The Briar Club

By: Kate Quinn
Published Year: 2024
Publisher: William Morrow
Pages: 432

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Washington, D.C., 1950. Everyone keeps to themselves at Briarwood House, a down-at-the-heels all-female boardinghouse in the heart of the nation’s capital, where secrets hide behind white picket fences. But when the lovely, mysterious widow Grace March moves into the attic, she draws her oddball collection of neighbors into unlikely friendship: poised English beauty Fliss whose facade of perfect wife and mother covers gaping inner wounds; police officer’s daughter Nora, who is entangled with a shadowy gangster; frustrated baseball star Bea, whose career has ended along with the women’s baseball league of WWII; and poisonous, gung-ho Arlene, who has thrown herself into McCarthy’s Red Scare.

Grace’s weekly attic-room dinner parties and window-brewed sun tea become a healing balm on all their lives, but she hides a terrible secret of her own. When a shocking act of violence tears apart the house, the Briar Club women must decide once and for all: Who is the true enemy in their midst?

What I thought

Kate Quinn is one of my favorite authors. I originally picked The Alice Network 6 years ago for book club and we’ve all been fans ever since. I think as a book club this is our third Kate Quinn book we’re reading together.

The Briar Club is a little different from Quinn’s other historical fictions. Alice Network, Huntress, and Rose Code all followed wars and historic events and how women played their roll. This story follows a group of women who live in a boarding house in Washington D.C in the 1950’s. When Grace moves into the Briar House, the residents don’t talk to one another. The landlady of the house is grumpy with a ton of rules and her children Pete and Lina are unhappy and isolated. Grace brings everyone (minus the landlady) together with Thursday night dinners.

Each chapter follows one of the residents of the Briarwood house, with a snippet in between from Thanksgiving night in 1954. I didn’t realize that this story had a bit of a murder mystery to it which was really interesting. The story starts from Pete’s perspective which was interesting and a little sad. I think Nora was my favorite resident, followed by Grace and Fliss. Bea and Claire were mediocre to me, with some exciting pieces, and Reka bored me. Arlene I hated.

On a personal note, the thing I struggled with this book was the size of the chapters. Because each chapter was about a resident, they were long. I much prefer shorter chapters because I find it difficult to stop mid chapter unless there’s a clear stopping point.

I found the background of the history of the 1950s and McCartheyism to be interesting. I liked that this book as about women on the street and not women in the war. More of the heroic everyday hero as opposed to a superhero.

What Book Club Thought

Everyone loved this one! We all agreed that Nora’s chapter was our favorite whereas Reka’s was our least favorite. There also was some agreement about how we would’ve rather had shorter chapters with chronological story telling as opposed to each chapter being solely from one resident’s perspective. We also enjoyed talking about what our theories were when we knew two people had died but didn’t know who had died yet. This was really a fun book club discussion because not only did we get to talk a lot about the book, but we were able to talk about the history and the facts of those events that we hadn’t really known about previously.

First Love Language

By: Stefany Valentine
Published Year: 2025
Publisher: Penguin Workshop
Pages: 304

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I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This in no way shape or form influenced my opinion of this novel.

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Taiwanese American Catie Carlson has never fit in with her white family. As much as she loves her stepmom and stepsister, she yearns to understand more about her culture and find her biological mother.

So Catie is shocked when an opportunity comes knocking on her Her summer spa coworker, Toby, says he’ll teach her Mandarin. In exchange, she needs to teach him how to date so he can finally work up the courage to ask out his crush. The only problem is that Catie doesn’t actually have any dating experience. But she can fake it.

With her late father’s copy of The Five Love Languages and all his annotated notes, Catie becomes the perfect dating coach. Or so she thinks. As she gets dangerously close to Toby and to finding out what really happened to her biological mom, she realizes that learning the language of love might be tougher than she thought.

First Impressions

Love the cover! It’s so pretty. My friends even complimented I when they saw me reading it. I was immediately intrigued by the summary too. It sort of reminded me of the Netflix show XO, Kitty with her wanting to find out about her mom from another country. I also was intrigued by the concept of setting up dates based off of the 5 Love Languages.

What I thought

I liked this book much more at the beginning than I did towards the end.

