It’s winter in the northern hemisphere, with snow photos everywhere on social media. It’s cold even here in Florida. It’s one of those times when I’d rather stay indoors, drink a cup of hot tea, and read (or write) a book.
Most of my contemporary Christian romance novels are set in the warmer months. I write about summer beaches and sometimes fall vacations, with a bit of cool winter thrown in if you can imagine winter in the southern USA.
Do you read summer books only in the summer and winter books only in the winter? Or do you read any book at any time of the year?
Quite a number of readers read Christmas stories all year round. Do you? For example, do you read Christmas books after seeing a flurry of Christmas in July promotions?
My latest novel is Let Me Hold You (Midtown Christmas Book 1), set in Atlanta, Georgia, in December. If you’ve ever been to Atlanta, you’d know that it can get cold and icy in winter, but rarely will it snow. When it does snow, the city shuts down. Schools close, businesses take the day off, and people stay home. We like our winters warmer LOL.
Oh, I remember the Blizzard of 1993 in Georgia, when snow accumulated to at least ten inches in the Atlanta suburbs. I was working downtown then, so I had to drive at least an hour each way to and from work. This was before employers texted everyone and told them not to come in. When I somehow found out I could stay home, it worked out for me because I couldn’t get out of my driveway. Overnight, snow and ice had frozen my wheels and the car wouldn’t run. The local news showed the entire metropolis blanketed in snow and ice all mixed together. It was a big mess. Way back then, there was no work-at-home telecommuting and Zoom hadn’t been invented, so we were given the day off from work.
Those of you who live in the northern states and Canada and Russia and everywhere else with snowfall every year might just laugh at us Georgians. In fact, for years after that, late night talk shows made skits to mock the poor city of Atlanta. Having grown up in the tropics, I can tell you that the blizzard was quite an unusual experience for me. I’d be happy to stay at home and read a book.
How about where you are? Does it snow? Do you ever get snowed in? When you are stuck at home in the thick of winter, what kind of novels do you read?
Before I became a published author, I was an even more voracious reader. I would read hundreds of books a year. I read all sorts of genres, from secular to Christian. Lately, I’ve made it a point to support Christian indie authors, so I buy more indie books than I do traditionally published books. That’s also because I can get all the traditionally published books I want to read from the local public library for free. However, most indie books are not in libraries, so I buy them or borrow them from Kindle Unlimited.
eBooks are such a blessing in the winter time when I don’t want to leave the house and drive to the library. Libraries rent out ebooks too. Do you read ebooks from you local library or do you borrow books via Kindle Unlimited or do you buy them or do you do all of the above?
If you’ve never heard of me and you’re new to my books, here’s a free contemporary Christian romance novella ebook for you. It’s set in the warmer months of the year and in the warmer states in the USA, notably South Carolina, Georgia, and Tennessee. It does snow a bit in Tennessee, especially up in the mountains, but not during the timeframe of this love story.
USA Today bestselling novelist Jan Thompson writes clean and wholesome multiethnic contemporary Christian romance with elements of women’s fiction, Christian romantic suspense with an air of mystery, and inspirational international thrillers with threads of sweet Christian romance. Join Jan's mailing list for her latest book news: JanThompson.com/newsletter
Wow, I can’t imagine what it’s like to have your car literally frozen. It doesn’t snow here in Sydney and I grew up in hot, desert country so the dreadful humid Sydney summers were a rude shock to me, where it literally rained every day for a month when I moved to Sydney, thought I had made the worst decision of my life back then.
I read despite the weather I am experiencing and the weather in books. I just love a great story. I am sure I miss out on things in books where I simply don’t have the experience of the cold, snowy weather to appreciate what the author is sharing. Thanks for the interesting post :)
Here in Canada our winter weather is variable …from heavy snowfall, -20 temperatures to freezing rain. A great time for reading!The hardest part is waiting so long for spring flowers…May. But…we have 300 acres and make maple syrup in the spring..
I read books of any season any time of the year. I read Christmas books any time of the year! Most of the books I buy now are by indie authors, as I’ll get traditionally published books from my church library. However, now that I’m volunteering in the church library, I’m trying to get some indie books put in there! I’m in Florida, and we are participating in winter this year, as we’ve been down in the 40’s with windchills in the 30’s where I live. North of me, up by Ocala, has been to freezing and below. It rarely snows in Florida! If it was ever much the whole state would shut down, for sure.
