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Emerald City Hearts
Emerald City Hearts delivers a story of hope and restoration wrapped with sweet romance in a lighthearted read.
Pour a cup of hot cocoa and settle in for a trip down the yellow brick road to the most charming town in the Texas Panhandle, where love and laughter flow from a children's theater to the mighty Crickets football field and back to the twinkling lights on the town square Christmas tree. Featuring clean romance laced with humor, Emerald City Hearts offers a perfect holiday read but will delight readers in any season. Fall in love with the residents of Cliffside City, where hardship and hope mingle on the road to an unforgettable Christmas production of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.With the existence of her children’s theater in jeopardy, Beth Hollister knows this production might be her last. Could a recurring dream guide Beth to her future, maybe even love?Something is off with Claire and Tristen Johnston. Just who are the people raising the precocious little girl with fiery hair and a personality to match?David Perkins spends his life coaching football but goes home alone. He needs more than Friday night lights to brighten his world.Unexpected twists and turns bring flirty fun, a message of hope, and new beginnings in Emerald City Hearts, book 1 of Cliffside City Romance.
Pour a cup of hot cocoa and settle in for a trip down the yellow brick road to the most charming town in the Texas Panhandle, where love and laughter flow from a children's theater to the mighty Crickets football field and back to the twinkling lights on the town square Christmas tree. Featuring clean romance laced with humor, Emerald City Hearts offers a perfect holiday read but will delight readers in any season. Fall in love with the residents of Cliffside City, where hardship and hope mingle on the road to an unforgettable Christmas production of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.With the existence of her children’s theater in jeopardy, Beth Hollister knows this production might be her last. Could a recurring dream guide Beth to her future, maybe even love?Something is off with Claire and Tristen Johnston. Just who are the people raising the precocious little girl with fiery hair and a personality to match?David Perkins spends his life coaching football but goes home alone. He needs more than Friday night lights to brighten his world.Unexpected twists and turns bring flirty fun, a message of hope, and new beginnings in Emerald City Hearts, book 1 of Cliffside City Romance.
256 pages, Kindle Edition
Published October 4, 2025
4 people are currently reading
9 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 19, 2025
This was a wonderful story. It definitely helped get me in the holiday spirit! I encourage anyone who enjoys Hallmark Christmas movies to read this book.
February 4, 2026
“Emerald City Hearts” is a great book if you like contemporary romance set in smaller towns. This book comes with some extra sweetness since it does take place mainly around Christmas which just adds that extra bit of magic to it. Laura was even awesome enough to add some recipes to the back of the book, for some cookies and a sweet potato dish that was actually prepared in the book. I look forward to baking the cookies at the very least myself 🙂
This story follows the four perspectives of the main characters of Beth, David, Tristan and Claire. While I am not the biggest fan of so many POVs, I think Laura worked with the chaos well. The story did feel much faster this way which was definitely not a bad thing in this case. I did have to get used to the quick switches, but Laura made it easier to figure out who was now speaking.
The Texas panhandle is the main setting for this story. Specifically, the small town of Cliffside which is a real town just north-west of Amarillo, Texas. As always in every other book set in Texas, I do have a sweet spot for these, particularly when I am pretty sure I have driven through that very town or come close to it on one of my own road trips. It adds a point of realism to the story, making the journey feel as though it is happening to real people. Anyways, Cliffside seems to be a very typical small country town you can see all over the more rural areas. There are the favorite eating spots, the local churches, the endless supply of relationship drama, an overwhelming obsession with high school football, you name it. I found myself imagining the layout of the streets in the town square and enjoying the Christmas decor that begins to be more present as the book follows its plot. Cliffside felt like the small town it is embodying, giving the expression “it’s a small world” some meaning.
Beth is the most prominent perspective in this book. She is the theater teacher in Cliffside, and her romance story is the one that is mainly focused on in this first book in the series. She runs into several roadblocks in the story that affect her future in this town. Being one of the newer residents, she was still in the process of settling herself in when all the problems started popping off. Luckily Beth is a very faithful Christian, and she rode that faith like a lifeboat at sea. Yeah, she becomes discouraged at times, but she was always able to lean on God and the friends she had made up to this point for guidance and encouragement. As a teacher to younger children, her loyalty to those she holds dear was showcased with all her effort she was putting into the children’s Christmas performance of ‘The Wizard of Oz’. Even through all the adversity, she was steadfast in the promises and expectations others had for her, and she rose and exceeded most if not all.
Claire is one of the adults who was helping Beth with the whole production, as she is related to one of the girls in the theater class. She has quite a bit of emotional and spiritual baggage from multiple situations that came from COVID, including the death of a dear friend. Due to her overwhelming loss and instability, she closed herself off from God. Even going so far as to blame God for everything that had happened. Basically, she was dealing with a lot of bitterness and feeling lost in life. Even while dealing with the overwhelming baggage, she remained a great friend and helper to Beth. Claire was always ready and willing to do whatever it took to prepare for all the deadlines and deal with all the chaos that comes when dealing with children. As the book goes on and she begins to figure out some things on her own, she concludes the book with the best character development in the story. That final bittersweet moment was one of the brighter moments in the book for sure. Her romantic feeling towards David is explored a bit, but not fully fleshed out, leaving that for the next book in the series I bet.
David is the football coach for the Cliffside Crickets. He begins by being the love interest for Beth, as he gets to know her when she takes him to the hospital after an unfortunate incident occurs. He enlists the help of the football places at one point, when a bunch of Beth’s theater stuff got ruined and was always making sure everyone was okay and supported. Like Beth, he carried his faith like a shield and was a regular at church. As the book goes on, he begins to realize his true feelings for Beth are not quite how he desired them to be and he showed great maturity, along with Beth as they made the decision together, as to what their relationship should be. David and Beth’s relationship was very wholesome and encouraging for people that may find themselves in a similar situation. He finds himself attracted to Claire which may be explored more heavily in the next book, as mentioned.
Tristan is the accountant career man in the group. He is the father of one of the girls in Beth’s theater class with an association with Claire. It was actually through Claire that he meets Beth and has an instant sort of attraction for her. Like Claire, Tristan is carrying around some past trauma, however he is handling it much more effectively than Claire. Tristan has been a regular church goer, along with his young daughter. He has even made several attempts to bring Claire, which is met with refusal. His faith is what is allowing him to have such an optimistic view on life still. Throughout the book, he is coming to terms with his own romantic feelings for Beth, and what that would mean for him and his daughter. Beth begins to lean on him more as the show becomes closer and closer as it seems like they would look for any opportunity to spend time with each other. At one point, Tristan begins to have his own professional issues of which he remains hopeful and optimistic through it all.
As you can imagine, I was really worried there was going to be a love triangle, or even square situation going on here. I am happy to say that I was not disappointed. Laura wrote the romance in a very mature and adult way, with mutual understanding and honesty. I feel like more romance authors should explore not just the swoon-worthy moments, but the cases in which the parties realize they are better suited as just friends as there is nothing wrong with that. The romance that is present remains sweet, respectful and patient throughout the whole story. I was glad about how the story ended and am now looking forward to cheering on the next couple.
All in all, if you like contemporary romance with elements of a smaller town and do not mind the heavier Christian themes throughout, this book may be for you. If you enjoy books that explore how characters deal with moments of adversity as they are trying to find where they fit both in this town, and life in general, you may get some deeper levels of enjoyment out of this story.
This story follows the four perspectives of the main characters of Beth, David, Tristan and Claire. While I am not the biggest fan of so many POVs, I think Laura worked with the chaos well. The story did feel much faster this way which was definitely not a bad thing in this case. I did have to get used to the quick switches, but Laura made it easier to figure out who was now speaking.
The Texas panhandle is the main setting for this story. Specifically, the small town of Cliffside which is a real town just north-west of Amarillo, Texas. As always in every other book set in Texas, I do have a sweet spot for these, particularly when I am pretty sure I have driven through that very town or come close to it on one of my own road trips. It adds a point of realism to the story, making the journey feel as though it is happening to real people. Anyways, Cliffside seems to be a very typical small country town you can see all over the more rural areas. There are the favorite eating spots, the local churches, the endless supply of relationship drama, an overwhelming obsession with high school football, you name it. I found myself imagining the layout of the streets in the town square and enjoying the Christmas decor that begins to be more present as the book follows its plot. Cliffside felt like the small town it is embodying, giving the expression “it’s a small world” some meaning.