Catie’s dad passed away 2 years ago and she currently lives with her adoptive mother and step-sister. When they have to move from San Francisco to Salt Lake City for the summer, Catie decides it’s time to get in touch with her Taiwanese mother’s side and see if she can find out more about her. Unfortuantely, she does not speak Mandarin anymore and she doesn’t know anyone in Salt Lake. When she gets a job, she becomes friends with the owner’s son who speaks Mandarin and is willing to teach her, if she will teach him how to go on dates. She finds her dad’s copy of the Five Love Languages, and even though she has no dating experience, she lies to Toby and uses the book to help teach him how to date.

There was a lot that went on in this book for being under 300 pages. I liked the beginning of the story because I enjoyed the teen angst of being dropped in Salt Lake in a community you no longer relate to and no friends. Catie’s adoptive mom’s family is Mormon, so there is a lot of discussion about Mormonism and how strict the church is.

Catie’s dad met and married her birth mom in Taiwan, but they divorced and she moved back to America with her dad. She kept in touch with her mom for a little bit but then eventually they stopped talking when she was little. She never asked her dad why they divorced or why her mom wasn’t in contact with her, so a lot of this story is Catie trying to figure that out. I would say that is the majority of the story and a little less so the fake dating.

I did like Toby and I liked when they went on dates. I didn’t like how easily things seemed to fall into place. Catie never planned these dates. She would just wing them in the moment and they always turned out perfectly. I would’ve appreciated if she had put at least some sort of effort into the dates.

I also understand that this is a YA novel, but I felt like the romance was so flat. Like, at one point she just goes “oh my God I love him.” Even though they have only known each other maybe a month? Like, they’ve never dated or kissed or anything and she decides that’s love? And then a little later, her sister and cousin say “Dude. Toby loves you too.” And immediately Catie goes ‘Oh my God he dose love me. Hoe could I have no seen it? There’s no way they’re wrong about this.” So it was a little bit too insta-lovey for me and I didn’t like how quickly she just decided that yes, they are in love and it’s the truth. I know I’m no longer a teen, but even back the I don’t think I would’ve decided I was full on in love with someone I had a crush on.

I think the author bit off a little more than she could chew given this was a debut novel. Between the Mormonism, the divorce, the cancer, the love, the abandonment and the move it was a lot going on. Not that that’s not necessarily realistic, but I just think there was a lot that got left behind.

This book is fine. I think it’s obvious that this is a debut novel. Maybe I would’ve enjoyed it more as a teen? I wanted more about the romance of the five love languages than of Catie researching her family history. Which was also left with an unsatisfactory ending. I think I would recommend this book more for young teens or even middle grade than I would older teens.

Accidentally Amy

By: Lynn Painter
Published Year: 2025
Publisher: Lynn Kirkle
Pages: 320

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I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. This in no way shape or form influenced my opinion of this novel.

Summary (Provided by Goodreads): IT STARTED WITH A CUP…

Isabella Shay is usually a very honest person.

But when she’s running late for her first day at a dream job and the barista yells for “Amy” 3x with no answer, she does the unthinkable.

Izzy takes that PSL.

It’s the exact drink she ordered and paid for, only waaaay further ahead in the line, so she mutters “I’m Amy” and grabs the cup.

But when she turns around and runs directly into the most attractive man she’s ever seen, spilling the drink all over his GQ shirt and tie, she ends up having the ultimate meet-cute. Sparks fly and things feel beyond promising until he says the words, “See you tomorrow, Amy.”

Uh, oh – she’ll definitely have to straighten him out the following day.

Only when she gets to her new office and meets the VP of her department, it is none other than Blake Phillips - the hottie from Starbucks. And the man might’ve been charming to “Amy,” but he is an arrogant grump to Izzy, an arrogant grump who dos not find her explanation funny at all.

First Impressions

I recently read The Love Wager by Painter and really enjoyed it. When I was offered to review this book it was almost an immediate yes for me because of that. The cover is cute but not my favorite. The summary on the other hand I was super into. I love a good meet-cute misunderstanding.

What I thought

Izzy is running late for her first day at her new job. While waiting for her Pumpkin Spice Latte, an order is called for Amy for the exact same drink. After a couple of minutes, Amy doesn’t claim her drink, so Izzy grabs it and pretends to be Amy. However, she immediately crashes into a gorgeous man who flirts with her. As she leaves he says goodbye to Amy and Izzy realizes her mistake. A few hours later, she runs into the coffee shop man again. And then a third time when he is introduced to her as her boss. Blake at that moment learns that Izzy isn’t who she said she was and becomes upset that she lied. Izzy then makes it her mission to become Blake’s friend anyway.

