Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    A Home for the Holidays
    A Home for the Holidays
    A Home for the Holidays
    Ebook71 pages50 minutes

    A Home for the Holidays

    By Joe Cosentino

    3/5

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    Bobby and Paolo’s Holiday Stories: Book One

    Bobby McGrath’s Christmas trip to the beautiful Italian island of Capri to meet his eccentric extended family offers stunning views—none more stunning than his third cousin, Paolo Mascobello, a real stocking stuffer. As the two young men embark on a relationship, Bobby, a driven law student, learns to relax and bask under the old Italian moon, and Paolo realizes there’s more to life than a frolic on the beach. For the two to find everlasting amore, Paolo must overcome his fear of commitment and learn to follow his dreams, and Bobby must get his wish for happily ever after.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDreamspinner Press
    Release dateDec 2, 2015
    ISBN9781634765367
    A Home for the Holidays
    Author

    Joe Cosentino

    JOE COSENTINO was voted Favorite MM Mystery, Humorous, and Contemporary Author of the Year by the readers of Divine Magazine for Drama Queen, the first Nicky and Noah mystery novel. He is also the author of the remaining Nicky and Noah mysteries: Drama Muscle, Drama Cruise, Drama Luau, Drama Detective, Drama Fraternity, Drama Castle, Drama Dance, Drama Faerie, Drama Runway, Drama Christmas, Drama Pan, Drama TV, Drama Oz, Drama Prince, Drama Merry, Drama Daddy, and Drama King; the Player Piano Mysteries: The Player and The Player’s Encore; the Jana Lane Mysteries: Paper Doll, Porcelain Doll, Satin Doll, China Doll, Rag Doll; the Cozzi Cove series: Cozzi Cove: Bouncing Back, Moving Forward, Stepping Out, New Beginnings, Happy Endings; the In My Heart Anthology: An Infatuation & A Shooting Star; the Tales from Fairyland Anthology: The Naked Prince and Other Tales from Fairyland and Holiday Tales from Fairyland; the Bobby and Paolo Holiday Stories Anthology: A Home for the Holidays, The Perfect Gift, The First Noel; and the Found At Last Anthology: Finding Giorgio and Finding Armando. His books have won numerous Book of the Month awards and Rainbow Award Honorable Mentions. As an actor, Joe appeared in principal roles in film, television, and theatre, opposite stars such as Bruce Willis, Rosie O’Donnell, Nathan Lane, Jason Robards, and Holland Taylor. He received his Master of Fine Arts degree from Goddard College, Master’s degree from SUNY New Paltz, and is a happily married emeritus college theatre professor residing in New York State.

    Read more from Joe Cosentino

    Related to A Home for the Holidays

    Titles in the series (2)

    View More
    View More

    Related ebooks

    Contemporary Romance For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      Little House

      Jun 5, 2023

      On Monday nights our mother made popcorn and served it to us in mugs with milk poured over. My younger sister and I carried our mugs into the family room and ate the popcorn with spoons, like cereal. We were five and seven. Until we were allowed to s

      21 min read

    • Article

      A Delta Housewarming

      Jan 10, 2019

      Since I was twenty-five, by which time I’d been away from home for almost ten years, I’ve fantasized about building a house, a retreat of sorts, in or near my hometown in the Mississippi Delta. I hadn’t realized how long I’d actually had this particu

      7 min read

    • Article

      Ella’s Choice

      Oct 6, 2021

      Ella’s Choice
      7 min read

    • Article

      Class Act

      Oct 27, 2020

      Class Act
      6 min read

    • Article

      We Are Here

      Apr 29, 2019

      We Are Here
      16 min read

    • Article

      'Tis The Season

      Nov 2, 2022

      'Tis The Season
      2 min read

    • Article

      BITS & PIECES

      Oct 4, 2022

      I heard it shortly before it appeared; suddenly, a small yellow airplane dipped from the clouds and glided slowly down onto the flat hayfield. This wasn’t the first time he’d landed there; just last week he’d flown in with pontoons on his plane and h

      3 min read

    • Article

      Home Bound

      May 18, 2020

      Home Bound
      6 min read

    • Article

      Camouflage

      Jun 1, 2020

      Camouflage
      9 min read

    • Article

      My Family Didn’t Know I Existed

      Sep 29, 2020

      Knocking on my hotel-room door on the last morning of our holiday in Italy, my big sister, Katrin, 50, surprised me with a biker jacket made of buttery-soft leather. ‘It’s your birthday present,’ she smiled. ‘You know I can’t resist getting my little

      4 min read

    • Article

      Diamonds

      Jun 4, 2018

      Diamonds
      9 min read

    • Article

      Who’s The Daddy?

