Sure, it might be the most wonderful time of the year, but it is also the most hectic.

There’s holiday traffic, burgeoning social calendars, champagne on school nights and wading through fellow frazzled shoppers, packed in like sardines. 

You have to seek refuge from the chaos when and where you can: a five-minute tea break, a 20-minute meditation or a 40-minute Netflix episode, which, in our opinion, is best prescribed snuggled under a duvet with a glass of wine and some Quality Street. 

If you’re looking for something new to watch – one can only watch Love Actually so many times, after all – you really need not look further than Virgin River.

That is to say, if you’re looking for a soothing, feel-good show set in a small country town, this is it: romance, escapism, cliffhangers – what’s not to like?

The book-to-TV adaptation of author Robyn Carr’s series of the same name debuted on Netflix earlier in December and has already amassed quite the following.

The show follows nurse practitioner Melinda Monroe, played by Alexandra Breckenridge (This Is Us and American Horror Story), after she moves to Virgin River, a tiny fictional town in northern California, for reasons mostly unknown. 

Throughout the first season, her traumatic past begins to reveal itself as she grows closer to many of the town folk, including handsome former marine-cum-bar owner Jack (Martin Henderson).

The show is – we’re calling it – extremely bingeable. 

But hey, don’t take our word for it, take Danielle Steele’s: the best-selling author recently gave the series her nod of approval with an endorsement via Twitter.

So if like Steele, and this writer, you end up watching all 10 episodes in a matter of days, the good news is that Season 2 has been confirmed and filming is already underway.

The new season is set to air in 2020.

Image: Netflix.