I flew through this book. It read more like a novella to me than a novel which was interesting. This is an insta-love kind of book but they both acknowledge it so I was more ok with that. They state multiple times that they shouldn’t have feelings this strong after knowing each other for such a short period of time. I honestly could’ve used an extra 100 pages of this book. I would’ve like a little bit of a slower burn. A longer period of time for Izzy to win Blake over and some more of his brothers too.

Their banter was top tier, and we know I love some good banter. Blake is like my dream man. He’s a little grumpy but has a heart of gold. He never allowed his grumpiness to become mean. He’s also a cat guy. Izzy is goofy and word vomits constantly. I liked her relationship with her cousin and again, wouldn’t have minded a few more scenes with the two of them.

This book was such a fun ride. I can see people not enjoying it because they might feel it’s not fleshed out enough, but I liked having something fun and straight forward. I also think sometimes Izzy’s goofiness comes off a little immature but it made me giggle. If you don’t mind a little insta-love and like cheesiness, I would pick this one up. If not, this one is not for you.

2024 Reading Round Up

It’s that time of year! I already did a post about my favorite read from each month of 2024, but now it’s time to look at some of my stats from the year.

I love looking back at my authors each year to see if I was better about reading more diversely, but first I’ll start with some general reading stats. In 2024 I read a total of 76 books. I was down a little from last year, but I did have one month where I was sick and read zero books. 46 of the books I read were physical books, 19 were audiobooks, and 11 were digital/e-reader. I did read less audiobooks and digital books this year which was interesting. The majority of the books I read were still between 300-499 pages with 15 books being less than 300 pages and 4 books being more than 500 pages. My average rating dipped a bit this year. Last year I had an overall rating of 3.82 but this year it was 3.71. I also only had 9 5 star reads which is 5 less than last year. I had 7 books under 3 stars compared to 10 from last year. Finally, the month that I read the most this year was May! I’m a little surprised because it’s usually the summer.

Now for the fun part

For 2023

Black- 9

Asian/Indian- 12

Latinx- 1

White- 42

Male- 5

For 2024

Black- 5

Asian/Indian- 11

Latinx-2

White- 39

Male- 9

 I did have a lot of repeat authors on my list this year. For example, I re-read the Book of Life series by Deborah Harkess which is 5 books as well as 3 books by Lucy Score and 3 books by Ashley Poston. It looks like my diversity dipped again. I thought I had made more of an effort to read diversely, but I guess I did not. I did at least get around to reading a couple of books by diverse authors I’ve had on my shelf, but I really need to make this a goal for next year. I do know a couple of books already that are by black authors that I intend on reading, so hopefully that will help.

Since I talked about my favorite books in a previous post, I will share what my bottom 4 books are here. I debated doing 5, but honestly, some of my other lower ranked books I don’t even remember, so I just wrote the ones I remember why I disliked them so much.

My least favorite book and one that I did not finish was Before the Coffee Gets Cold by Toshikazu Kawaguchi. I really wanted to like this book because I had heard so many good things about it and I love the concept. I absolutely could not stand the writing. It felt so misogynistic to me. The other book I did not finish this year was The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo. I was so excited for this book since I really enjoyed Ninth House by her. However, I could not get into this one. I didn’t like the characters at the beginning. In fact, I can’t really remember much about this book given how little I read about it.

These are my other least favorite reads of 2024:

West Side Love Story by Priscilla Olivieras

This was a book I got for free from Amazon Reads. It just was soooo slow to me. I remember the characters really getting on my nerves.

Sula by Toni Morrison

Admittedly, this is probably because I’m not the target audience for this book. I read this along with the Well Read Black Girl account as a book club of sorts. I did not understand the appeal at all.

The Pumpkin Spice Café by Laurie Gilmore

This book has the cutest cover and has been getting so much hype on the internet. I listened to it and found the characters insufferable, immature, and the writing to be poor. I don’t understand how this series has the internet in such a choke hold.

The interesting thing about this year’s reads is that even though I had less 5 star reads this year, I feel like some of them are going to be lifetime favorites. I also discovered some new favorite authors this year like Ashley Poston. In fact, I read 37 new to me authors this year.