Beth is the most prominent perspective in this book. She is the theater teacher in Cliffside, and her romance story is the one that is mainly focused on in this first book in the series. She runs into several roadblocks in the story that affect her future in this town. Being one of the newer residents, she was still in the process of settling herself in when all the problems started popping off. Luckily Beth is a very faithful Christian, and she rode that faith like a lifeboat at sea. Yeah, she becomes discouraged at times, but she was always able to lean on God and the friends she had made up to this point for guidance and encouragement. As a teacher to younger children, her loyalty to those she holds dear was showcased with all her effort she was putting into the children’s Christmas performance of ‘The Wizard of Oz’. Even through all the adversity, she was steadfast in the promises and expectations others had for her, and she rose and exceeded most if not all.
Claire is one of the adults who was helping Beth with the whole production, as she is related to one of the girls in the theater class. She has quite a bit of emotional and spiritual baggage from multiple situations that came from COVID, including the death of a dear friend. Due to her overwhelming loss and instability, she closed herself off from God. Even going so far as to blame God for everything that had happened. Basically, she was dealing with a lot of bitterness and feeling lost in life. Even while dealing with the overwhelming baggage, she remained a great friend and helper to Beth. Claire was always ready and willing to do whatever it took to prepare for all the deadlines and deal with all the chaos that comes when dealing with children. As the book goes on and she begins to figure out some things on her own, she concludes the book with the best character development in the story. That final bittersweet moment was one of the brighter moments in the book for sure. Her romantic feeling towards David is explored a bit, but not fully fleshed out, leaving that for the next book in the series I bet.
David is the football coach for the Cliffside Crickets. He begins by being the love interest for Beth, as he gets to know her when she takes him to the hospital after an unfortunate incident occurs. He enlists the help of the football places at one point, when a bunch of Beth’s theater stuff got ruined and was always making sure everyone was okay and supported. Like Beth, he carried his faith like a shield and was a regular at church. As the book goes on, he begins to realize his true feelings for Beth are not quite how he desired them to be and he showed great maturity, along with Beth as they made the decision together, as to what their relationship should be. David and Beth’s relationship was very wholesome and encouraging for people that may find themselves in a similar situation. He finds himself attracted to Claire which may be explored more heavily in the next book, as mentioned.
Tristan is the accountant career man in the group. He is the father of one of the girls in Beth’s theater class with an association with Claire. It was actually through Claire that he meets Beth and has an instant sort of attraction for her. Like Claire, Tristan is carrying around some past trauma, however he is handling it much more effectively than Claire. Tristan has been a regular church goer, along with his young daughter. He has even made several attempts to bring Claire, which is met with refusal. His faith is what is allowing him to have such an optimistic view on life still. Throughout the book, he is coming to terms with his own romantic feelings for Beth, and what that would mean for him and his daughter. Beth begins to lean on him more as the show becomes closer and closer as it seems like they would look for any opportunity to spend time with each other. At one point, Tristan begins to have his own professional issues of which he remains hopeful and optimistic through it all.
As you can imagine, I was really worried there was going to be a love triangle, or even square situation going on here. I am happy to say that I was not disappointed. Laura wrote the romance in a very mature and adult way, with mutual understanding and honesty. I feel like more romance authors should explore not just the swoon-worthy moments, but the cases in which the parties realize they are better suited as just friends as there is nothing wrong with that. The romance that is present remains sweet, respectful and patient throughout the whole story. I was glad about how the story ended and am now looking forward to cheering on the next couple.
All in all, if you like contemporary romance with elements of a smaller town and do not mind the heavier Christian themes throughout, this book may be for you. If you enjoy books that explore how characters deal with moments of adversity as they are trying to find where they fit both in this town, and life in general, you may get some deeper levels of enjoyment out of this story.
November 12, 2025
Devine read
I enjoyed this lovely book immensely. I found the twists and turns added to the depth of this story. Life brings us mountains and valleys, and this book shows how faith can be restored after intense grief. I look forward to book 2.
I enjoyed this lovely book immensely. I found the twists and turns added to the depth of this story. Life brings us mountains and valleys, and this book shows how faith can be restored after intense grief. I look forward to book 2.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews