Publishers Weekly
08/28/2023
Freeman’s compassionate if rocky debut digs into the heart of what makes holidays special: the people they’re spent with. Hannah and Finn’s college acquaintanceship becomes a best friendship when both are stuck on campus over the holidays. Hannah’s an orphan and Finn’s family disowned him after he came out as gay, so neither has anywhere else to go—but they make things merry by dressing up in costumes from the drama department and holding a pancake feast. Christmas together becomes a tradition, and the festivities only get more elaborate when they add Hannah’s N.Y.C. roommate, Priya, and Theo, Finn’s onetime Christmas Eve hookup turned good friend, to the mix. This year, however, Finn drops a bombshell: he’s moving cross-country for work. Hannah is devastated but determined to make this last Christmas one to remember. But with Hannah’s boyfriend pressuring her to join his family for the holidays and Finn wrestling with whether to admit his lingering crush on Theo, it might be memorable for all the wrong reasons. Freeman doesn’t skimp on the yuletide atmosphere and puts a lot of care into her characters’ growing pains. The novel’s structure has some flaws, however, hopping back and forth between many different Christmases and thereby creating information gaps and telegraphing surprises. Still, Freeman’s take on how relationships evolve is full of feeling.Agent: Allison Hunter, Trellis Literary. (Sept.)
From the Publisher
Praise for The Christmas Orphans Club:
“Becca Freeman gives a much-needed update to classic holiday tales. Told over the course of eleven Christmases, this witty and heartfelt debut tracks a group of four young New Yorkers as their friendship solidifies into a chosen family, one with its own traditions, tensions, and drama. It’s a whip-smart story of modern love, letting go, and growing up.”
—Carley Fortune, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Meet Me at the Lake
“A fabulous festive read about found family. I loved it from the first sentence.”
—Sophie Cousens, New York Times bestselling author of Before I Do
“I’m completely in love with this book! The Christmas Orphans Club is a beautiful story of friendship with laugh-out-loud dialogue and characters you can’t stop thinking about. Becca Freeman’s debut is witty, heartwarming, and hilarious and the most delightful thing you’ll read all year.”
—Jennifer Close, New York Times bestselling author of Marrying the Ketchups
“Freeman's writing is filled with wit and insight, and her dialogue crackles. Beneath the abundant humor and charm is a thoughtful exploration of friendship, tradition, and the challenges of growing old.”
—Grant Ginder, bestselling author of The People We Hate at the Wedding and Let's Not Do That Again
“If you adore Christmas and loved Friends, then this is the perfect book for you. I would happily abandon my husband and kids to spend Christmas in New York with Hannah, Finn, Theo and Priya. A festive, funny, hug of a novel about love in all its forms.”
—Clare Pooley, New York Times bestselling author of Iona Iverson’s Rules for Commuting
“Funny and wise—this totally unexpected story of chosen family warmed me from the inside out. I absolutely adored it.”
—Annabel Monaghan, author of Nora Goes Off Script
“The Christmas Orphans has everything you could want in a holiday book-treat: sweetness, laughs, and delicious rom-com moments that'll make you jump up and yell, 'Kiss him! Kiss him!' Thank you, Becca Freeman, for an ensemble cast so lovable I wish they were real and could be my friends.”
—Mary Laura Philpott, author of Bomb Shelter: Love, Time, and Other Explosives
“Set in the holiday glow of a luminously rendered New York City, The Christmas Orphans Club is a big-hearted, poignant, page-turning novel about the chosen families that sustain us. Becca Freeman is a writer who truly knows what it means to be a good friend, and she perfectly captures the tensions that arise within a tight-knit group when we make room for romantic love. With this dazzling debut, Freeman is the heir apparent to the mantle of sophisticated, feel-good fiction. I will read anything she writes.”
—John Glynn, author of Out East: Memoir of a Montauk Summer
“A hilarious and poignant contemporary fable.”
—Seattle Times
“Freeman’s take on how relationships evolve is full of feeling.”
—Publishers Weekly
Library Journal
08/01/2023
DEBUT Host of the Bad on Paper podcast, Freeman makes her debut with a holiday story of four friends who always celebrate Christmas together, through the many ups and downs of their lives—until their potentially last Christmas together in NYC in 2019. The first holiday together for the founding friend duo, Hannah and Finn, was in 2008. The only ones on campus during winter break (Hannah because she's an orphan and Finn because he wasn't welcome home after coming out to his family), they had a magical Christmas together. After graduation and their move to NYC, Hannah's roommate Priya was added to the group and then Theo, whom Finn brought home from a gay bar one night. Now they're planning one last Christmas together as jobs and significant others pull the four in different directions. Finn might also finally tell Theo how he really feels about him. While everyone gets a happy ending, the story is less about romance and more about friends growing up during their twenties against the backdrop of a fondly portrayed NYC. VERDICT Readers who enjoy found-family stories and tales of twentysomethings finding their way will appreciate Freeman's novel.—Melissa DeWild
JANUARY 2024 - AudioFile
André Santana and Brittany Pressley deliver a steady performance that highlights two men and two women who navigate a friendship over 10 years. When Hannah and Finn meet while alone at college over Christmas break, the two form a strong friendship and develop Christmas traditions that continue while they live in New York City. Over the decade of the story, two more friends join their group. Then Finn accepts a job offer in L.A. The narrators replicate the highs and lows of characters in their 20s. The story is not told in chronological order; instead it jumps around, frequently returning to the present. This back-and-forth allows the listener to hear the characters' growth in the narration. B.E.S. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine
