Good Spirits

Set in Annapolis, Maryland, the novel follows 27-year-old Harriet York, the owner of the Crow's Nest, an antiques shop she inherited from her beloved aunt Matilda. A lifelong people-pleaser shaped by a cold, critical mother and an indifferent father, Harriet has spent years trying to earn her family's approval, only to be treated as a perpetual disappointment. Her relationship with her sister Samantha has deteriorated into silence, and her bond with her mother never recovered after Harriet left a prestigious legal career to take over the shop. Despite all of this, Harriet clings to optimism, surrounding herself with color, candy canes, and Christmas cheer.

On the first night of December, a stranger appears in Harriet's living room and announces he is a Ghost of Christmas Past, sent to help her mend her ways. Harriet screams, hurls a TV remote at him, and refuses to believe a word he says. The ghost, an Irish fisherman named Nolan who drowned over a century ago, is equally bewildered by her. His previous assignments have all been genuinely terrible people, and Harriet, with her stubborn kindness, does not fit the pattern. She demands to speak to his supervisor before agreeing to anything, and Nolan reluctantly departs.

Nolan reports to the Department of Hauntings and Spirits, a hidden bureaucratic office in downtown Annapolis overseen by Isabella, a formidable spirit who has run the Holiday Spirits division since the 15th century. Isabella dismisses his doubts, insisting that mistakes are never made, and warns him to figure out why he has been paired with Harriet. Nolan returns the next day with coffee, and Harriet, confronted with proof that he is real, finally agrees to take his hand and visit her past.

Their early trips to Harriet's memories reveal nothing sinister. They watch a young Harriet steal a toy boat from a holiday display after her mother scolds her for lingering; they observe a 21-year-old Harriet cutting down a Christmas tree alone in a snowy field because no one in her family would come with her. Each memory shows a girl, and then a young woman, starving for affection and bravely carving out joy despite receiving none from her parents. Nolan grows increasingly confused and protective, having never encountered an assignment like hers.

A tentative friendship forms. Harriet proposes a theory: Perhaps Nolan was assigned to her not because she is a bad person, but because she is the key to resolving his own unfinished business. She reasons that her shop might contain something that once belonged to him. Nolan reacts with anger, lashing out that she knows nothing about his existence, and immediately regrets his cruelty. He apologizes by taking her ice skating, where they share vulnerable truths. Harriet explains how her mother's resentment of Aunt Matilda poisoned her childhood, and Nolan confesses he stopped hoping for anything better long ago because the disappointment was too painful.

Then something unprecedented happens. Nolan's magic deposits them not in Harriet's memories but in his own: a beach in Ireland where his father chases his younger self through the sand near a lighthouse. Nolan panics, overwhelmed by grief for a life he has almost entirely forgotten. For the first time in over a century, he dreams, tastes food, feels temperature, and develops bruises. He returns to Harriet and admits she was right, confessing that she is "the first thing in a hundred years to make me feel anything at all" (153).

Their connection deepens into romance. After visiting a memory of Aunt Matilda comforting a teenage Harriet who was humiliated at school, Nolan's magic erupts involuntarily, blanketing the shop's tin ceiling with hundreds of sprigs of mistletoe in a cascade of golden sparks. He uses them as an excuse and kisses Harriet for the first time. They agree to hold on to each other for as long as they can, even though Nolan warns that after Christmas Eve, his deadline, her memories of him will blur and fade. He promises to remember everything about her.

Their intimacy grows alongside mounting complications. Nolan's magic becomes increasingly unstable, pulling them through rapid sequences of intertwined memories. He collapses, and Harriet nurses him through the night. When he wakes, their physical relationship begins. Isabella appears at the shop to warn Nolan that his attachment is jeopardizing the assignment and that consequences will follow if he misses his deadline.

A pivotal trip lands them at the dinner where Harriet told her family she was leaving law. Her mother called the decision a betrayal, her boyfriend Brent sided with the family, and Samantha stayed silent. Watching from the sidelines, Nolan sees that Harriet's only crime was choosing herself. Back in the present, he discovers his old compass on a shelf in the shop's storage closet: dented, broken-chained, its arrow never pointing north. He recognizes it from his life in Ireland but hides it beneath a crate, unwilling to trigger his departure.

Nolan accompanies Harriet to her family's Christmas gala, where he confronts her mother, Donna York, at the bar. Harriet finally stands up for herself, claiming every quality her family has treated as a flaw: her sensitivity, her sentimentality, her big heart. She declares she will no longer try to earn their approval and leaves with Nolan. That night, they consummate their relationship.

Their final trip to the past deposits them on Nolan's fishing boat during the storm that killed him in 1902. Harriet falls into the churning ocean and sinks into a dreamlike state. Beneath the water, she sees past Nolan dying and reaches for his hand. Present-day Nolan pulls her out with his magic and revives her, but the experience unlocks a buried memory: He saw Harriet in the water as he drowned more than a century ago.

In their remaining days, they choose to live in the present. On their early Christmas celebration, Harriet gives Nolan a wrapped gift: the compass she found in the closet. She does not know he hid it there himself. The compass arrow points steadily at Harriet, no matter who holds it. Nolan confesses he found it first and concealed it because he did not want to leave. His magic begins pulling him away in golden sparks. Harriet asks him not to say goodbye but to tell her he will see her tomorrow. He kisses her, whispers the words, and disappears.

Harriet wakes the next morning and discovers she still remembers everything about Nolan. She places a candle in the window, echoing the tradition of Nolan's mother who lit candles to guide lost sailors home, and waits. Days pass. Christmas comes and goes. Nolan does not appear, but her memories remain intact and the candle burns without melting, a last trace of his magic. Samantha visits the shop and confesses she always envied Harriet's willingness to be herself; the sisters hold hands and agree to rebuild their relationship.

Meanwhile, in the afterlife, Isabella and the recently departed Aunt Matilda reveal the truth to Nolan: Harriet was never his assignment but his soulmate, the person his soul was always meant to find across time. Nolan remained a ghost for over a century because he was waiting to exist in the same era as Harriet. The compass, the songs he hummed that she loved, the fig jam that matched his mother's recipe: All were threads connecting them across lifetimes. He is given a choice between two doors, one leading to eternal rest and one returning him to Harriet as a mortal. He chooses Harriet without hesitation.

On a winter evening, just as Harriet blows out the candle and accepts that Nolan is gone, a knock sounds at her door. Nolan stands on her porch, alive and human. He tells her his unfinished business was never the compass but Harriet herself. He tells her he loves her and promises to be with her for every tomorrow she allows. Harriet pulls him inside, and they kiss in the glow of her Christmas tree.