🎄 Bookish Thoughts
Christmas with a Chimera is a short and sweet monster romance! A cozy, second chance holiday novella with all the warm feels.

I loved Claw Haven and how cozy the town felt. Arthur, the famous actor, coming back home and filming in his high school sweetheart’s café made for a fun and awkward setup 🤣

Emma was my fave with her fighting spirit, and honestly, I didn’t blame her one bit for still being mad at Arthur after all these years. Getting dumped on Christmas Eve?! Rude. And lowkey Arthur really was a bit much and I loved Emma roasting him 🤣

♥️ What to Expect
• Chimera MMC
• Cafe Owner FMC
• Second chance romance
• Small town setting
• Exes to lovers
• Grumpy x sunshine
__ _

📖 Final Score: 3.75
🎧 Audio Score: 3.75
📅 Pub Date: October 7, 2025
Thank you to Harlequin and NetGalley for the advanced copy and audiobook. All thoughts are my own.

Thank you so much to Isabelle Taylor and Harlequin - Romance | Harlequin | Harlequin Audio for the eARC and ALC of this. I was so excited to get this after finishing the 1st book in the Claw Haven Series. I LOVED this and I absolutely cannot wait for the rest in this series. It is so well written, has a great narrator, and flows really well. I devoured this in no time. Highly highly recommend to anyone who loves a good paranormal romance setting. It's a second chance troupe which I'm usually not a big fan of but it was so well written here, I kinda of loved it. Definitely has some spice too!

I was so excited to go back to Claw Haven after reading Accidentally Wedded To A Werewolf, the first in the Claw Haven series, and Christmas with a Chimera did not disappoint. Everything about Claw Haven is so cozy and whimsical. I love the FMC, Emma and what an asshole she is, she is very likeable. The smut in this is just right. Narrator for the audiobook is excellent. I can’t wait for the next book in this series.

This novella packed quite a few things in one quick and cozy story: we have sweet moments, spicy moments, tense moment, angst, and a fun second chance romance. I actually think I enjoyed this more Accidentally to a Werewolf, which surprised me since this is a quick novella. I just really liked Emma and her masking. She doesn’t like emotions and feeling vulnerable, so she covers it up with anger. Even to herself. She seems to be a bit stuck in confusing “surviving” for “thriving. I found her very relatable in a lot of ways. Arthur is very similar except that he covers his insecurities with the opposite tactic: kill them with kindness. He’s a people pleaser and he needs everyone to like him. Basically, he is also super relatable.
The plot is pretty straight forward: Two exes end up in closed proximity after not speaking for a decade when the movie star starts shooting a new film in his ex’s cafe. They argue, they fight the attraction/feelings, they “hate f**k,” they fight it some more, they grow together, etc. it’s nice, easy, and quick. The perfect palette cleanser/feel good story.
Jade wheeler does a great job with the narration. She’s fun and emotive. She brings each character to life and does well capturing tones and feelings. I definitely recommend this story and the audiobook!

Arthur Pineclaw waltzes back into Claw Haven with movie star hair, a smug little smirk, and the kind of fake humility only a chimera who’s played “the sensitive beast” in seven rom-coms can pull off. He’s here to film a holiday romance, charm the locals, and maybe casually haunt the café he once emotionally decimated like he’s not the reason its owner refuses to decorate for Christmas. Guess who owns the café? That’s right. Emma Curt. Local caffeine queen, emotionally scorched earth specialist, and the high school sweetheart he dumped on Christmas Eve before bolting off to Hollywood.

I love her.

Emma is a grumpy fireball in a chunky sweater and she’s not here for Arthur’s little redemption tour. She is trying to keep her café running, her middle finger holstered, and her heartbreak buried under twelve years of sarcasm and iced coffee. Arthur, meanwhile, is walking around like the ghost of “We Could’ve Had It All” with perfect hair and a tragic little pout like, why won’t she talk to me bro you emotionally detonated her under a string of Christmas lights, maybe sit with that for two seconds.

And because fate is a petty little matchmaker, his movie is being filmed inside her café. Welcome to forced proximity with a side of peppermint mochas and unresolved sexual tension. It’s messy. It’s festive. It’s giving “we broke up during high school finals and never really recovered emotionally or hormonally.”

This is a novella, so don’t come in expecting deep lore or a five-act opera about grief. But for what it is, it slaps. The pacing is tight, the banter is sharp, and the chemistry is immediate in that “we were in love, then we were enemies, and now we’re making out behind a pastry case” kind of way. The fact that Arthur is a literal chimera only adds to the chaos. Because yes, he has paws and fur and maybe a lion’s face, and yes, they still find time for some emotionally charged smooching and full-body reconciliation. We do not kink shame in Claw Haven. We light a cinnamon candle and mind our damn business.

Emma’s arc is the real gift here. She’s angry, and rightfully so. But as the story unfolds, you see her start to untangle that anger, not just toward Arthur, but toward herself, her town, her own fears about being vulnerable again. She’s not just mad. She’s hurt. She’s scared. And she’s spent years pretending that biting people is the same as healing. Her growth sneaks up on you in quiet moments, like when she apologizes to someone she was short with, or when she actually lets herself hope again.

Arthur, on the other hand... look. He tries. His arc is mostly “oh no I have feelings,” which is fine. It’s very on-brand for a golden retriever in a chimera’s body. He’s trying to be better, even if his first ten attempts are mostly performative nonsense. I wish we got more internal reckoning from him, something deeper than movie-script monologues and one heroic grand gesture, but honestly, this man is fighting for his life against Emma’s resting grinch face. He is doing his best.

Claw Haven remains the coziest town I would absolutely move to despite the risk of enchanted mistletoe and accidental magical bonds. There are cameos from the first book (hi, Luna, never change), and the whole place feels like someone spiked a snow globe with monster pheromones and good intentions. It’s whimsical, weirdly sexy, and deeply sincere.

Would I have read a full-length version of this story with more angst, more groveling, and a slightly more fleshed-out emotional payoff? Absolutely. But as a bite-sized, slightly spicy, emotionally satisfying novella? It hits. It hits like a chimera in a cable knit sweater confessing his love at closing time. Solid 3.5 stars.

Merry Mayhem Prize: For the Chimera Who Thought Making Out in a Snowstorm Would Fix a Decade of Emotional Avoidance... and Honestly, Wasn't Entirely Wrong

Thank you to Harlequin Audio and NetGalley for the ARC of "Christmas with a Chimera". I didn’t know I needed a spicy second-chance monster rom-com in my life, but here we are. I laughed, I swooned, I briefly questioned the logistics of kissing a lion-faced man. No notes.

Welcome Back to Claw Haven, aka the cutest Hallmark Monster Romance town! This one brings you a sweet second chance love story between a human and her high school sweetheart - turned movie star Chimera. Grumpy Sunshine small town romance abundant! This one gives you all of the aches and feels. Perfect Christmas story for you monster romance lovers.

The narrator did a great job!