I’m excited to see what 2025 has in store for me. I hope I can keep my intention of reading more diverse reads next year and not dip for the 3rd year in a row.

Book Club January 2025- Happy Medium

By: Sarah Adler
Published Year: 2024
Publisher: Berkley
Pages: 388

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): A clever con woman must convince a skeptical, sexy farmer of his property's resident real-life ghost if she's to save them all from a fate worse than death, in this delightful new novel from the author of Mrs. Nash's Ashes .

Fake spirit medium Gretchen Acorn is happy to help when her best ( wealthiest) client hires her to investigate the unexplained phenomena preventing the sale of her bridge partner’s struggling goat farm. Gretchen may be a fraud, but she'd like to think she’s a beneficent one. So if "cleansing" the property will help a nice old man finally retire and put some much-needed cash in her pockets at the same time, who's she to say no?

Of course, it turns out said bridge partner isn't the kindly AARP member Gretchen imagined—Charlie Waybill is young, hot as hell, and extremely unconvinced that Gretchen can communicate with the dead. (Which, fair.) Except, to her surprise, Gretchen finds herself face-to-face with the very real, very chatty ghost that’s been wreaking havoc during every open house. And he wants her to help ensure Charlie avoids the same family curse that's had Everett haunting Gilded Creek since the 1920s.

Now, Gretchen has one month to convince Charlie he can’t sell the property. Unfortunately, hard work and honesty seem to be the way to win over the stubborn farmer—not exactly Gretchen's strengths. But trust isn’t the only thing growing between them, and the risk of losing Charlie to the spirit realm looms over Gretchen almost as annoyingly as Everett himself. To save the goat farm, its friendly phantom, and the man she's beginning to love, Gretchen will need to pull off the greatest con of her being fully, genuinely herself.

What I thought

This book was different than I expected. I kind of expected it to be silly and light hearted, and while it had its moments, it had a lot more serious moments than I expected.

Gretchen was raised by a con artist to be a con artist. She currently runs a business where she claims to talk to the dead. She mainly focuses on old rich women outside of DC. When one of the women comes to her asking for assistance to exorcise a ghost at her friend’s farm, Gretchen goes expecting another older resident. She is surprised by a man in his 30s as well as an actual ghost.

This book is a little bit of an odd combo of enemies to lovers and insta love. Both Gretchen and Charlie are immediately attracted to each the to the point where they want to jump each other’s bones. However, Charlie immediately sees Gretchen as the fraud she is and wants her gone.

My favorite part of the story was easily Everett the ghost. I liked his relationship with Gretchen a lot and found them to be very silly. He’s obsessed with TV and it made me laugh when he would get mad about the TV being left off. Charlie can be a bit over the top sometimes. I understand he doesn’t want to get conned, but he can be a bit practical for my tastes. I also found his attraction to Gretchen to be a little less believable than her attraction to him. I think Adler at times took on too many plot points and the book did seem to feel a little bumpy at times for lack of a better word. I think there could’ve been a couple of cuts that wouldn’t have impacted the story at all, but nothing that majorly bothered me.

I liked Gretchen’s character development a lot too. Her growth from con artist to good person was fun to read and I liked how she addressed some of her issues. Overall, this was a cute book. I don’t know how much conversation it’s going to bring as a book club book, but it was a cute story.

What Book Club Thought

Everyone really loved this one. I think I was the one who liked it the least, but that doesn’t mean I disliked it. We had an interesting discussion about why Gretchen was able to see Everett as well as some discussion about her dad and his con artist past. We had more discussion about the book than I thought we would, so that was good. A few of the other Book Club members said they are going to look into Adler’s other books which is always a win. This was a fun and different read that was easy to get through. If you’re looking for an easy read with a few laughs, I definitely recommend this one.

A Jingle Bell Mingle (Christmas Notch #3)

By: Julie Murphy & Sierra Simone
Published Year: 2024
Publisher: Avon
Pages: 400

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): What happens when there’s no room at the inn and you and your potentially demonic cat become roommates with your grumpy one-night stand?

Part-time adult film actress/one-time adult film director/makeup artist Sunny Palmer has accidentally sold her very first screenplay to the Hope Channel. That was six months ago. Fast forward to a looming deadline, an uninspired Sunny has returned to the source of her inspiration in Christmas Notch, Vermont, to immerse herself in the local Christmas miracle on which her fever dream of a movie pitch was based.