      Oct 23, 2020

      Who’s The Daddy?
      5 min read

    • Article

      Picture Imperfect

      Jun 20, 2021

      The photo is seven decades old this week. It’s the shortest day of 1951, I’m sitting on the back veranda of our shabby old house, and I’m about to turn eight. I know it was the shortest day, because that was part of my Mum’s mantra whenever she brou

      3 min read

    • Article

      Emma Lou

      Jan 4, 2022

      Emma Lou
      9 min read

    • Article

      A Southern Christmas

      Nov 1, 2023

      A Southern Christmas
      7 min read

    • Article

      Bella’s Magic Oven

      Dec 1, 2021

      Hi! I am Bella Andreson. I just turned nine years old. I have two younger sisters, one older brother and a pet goldfish named Bubbly. I am really sad because my friend Lucas Hill just moved to the future, which means I might never see him again. But

      4 min read

    • Article

      What the Tornado Gave Us

      Jul 1, 2022

      In part 1, Rosica tells the story of how she and her family moved from Mexico to North Carolina to join her father, who works as a roofer and has been sending home money. Adjusting to a new school where they didn’t know the language was easier on her

      9 min read

    • Article

      Ribs, Muscle, Bone

      Jan 7, 2020

      Ribs, Muscle, Bone
      10 min read

    • Article

      When Life Gives You Lemons

      Apr 2, 2020

      When Life Gives You Lemons
      7 min read

    • Article

      Counter Waves

      Oct 23, 2020

      Counter Waves
      8 min read

    • Article

      Come Stay

      Jan 16, 2024

      Come Stay
      23 min read

    • Article

      All Of Us Here

      Jun 4, 2020

      All Of Us Here
      6 min read

    • Article

      Your Page

      Dec 7, 2022

      I’m stuck at home trying to recover from COVID and I’ve read all my books, and watched too much TV. With the urge to cook something, I asked my best friend Carol to grab some supplies. She dropped off the essentials to make orange cornflake biscuits,

      3 min read

    • Article

      Secrets That Hold Us

      Oct 21, 2020

      How could we have lived so long, on an island as small as Jamaica, without knowing our mother's mother still lived? The post Secrets That Hold Us appeared first on The Millions.

      8 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for A Home for the Holidays

    3/5

    2 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      A Home for the Holidays - Joe Cosentino

      Table of Contents

      Blurb

      Dedication

      Acknowledgments

      Text

      About the Author

      By Joe Cosentino

      Visit Dreamspinner Press

      Copyright

      A Home for the Holidays

      By Joe Cosentino

      Bobby McGrath’s Christmas trip to the beautiful Italian island of Capri to meet his eccentric extended family offers stunning views—none more stunning than his third cousin, Paolo Mascobello, a real stocking stuffer. As the two young men embark on a relationship, Bobby, a driven law student, learns to relax and bask under the old Italian moon, and Paolo realizes there’s more to life than a frolic on the beach. For the two to find everlasting amore, Paolo must overcome his fear of commitment and learn to follow his dreams, and Bobby must get his wish for happily ever after.

      To Fred, for everything over all these years; to the staff at Dreamspinner Press; and to everyone seeking a home for the holidays.

      Acknowledgments

      TO MY parents, sister, niece, nephew, and cousins for insisting I take a trip to Italy. You were right!

      BOBBY, EVERY Christmas your father and I buy you a nice gift and you return it. So this year before we go shopping, I’m asking you. What do you want for Christmas, exactly?

      I was tempted to answer, How about the new Zeb Atlas DVD, Mom? No longer reading my law textbook, I pressed the cell phone against my ear and responded, My red sweater is getting frayed. I guess I could use a new one, Mom.

      "I don’t like red on you. I’ll get you a green sweater. It will go nicely with your eyes. You’ll be twenty-four in June. Nobody ever caught a husband wearing red clothes, except for Mrs. Klaus, and then look how overweight he was."

      I adjusted the heavy book on my knees and leaned back against the headboard of my narrow dorm room bed. Since fall semester of my third year of law school was over, my roommate had already gone back to Utah to be with his father and three mothers. Normally I would go home for the holidays.

      As far back as I can remember, every December twenty-third through the twenty-fifth my mother works herself to exhaustion while forbidding anyone to help her. Since I am not married, I am seated at the kiddie table, where I dodge meatball and manicotti grenades courtesy of my little nieces and nephews. Then the gifts are bestowed with price tags on them so we all know how many hours your father and I had to work to be able to buy our children such beautiful things. This is followed by oohs and ahhs for every gift except the presents from me, which garner comments from my parents and two sisters like, Oh well, I can wear that for dress-down day at work… if I keep on my coat. After the extended family of aunts, uncles, and cousins arrive for dessert (cannoli grenades at the kiddy table), my mother’s side (the Mascobellos) eat the pastries, and my father’s side (the McGraths) drink the liqueurs, while I sit upstairs in my old bedroom reading law case decisions on the Internet.

      This Christmas is going to be different. Throughout my childhood I heard stories about my mother’s now-deceased father who had a first cousin in Capri, Italy. Mom, too exhausted from taking care of all of you to survive such a journey, had recently spoken on the phone to her deceased father’s cousin’s daughter-in-law (got that?), and the two women had arranged for me to spend this Christmas with my Italian relatives. This led to my Christmas in Italy with my Italian cousin, Paolo Mascobello. More on that later!

      Don’t worry, Mom.

      How can I not worry? This is the first time you won’t be with us for Christmas. You’ll be halfway around the world.

      But you made the plans with your relatives.

      That’s what I’m worried about. Please don’t embarrass me, Bobby, Mom said, followed by a maternal sigh. And do everything they ask you to do.

      I will, Mom, except I’m not eating octopus.

      Eat anything they put in front of you! And say ‘Thank you.’

      Okay, Mom.

      And bring extra underwear. For all I know they do their laundry on a rock in the Mediterranean. What? Oh, Dad says to put your money in your underpants in case somebody tries to rob you.

      What if the robber reaches into my underpants?

      Hey, don’t talk dirty to me. I’m your mother.

      I glanced at my watch. Okay, Mom.

      And don’t spend all the money I sent you in one place.

      You didn’t need to send me money, Mom.

      "Take it.

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1