Welcome. I am one of those that read holiday stories all year long
Hi, I read all kinds of books all during the year, it doesn’t matter the season . I can rad Christmas books anytime of the year. I dont read ebooks at all as I am not tech savvy so all I read are books in print . Here in West Texas where I live , we dont get snow very often , it gets pretty cold though. about 4 years ago we had a bad ice storm, we were without electricity for about 3 days and our house is All electric. My husband , our pup and I just stayed in 1 room, with candles going, a little propane camping stove, where my husband would make us coffee and oatmeal on, it was a rough 3 days for sure, but Thank God we managed. Have a great weekend. I enjoyed reading your post.
Thank you for your comment, Dianne!
Sydney sounds like Seattle. Lots of rain!
I’m the same way — I’ll read the book regardless of the weather and season in the book.
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
Thank you for your comment, Judy!
-20 is cold. Brrrr!
Oh that’s good to know that spring flowers bloom in May where you are. That means if my spring books publish in May, it’s not too late. Over here, May means hot weather in the 80s.
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
Thank you for your comment, Trudy!
That’s very nice of you to put indie books in the library. Two church libraries that tried to put indie books in them have now closed down to make way for other ministry space. So it’s a blessing that your church library is still going.
I’m also in FL and yes I agree re: wildly fluctuating temperatures. Never a dull day. :-)
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
Thank you for your comment, Lori!
Fun fun fun!
Since I write Christmas stories also, that means I have to write the books in this series out of season so that they will be ready when Christmas shopping time comes around. So I, too, read Christmas books all year round.
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
Thank you for your comment, Alicia!
I do love paperbacks and hardcover books also.
Wow! That’s an incredible span of time to lose electricity. Even 3 days, it meant many hours. I’m glad that you and your hubby went on an indoor camping trip :-) Candlelight sounds romantic. Thank God you made it through the power outage.
The longest time we’ve had to use candles back in GA was overnight. I lit a bunch of candles on a serving platter so we’d have more light. After that episode, we bought camp lanterns that had magnet on the bottom so we could stick them anywhere e.g. on refrigerators.
BUT I was so glad the electricity came back!
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
I’m another reader who will happily read Christmas stories all year round, I enjoy stories set any time of year throughout the year.
I have started reading more and more ebooks over the past few years, I borrow from my library and buy books, and sometget a kindle unlimited membership if there’s a special offer.
I’m in the South West of England, I love hearing about places that get proper snow. We occasionally have a very little snow (a couple of inches max!) but everything closes down as we’re just not used to it. The last time it snowed was about 6 years ago when my eldest was a toddler, my younger children have never seen snow.
Thank you for your comment, Ruthie!
Ooh that’s fun to read Christmas stories all year round. I love to read snow stories even though I rarely write about snow in my books.
Like your south, our south here is also devoid of snow most of the time. The news will be flooded with regular updates as soon as there’s an accumulation of snow at all. It’s a real treat for the locals.
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
I am also a voracious reader but I have decided to limit myself to only Christian authors or trusted authors who I know don’t write things I don’t want to read or who I discovered after doing proper research, I decided that life is too short to read books like that where the story is good but I need to skip a few pages or chapters so as not to dirty my mind…I can find equally good or better stories even with the same romantic trope and not have to skip anything.
In Chile it is summer at the moment, in winter it does not snow in the area where I live but it does in other places in the country, the truth is that I do not care much about reading books according to the season I am in except at Christmas where it helps me enter the spirit.
I lived for many years in Seattle. And, yes, it does rain a lot. We just worked around the rain a got stuff done. But snow was a whole other story. For a while, I lived at the top of one of the seven hills of Seattle. I would look out my window and watch cars slip and slide to the bottom. Then I would go catch my bus to go to work. Let the bus drivers do the driving. Then I moved to West Seattle and getting to work entailed crossing a bridge. A bridge that froze over enough so that the sand trucks could barely drive on them. Those years. a snow day would be a no work day. I spent a few years in South FL. Now, I live in the very SW corner of AZ. No snow. Ever. Just “snow birds”. Winter here is the bee’s knees. It’s 73F right now and I have the doors open for some fresh air. Lovely.
As to seasonal reading… I have an immense TBR (around 3000 books) and I am more of a “rotational reader”. I read an historical, then a contemporary, then something deep and intense. After that I usually read something light and start all over. My only stipulation on what I read is that it must be written by a Christian author and I only read holiday books that are by authors I really like. That give me a lot of leeway, because I like a whole lot of authors… yourself included. Happy Florida Winter.
