A Snow Ball's Chance: A Chestnut Creek Christmas

Their frosty rivalry heats up with one chance Snow Ball.

High school English teacher Ember Lockhardt is a stickler for the rules when it comes to protecting her students’ best interests and educational opportunities. Born and raised in Chicago, Ember landed in small Chestnut Creek, North Carolina, working with a state-led program to bring gifted educators to under-accommodated rural schools. As her tenure nears its end, she’s assured a sizable financial stipend, which she hopes to use to start an English and writing conservatory in the picturesque mountain town, despite her mother’s incessant pleas, trying to lure her back to the big city life.

Local wrestling coach and gym teacher Cole Hansen, born and bred in Chestnut Creek, is a beloved figure in the town and a favorite among the students at Chestnut Creek High School. He inherently understands the full spectrum of needs his students face and prides himself on advocating for them. Fiercely protective of the small town and his family’s legacy there, he mistrusts outsiders and their intentions, especially big-city transplants. He’s lost enough to those cosmopolitan allurements—the most hurtful being his own mother who abandoned him as a child to pursue an acting career.

When Ember bars the champion wrestler from competition because of failing grades, she and Cole have a heated exchange in the school’s hallway. The principal, hoping to heal the rift between them, charges Ember and Cole with planning the school’s holiday dance. Working together, Ember’s love of Christmas and Chestnut Creek softens Cole’s hardened exterior, but when opportunity comes knocking from the big city, he realizes that convincing Ember to stay might mean parting with the very life he loves.

This enemies-to-lovers romcom proves that ice can sometimes be nice...