Julia meets a real-life Ebenezer in her standoffish neighbor, Cain, in Debbie Macomber’s Twelve Days of Christmas. After working at a Macy’s for seven years while attaining her communications degree, Julia has a shot at her dream job: running social media for a large company. To get it, however, she needs to get more engagement on a blog than any of the other applicants. 

When one encounter with her unpleasant neighbor leaves her furious, her best friend suggests pivoting from DIY Christmas decorations tutorials to being nice to her neighbor for the 12 days left until Christmas and documenting her progress—and the change she sees in him. 

Her blog, Twelve Days of Christmas, takes off the very next day. She brings him his newspaper and attempts to buy him coffee, reporting it all on her blog. Cain responds with skepticism, but slowly, he starts to open up. Meanwhile, Julia meets his grandfather Bernie, who sheds insight into his grandson’s demeanor. But as Cain and Julia get closer, things get riskier for Julia. Confessing that she started being extra nice to him just for the blog would break his trust. But the blog gets more popular than she could have ever imagined, and it seems that the truth coming out is inevitable. 

There doesn’t seem to be a way out of Julia’s situation, which makes the story interesting, but some of Julia’s actions make Cain’s accusation of her being a stalker not unreasonable. Julia keeps running into Cain everywhere he goes, and finding Bernie and becoming close friends with him, all behind Cain’s back, is one of her more questionable decisions. Bernie and Julia’s bond also sometimes seems stronger than Bernie’s relationship with his own grandson as he chooses to spend Christmas dinner with Julia over Cain and often takes Julia’s side. 

The dogs on the cover are a little deceiving, with a dog only briefly making an appearance and being mentioned a couple times. With alternating perspectives showing both Julia and Cain’s point of views, readers get the full experience in this story of holiday cheer, kindness, and learning to trust again. Even without dogs, the story is a cute addition to the winter season and invokes a comforting holiday spirit.