It’s a pleasure to join the Rachel’s Random Resources blog tour for The Mistletoe Mixtape by The Christmas Collective by sharing a guest post today. My thanks to Rachel for inviting me to participate. As well as a guest post, there’s also a smashing competition for a lucky reader to win a paperback copy of The Mistletoe Mixtape further down this blog post.

The Mistletoe Mixtape is available for purchase here.

The Mistletoe Mixtape

Snuggle up for the holidays with 12 very different tales of love that will have you dancing under the mistletoe!

The Mistletoe Mixtape, the second anthology from The Christmas Collective, is a diverse and inclusive mix of stories, with more swoon-worthy characters, second chances and happy endings.

Amongst these twelve Christmas music inspired stories you will discover long lost love, festive fantasy, LGBTQ+ love stories, witty one liners and holiday romances. There really is a story to capture every reader’s festive spirit. So grab yourself a hot chocolate, pop on your favourite festive tunes and immerse yourself in the magic of The Mistletoe Mixtape.

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Creating Romantic Leads

A Guest Post by Jenny Bromham of The Christmas Collective

Who doesn’t love a swoon-worthy leading man or woman? To me, that’s one of the main reasons we pick up a romance book or watch a romance film – we don’t just want to watch the characters fall in love, we want to fall in love with them ourselves!

But where does the inspiration come from, for these irresistible characters? Are they based on real life love affairs, on heart-throb celebs, on literary heroes? With this question in mind, I interviewed some of the authors from The Mistletoe Mixtape anthology. I asked them to reveal the inspiration behind the characters we’re all going to fall in love with this Christmas.

Dominic the Donkey by Donna Gowland

Kate Winslet’s character in The Holiday was an inspiration, as was Ryan Reynolds’s character in The Proposal. I loved the idea of a character who’d spent so long lusting after her boss, that she’d closed herself off to any other chance of love.

Wrapped in Red by Joe Burkett

My leading man is Charlie. He is a lost soul who has been cast adrift. My inspiration for him…I wanted to create a character who thought that they had it all sown up, only to realise that their world was built on sand. From there, I wanted to see how Charlie could rebuild his life.

Santa Baby by Helen Hawkins

Erm… every Netflix/Hallmark Christmas movie heroine ever! Busy city business woman meets small town kind hearted gentle giant…

Walking in a Winter Wonderland by S.L. Robinson

My inspiration was my own woeful love life, being single again (by choice) at the age of 32. Though I’m not as dramatic about it as my protagonist, Lucky, I made her slightly older and with a more devastating reason to be turned off love. It was cathartic to have myself work out the harder parts of a breakup with some fantasy and escapism!

A Winter’s Tale by Jenny Bromham

My leading man, Garry, is a gentle giant and an unassuming romantic.Physically, he’s based on Mikael Persbrandt’s character, Jakob, from the TV show, Sex Education. Emotionally, he’s based on Gabriel from Far From The Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy. Garry’s unrelenting patience and love for my protagonist, Sarah, simmers gently and endlessly throughout.

White Christmas by Marianne Calver

I think lots of us can relate to that feeling of wanting to present our best selves to the world, especially on social media. That was the basis for Bianca who is struggling with how she wants to be perceived and how she sees herself.

Fairytale of New York by Michelle Harris

I really wanted Daniel to be a well-rounded character with depth. Not easy in a short story but, hopefully, I succeeded. I also imagine him as quite smouldering and hot, because life is more fun that way. I imagine him as a Regé-Jean Page type to look at. I wonder if readers would agree?!

I think Michelle’s question is key here. Will you imagine the romantic leads as they are in the authors’ minds, or will you have your own equivalent to Ryan Reynolds, Mikael Persbrandt or Regé-Jean Page? Will the stories of lost love, found love and love that’s been waiting at the sidelines stir memories from your own experiences?

The Mistletoe Mixtape offers twelve very different tales of love with twelve very different leading men and women. I really enjoyed chatting to my co-authors and learning where their larger-than-life characters sprung from. Now the only question that remains is, which of them are you going to fall in love with this Christmas?

About The Christmas Collective

The Christmas Collective is a group of twelve romance authors who came together when shortlisted for a festive romance competition. Together they have created two Christmas Romance anthologies, More Than Mistletoe (2021) and The Mistletoe Mixtape (2022).

The Christmas Collective authors are spread far and wide, across the UK, Ireland, Spain and South Korea, however, one thing connects them despite the distance: a love of romance and Christmas.

For further information, visit their website, find them on Facebook, TikTok and Instagram or follow them on Twitter @ChristmasCo2022.

There’s more with these other bloggers too:

Giveaway

For your chance to win a paperback copy of The Mistletoe Mixtape (Open to UK and Ireland only) click here.

Please note that this giveaway is run independently of Linda’s Book Bag as follows:

The winner will be selected at random via Rafflecopter from all valid entries and will be notified by Twitter and/or email. If no response is received within 7 days then Rachel’s Random Resources reserves the right to select an alternative winner. Open to all entrants aged 18 or over.  Any personal data given as part of the competition entry is used for this purpose only and will not be shared with third parties, with the exception of the winners’ information. This will passed to the giveaway organiser and used only for fulfilment of the prize, after which time Rachel’s Random Resources will delete the data.  I am not responsible for despatch or delivery of the prize.