Matthew's Present

By Sarah Hadley Brook

Christmas is around the corner and Matthew Blick is not looking forward to spending another holiday alone. His five-year-old niece, Hannah, loves her uncle so much, she asks the department store Santa to bring her uncle someone to love.

When Santa shows up at Matthew’s house, he doesn’t recognize him. As memories of his first kiss rush back, he’s shocked to find the man he hasn’t been able to get out of his mind since high school. Can a kiss change the way Matthew feels about Christmas?

• Language: English
• Publisher: JMS Books LLC
• Release date: Dec 17, 2019
• ISBN: 9781646561735

Sarah Hadley Brook

Sarah Hadley Brook reserves her evenings for her hobby-turned-passion of writing, letting the characters she conjures up in her mind take the lead and show her where the story will go. She dreams of traveling to Scotland some day and visiting the places her ancestors lived. Sarah believes in “happily ever after” and strives to ensure her characters find their own happiness in love and life. For more information, visit sarahhadleybrookwrites.com.

Book preview

Matthew's Present

By Sarah Hadley Brook

Published by JMS Books LLC at Smashwords

Visit jms-books.com for more information.

Copyright 2019 Sarah Hadley Brook

ISBN 9781646561735

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Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com

Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.

All rights reserved.

WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.

This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Published in the United States of America.

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Matthew's Present

By Sarah Hadley Brook

There he is, Uncle Matthew, his niece announced quietly, her excitement tempered with the respect all children have for Santa. Eagerly, she nudged him and pointed ahead, barely able to contain her enthusiasm. She was practically bouncing up and down in her pink-and-white snow boots as a grin spread across her delicate face.

Finally, he thought, fighting another yawn. They had been standing in line for at least an hour. He shifted her pink coat onto his other arm and glanced over at Santa’s Workshop, immensely pleased that someone in a Santa suit was making his way over to the green velvet

Reviews for Matthew's Present

[serenayates · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Reunions are one of my favorite ways to bring lovers together, and with how much I love Christmas stories, I’m sure you can guess that it doesn’t get much better for me than a Christmas reunion. ‘Matthew’s Present’ is particularly cute, with Matthew not liking the holiday very much at first, his five-year-old niece “getting in on the action” to fix this, and a result that had me smiling for quite a while.

If you like your Christmas stories deceptively simple and super cute, you’ll probably adore this one!


NOTE: This book was provided by Dreamspinner Press for the purpose of a review.

[schatzi_5 · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

Matthew Blick is pressured into taking his five-year-old niece, Hannah, to see Santa at the mall so she can tell him what she wants for Christmas. Matthew has been relatively grinchy since finding his boyfriend in bed with another man years ago, and although he no longer has feelings for his ex, the holiday season just reminds him of the betrayal. It turns out that Hannah wants her Uncle Matthew to find a man to make him happy for the holidays, and Santa knows just the man for the job.This story was pretty short, and I just don't feel like the characters were fleshed out all that well. I never really understood why Matthew was so upset about the holiday season if, as he claimed, the feelings he had once had for his ex are really water under the bridge. Yes, I still get stupidly sentimental about my first serious girlfriend around the holidays (and other times of the year, or when certain songs come on the radio), but I will be the first person to admit that I still love her, even though we haven't seen each other in years and years. There was also a very insta-love feel to this story. It turns out that "Santa" is actually the first guy that Matthew kissed back in high school. They didn't attend the same school, and Matthew didn't really recognize the guy upon meeting or even the guy's name. Just too much too fast for me, and it didn't feel believable because of it.