Synopsis/Details
Elliot Brandt, a once-beloved children’s book author, is adored by fans for his whimsical stories of Thomas the Wondering Buffalo—but off the page, Elliot is burned out, bitter, and barely holding it together. Estranged from his family and disillusioned by life, he dreads the holidays more than deadlines.
When he learns that his five-year-old niece Lily—whom he’s never met—has only one Christmas wish: to receive the one-of-a-kind Thomas plush he sewed years ago, Elliot reluctantly agrees to deliver it cross-country. His sister’s guilt trip and his publisher’s push for a “viral author road trip” don’t help.
What begins as a begrudging solo drive from New York to Shasta, California turns into an unpredictable, life-altering journey.
Along the way, Elliot shares a rental car with a single dad and his spirited daughter, helps a grieving boy recreate a lost drawing, reads to children at a struggling bookstore, and rescues a runaway bride. But it’s after pulling a woman from a burning car in the snow that Elliot’s world truly shifts—and when a bearded Irishman named Santa O’Connor arrives in a sleigh with two horses and a flask, the story tips from road trip to miracle.
Together, they race the clock through icy streets to save a life, and then—with no buffalo and no suitcase—Elliot sleigh-drifts into his sister’s front yard on Christmas Eve.
But the magic isn’t over yet: Taylor Swift arrives in a pink Cadillac with Thomas and Elliot’s suitcase, just in time for hot cocoa, a group reading of The Night Before Christmas, and a long-overdue reunion with his family.
Three months later, Elliot is back in a bookstore—but this time, not jaded. He reads from his new book, Thomas the Wondering Buffalo Goes Home for Christmas, to a room full of children, with Lily and Thomas sitting proudly in the front row.
Christmas Across America is a heartwarming, high-speed holiday journey about second chances, unexpected miracles, and learning that sometimes… wonder finds you when you finally stop running.