Hi Jan. It is wonderful to be with you today. Thank you so much for sharing. God bless you.
Hi Jan. One day I want to see fresh snow. I saw very old snow in Canada it was end of Summer and was really just ice so it doesn’t really count. I have never seen it fall or recent snow fall. They say it snowed here about 80 years ago but it was only one the ground a very short time. they say it snows in the air but cos we are in a valley its rain before it hits the ground (people flying have seen it).
I read Christmas and love reading of the cold as its often hot here. (almost end of Jan and we have had a few really hot days but more humidity than we are use to but not a hot summer) We were told where I am it would be a long hotter than normal dry summer. They got that wrong we have had so much rain. But I don’t think we have actually hit 100 yet. Where Dianne and Narelle are have been hotter than where I am.
As I am Aussie if I read when books come out they are often winter in summer etc. I just read an ARC which is American Summer. I have been in a real readers slump and this book has me wanting to read. (I read in one night ending after midnight which is why I am so late replying to this). My friend is in Georgia near Chatanooga, and I know she loves to see snow which isn’t every year.
Romania is on the parallel 45, like some Northern US states. So it usually snows in winter. Well, during the last 10 years it seldom snowed – say global heating – but every winter we have some days with snow. When I was younger there were more such days. I remember a 2nd or 3rd of January about 12-15 years ago when it just started to snow after the beginning of the New Year. I guess on 2nd in the evening. In the afternoon we sent our nieces to the train (they were at us for Christmas and New Year, but they lived at about 350 km towards the south-center of the country) and it had just started to snow. They arrived home on already set snow, and we next morning, when we went to work, here the snow was up to mid-thigh, up to a mini-skirt level :P And I left early in the morning, so nobody had shoveled it…
3-4 years ago we had an episode of freezing rain, I had never seen that before, they said at TV it was the most serious in the latest 40 years or so.
This year we had a week of snow and ice… it is better to be sent to the fields, where it belongs to irrigate and fertilize, not to the city… (Yes, I love summer and I think there should be meteorological asylum too…. to tropical countries… from November till March).
Thank you for your comment, Lilly!
Yes, I feel the same about reading only books by Christian authors these days.
Must be nice to have warm weather in the southern hemisphere right now. It’s a bit chilly here.
Have a great weekend in the Lord!
Thank you for your comment, Dana!
And AZ doesn’t have to deal with time changes in the spring and fall either. :-) Yes, I have the windows open a lot during the winter here in FL.
Seattle is a nice city to visit, for sure. When we were there for a couple of days, it didn’t rain, which apparently was uncommon.
I hear you about freezing bridges. We had that in GA where the ice was transparent so cars couldn’t see it.
Have a great week in the Lord!
Hello Debra! That you for your comment. May God bless you too!
Thank you for your comment. It’s been a while since I saw “fresh snow” as well. I wrote about it last year, reminiscing about the time when it did snow in the forest behind my old house in GA.
That’s amazing that it was that many decades ago that it last snowed there. Now that I’m not in snow land anymore, I won’t be seeing much of it sadly. Unless I go on vacation to a snowy place.
I’m so glad you found a book you enjoy. Yes, if I like a book, I may stay up at night to read it.
Oooh Chattanooga. I’ve been there a lot of times since it’s just a couple of hours north of Atlanta. In fact my next novel is set in Chattanooga (it’s on the cover) but it’s a romantic suspense novel for the Summer Suspicions anthology, so I won’t mention the CRS title here in a CCR forum. BUT no snow in Chattanooga in this novel because it’s set in the warmer months.
Have a wonderful week!
Have a great week in the Lord!
Thank you for your comment, Marina!
Glad you still have some snow in Romania. I see you’ve had a lot of snow before in your backyard.
Yes, winter ice can be treacherous. In GA, the ice can freeze overnight on the road and it’s very slippery for vehicles especially when the drivers cannot see the transparent ice on the road.
I do like all seasons, but have a special place for summer. Beach time!
Have a wonderful week!
I think the even over 80 years ago it was a rarity. My friend is in Rossville which is just over the border from Chattanooga I got to visit a couple times. I took the bus from Atlanta airport to there and then flew on the way back. next time I would do the bus both ways. The book sounds interesting. I read wide. (It would be so boring to read only ccr) I really enjoy different genres and there are times I want to read a historical or cosy mystery.