Dear friends of JEPP:
it is this time of the year again to thank you, our dear reviewers, authors and readers, for producing great research, constructively commenting on manuscripts and engaging with the pieces published in JEPP. We know 2025 will be very different from previous years for JEPP (and its family) but we are sure you will make it as productive for research on public policy, European politics and the EU as 2024 was.
Despite the transition at JEPP, we continue with our tradition to let you know how the JEPP editors will spend their holidays. Scroll down to read more about our plans. After you all can hopefully enjoy a well-deserved break as well, we are looking forward to hearing from you in 2025! Stay tuned for our upcoming issues, debate sections and special issues. Follow us on X (@jepp_journal) or Blue Sky (@jeppjournal.bsky.social) and subscribe to our newsletter.
Happy holidays!
Your JEPP team
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Veronica will spend the winter holidays with her partner in New York. 
All Veronica wants for Christmas is the end of great power competition, and the triumph of reason over emotions in European democratic politics.A couple of weeks and some catching up on JEPP reading should do it. She will be contemplating that path to a better world while also questioning her lifestyle choices every time she has to pay 15$ for a cup of New York mulled wine. Cheers?!
In contrast to his globetrotting co-associate editors, Martin will spend the holidays at home in Copenhagen – with his wife and two daughters. He will have high hopes to catch up on reading novels and JEPP articles, plan to get all sorts of important practical home projects started AND finished, maybe even find the time for several rounds of crate digging vinyl records. Sleep in every day. Like the good ol’ days. The days before the arrival of the beautiful Flora and Merle. Reality will quickly dawn on Martin. He will get nothing practical done, since Flora and Merle will keep him busy with demands to be tickled, read Lion King-books, and play dress up. They will wake (too) early, even on Christmas Day or January 1 (how is that even legal?!). And Martin will once again be surprised at how much he enjoys the Christmas break despite its radical departure from initial aspirations.
According to DALL-E, this is how Michael’s holiday break will look like 😊 Since I will be handing over my responsibilities for JEPP’s research agenda and debate sections soon, I want to take this occasion to say thank you. Thank you, first and foremost to Jeremy and Berthold for their trust and for learning from them so much about being a good editor and colleague. I am also deeply grateful to everyone I had the privilege of working with in my role at JEPP over the past ten years—I hope the pleasure was mutual! I wish Berthold and his new team all the best! Warm regards, Michael
Daniel is going to take a few weeks off around Christmas for a well-needed (if not well-deserved) break, splitting time between home and friends in Southampton, and family in Essex and Portsmouth – all the nice places in England…! A lot of the time will probably be around home due to the cat (pictured) being very social with humans but not other animals, meaning we can’t put her in a cattery; but why would we want to, when she has a face like that?
This year, Sarah, Alex and the two girls will spend the holidays in Miami visiting Alex’s brother and his wife. 
It certainly will be an adventure since it will be Paula’s and Tilda’s first long distance flight and travel oversees. Sarah’s sister-in-law will deliver on her promise to whisk everyone away to Disney World on Christmas day and Sarah will probably need all her strength to not get overwhelmed by the hustle and bustle. While skeptical at the prospect of spending Christmas full of glitter, she will be up for any kind of fun once she gets there – as always.
As always, Jeremy and his family will be having a Kiwi Christmas at our house in Akaroa. It is a chance for Sonia and me to spend some quality time with Tess and Molly. The girls were born during the early years of JEPP. As you can see from the photo, they are now as grown up as JEPP! What is a Kiwi Christmas? In short, a BBQ and visits to the beach, and maybe a swim for the girls and their partners, Billy and Mitch. In attendance will be Murphy, of course, with expectations of his own plate of fillet steak and sausages. He is a ‘rescue dog’, found abandoned in the city centre. We adopted him some years ago. He must think he won the dogs’ lottery! Not just steak for Christmas, but far more walks with ‘Dad’ in 2025.Miri Kirihimete: Merry Christmas
Berthold’s end of the year plans are rather simple. He will take a break from JEPP-related transitions, which will involve catching-up on quality time with his loved ones, ridiculous amounts of Panettone eating, overfeeding his cat (not with Panettone) and, snow permitting, some cross-country skiing (to eat more Panettone afterwards). He may also ask a bot to compensate for the prospective lack of JEPP-related Emails from Jeremy come 2025.
Thomas and his wife will spend the holidays in San Francisco. They are looking forward to some quiet days and good food. “Karl the Fog” permitting, Thomas aims to go for runs in the rainy mornings so as to claim for the forseeable future that he exercises regularly. He has also been mandated with planning the Christmas dinner.
Asya will spend the holidays with her husband in her Bulgarian hometown of Bourgas, nestled at Black Sea coast, visiting her parents and sister. 
She hopes to soak up some much-needed vitamin D to counter the dark winter days of the Netherlands, all while diplomatically avoiding political debates with her family. Another aspiration is to resist overindulging in her mother’s incredible, seemingly endless array of homemade dishes—and to sidestep any potential family drama. As in years past, these plans will likely remain more wishful thinking than reality. Still, she holds out hope to enjoy at least one good novel and reconnect with cherished old friends.