I went on three-month maternity-leave hiatus during Red String’s original run (4 or so years ago). One thing that happened after the hiatus was that a LOT of people didn’t realize I had come back. I lost a quarter of my readership that I never recovered (4k or so readers). Even though the site was updating, rss was going, and I was announcing it on all my usual social media spots, people were just unaware the story was back. I would be at conventions and they were shocked it was still going, saying they thought the hiatus meant it wasn’t coming back.
Short breaks over holidays haven’t had any adverse affects as of yet on my current series. ^_^