation. The use of the Latin culture was clearly authentic as were the areas and events around Chicago. I had not previously read the stories of the other sisters/cousins but this novella just makes me want to go and read that back list. It’s a wonderful warm hug going into the holiday season.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for this ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

3 Stars
This was such a cute and fast-paced contemporary story. I loved the hero, he reminded me so much of the gentleman in historical romance novels where the guy MC is a gentleman and has those type of manners. I did think that this story could have been longer, and the story could've expanded upon certain things that were brought up and it felt rushed. I loved the Latin aspect of this story, learning about a different culture is always fun for me. I really did enjoy both the character's independently but I felt as if we didn't get to see them together. Overall I feel like this is a light fast-paced fun read that incorporates the ambiance of Christmas.

I so enjoyed this book about Julia and Ben.. Julie wanting to prove to her family comes to Chicago to work on a fund raiser for the children of the puerto rican nationality and works with Ben a former baseball player turned sports reporter. See how it all turned out. A GOOD READ.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

Holiday Home Run was previously published in the anthology A Season to Celebrate, and is now being reprinted on its own in ebook. It’s a delightful companion novella to Priscilla Oliveras’ Matched to Perfection series, following a Fernandez cousin Julia as she finds her own HEA, though it can be read as a stand-alone.

However, much like the main books in the series, and Oliveras’ work in general, there’s a distinct Latinx flavor and familia remains central, with Julia having close relationships with her mother and cousins, who appear in supporting roles. However, there’s also the interplay between their expectations for her vs. what she wants, and that was conveyed beautifully.

Ben is a great hero, and I liked seeing him working to find a new family and purpose after finding himself retired from baseball due to injury, and seeing something in Julia, even though she is resistant to kobo at first.

This is a charming story, and a great addition to a fabulous series. I also think it would be a great introduction to Oliveras’ work to those who love sweet, culturally rich contemporary romance.

Julia has moved to Chicago to pursue her event planning dreams - em cee at her big chance in Ben, an ex-MLB pitcher. Too bad she's sworn never to date a baseball player...

A sweet, cute, and light novella about finding your home away from home during the Christmas season. Even though it's set in an established universe, it was easy for me to get to know the characters and get a feel for Julia's family.

Low heat, low angst, just a lovely snack size story to head into the holiday season with.

I received an ARC of the book from the publisher via NetGalley.

Thanks to Kensington/Zebra Books for an advanced copy of Holiday Home Run a cute Christmas novella! This is part of the holiday anthology A Season to Celebrate and if you've read any of @priscillaolveras earlier books in the Matched to Perfection series the main character is a cousin of the Fernandez sisters.

Originally from Puerto Rico, Julia is in Chicago interning and keeping her fingers crossed it will turn into a job. Former MLB star Ben is figuring out his life after baseball when he volunteers to MC for the youth center fundraiser Julia is working on. Will sparks fly when they start working together?

This was such a sweet and cute novella. It just under 100 pages, so something quick and is just the perfect amount of holiday setting!

Cute, fun short story that will transport you out of our quarantined state for a few peaceful hours. Not necessary to read the prior books in this series, but certainly makes it more fun.

A cute and sweet Holiday story, that could be on the Hallmark Channel. It is a novella, so it is super short and a light/fast read. It was multicultural, which was a nice change in the book world. J

Thank you NetGalley, Kensington Books and Priscilla Oliveras for gifting me an advance copy of this book in exchange for my honest review!
Julia Fernandez has one chance to make her goals a reality. Her parents are planning for her to take over their family business in Puerto Rico, but she dreams of working in Chicago as an event planner. When she gets the opportunity to intern in the city she takes it and hopes it becomes a permanent gig. Former Chicago Cubs star pitcher, Ben Thomas, is a little lost. After an injury ends his professional baseball career early, Ben doesn’t know where to turn. When he meets Julia at a fundraiser their connection is instant!
I read Priscilla Oliveras’ book Island Affair in June and loved it! I’ve been patiently waiting for the day the second book in the series comes out. I requested this book, not even realizing who the author was until I opened it on my Kindle to read. Talk about a pleasant surprise! This holiday novella was packed full of chemistry and heartfelt bonds. While this was a very quick book and the story wasn’t the most in-depth, you still end up rooting on Julia and Ben as they try to find their balance.
Priscilla Olivaras is on my must read author list and Holiday Home Run is just another reason why!