Sloane Kincaid has built an entire career-and a carefully controlled life-around one unshakable belief: less is safer.
As a high-end professional organizer for the elite, Sloane doesn't just declutter homes-she edits lives. She erases chaos, sentiment, and emotional excess with ruthless precision. White space is her sanctuary. Minimalism is her armor. And Christmas? Christmas is a logistical nightmare she avoids at all costs.
So when Sloane is offered the promotion of her dreams, there's only one catch: she must purge the infamous Holloway Estate-a sprawling Victorian mansion drowning in decades of Christmas decorations, family heirlooms, and emotional baggage-before Christmas Eve.
The job should be simple.
It isn't.
Because half the house belongs to Julian Ashcroft-a flannel-wearing, stubbornly sentimental carpenter who believes memories are meant to be kept, not boxed up and auctioned off. Where Sloane sees clutter, Julian sees history. Where she demands efficiency, he insists on heart. And thanks to an inconvenient clause in the will, he has the power to veto every ruthless decision she makes.
Snowed in by a blizzard and trapped under the same roof, Sloane and Julian are forced into an uneasy truce. What begins as a battle of wills turns into a reluctant partnership when they discover something unexpected hidden among the chaos: a cryptic trail left behind by Julian's grandfather, pointing to a mysterious object known only as the Heart of Holloway-an asset valuable enough to save the house... if they can find it.
As they follow clues through rooms packed with memories, traditions, and long-buried truths, Sloane is confronted with the one thing she's spent her life avoiding: the difference between clutter that suffocates and memories that anchor. And Julian must face the reality that holding on too tightly can be just as dangerous as letting go.
With every discovery, the walls Sloane has built begin to crack. The house starts to breathe. And somewhere between tangled Christmas lights, shared meals, and late-night confessions by firelight, something warmer-and far more terrifying-takes root.
Because falling in love might require Sloane to risk the very chaos she's sworn to eliminate.
Love and Other Clutter is a heartwarming, witty, slow-burn holiday romance about opposites who clash, heal, and discover that sometimes the messiest things in life are the ones most worth keeping. Perfect for fans of forced proximity, grumpy-sunshine dynamics, found family, and Christmas stories with both humor and heart.