Isaac Kelly, former boy band heartthrob and the saddest boy in the music biz, is the latest owner of the town’s historic mansion. After his years of heartbreak following his young wife’s death, Isaac’s record label is done waiting for new music. What better place to attempt his first holiday album than a snow-covered mansion where he can become a hermit in peace?

But after their best friends’ wedding leads to them waking up together in a freezing motel room with questionable wiring and a broken shower, Isaac takes a chance and asks Sunny to stay with him at his home. Surely the place is big enough that he’ll hardly see her or her unhinged cat. But when the two discover they’re both creatively blocked, they make a handshake deal: Isaac will help Sunny hunt down the truth behind the local lore, and Sunny will find Isaac a new muse.

And with these two opposites under one roof, there’s no way this jingle bell mingle could go off script…right?

First Impressions

Last year we read the second book in this series for Book Club. Before starting that one, I made sure to read the first book in the series. I did like the first one slightly better than the second, but I was curious to read the third book in this series following the sad third boyband member, Isaac. All of these covers are deceptively cute and I enjoy them all.

What I thought

This was hands down my favorite book of the series!

Sunny and Isaac reconnect at Bee and Nolan’s wedding in Christmas Notch. Sunny has been hired to write a Christmas screenplay for the Hope Channel and Isaac has moved to Christmas Notch to continue to hide from the public eye and grieve in private. When they meet up again, they realize they can’t keep their hands off of each other and come to a mutual roommates with benefits agreement where Sunny is Isaac’s muse for new music in exchange for Isaac helping Sunny research a town legend that she’s using as inspiration for her screenplay.

In the first few books, you learn that Isaac is a widower. He lost the love of his life unexpectedly and has been in a dark hole of grief ever since. For some reason, Sunny is the only one who can semi get him out of it. I loved Sunny in the first few books as well. She’s Bee’s best friend and fellow porn story and she was always just spunky and funny. Now, I will warn this book might be the raunchiest of them all. I was a bit shocked by some of the scenes to be honest. So, this book is not for the faint of heart.

However, the way that these authors dealt with telling a story of grief and love and connection was done so beautifully. I was surprised by how well a romance novel dealt with these heavier topics and felt very seen by some of the scenes.

Sunny and Isaac have immediate chemistry and while it did sometimes get annoying to see how in denial Isaac was being, I was able to overlook it. I liked Sunny’s side story as well, looking into a legend of Christmas Notch. Plus all of the characters from the previous books made an appearance.

This book was a fun Christmas read. It really felt very festive and I loved the unexpected depth of this story. I do wish it was slightly less raunchy so I could recommend it to more people, but it was well done and definitely ended the series with a bang!

Favorite Books for Each Month of 2024

I used to do a variety of end of year reading posts. Sometimes I did surveys and sometimes I did a top 10 for the year. I saw someone on TikTok doing a favorite book from each month and I loved this because I felt like it would help me to make easier decisions rather than just picking books from the year as a whole. I will still do my comparison of diverse reads in January, so you can still look forward to that.

January

I started off 2024 strong. I had 3 5 star reads in January. However, of those 3, the one I think about the most and have recommended the most is Tom Lake by Ann Patchett. I loved this book. Immediately told my mom to read it and she loved it too Highly recommend.

February

The Women by Kristin Hannah was hands down my favorite read for February. It might even be my top of the year. It was so good and yet another one that I have recommended to multiple people.

March

I did not have any 5 star reads this month. The highest ranked book was 4.5 stars and that was The Dead Guy Next by Lucy Score. It’s kind of interesting because I did really enjoy this book but it has become more forgettable for me as the year went on. I don’t know if this is because I didn’t enjoy the second one as much or what, but definitely not a top of the year for me.

April

Another month with no 5 star reads! However, I adored my 4.5 star read and am kind of surprised looking baking on it that I didn’t give it 5 stars. My favorite book for April is Starter Villain by John Scalzi. I found this book to be so funny and so unique to everything else that I have read. This was a book club pick and I loved it.

May

Oof, this one is tough. I had two 5 star reads that would probably make a top 10 for the year for me. I think I will have to choose The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston because it was the first book I read by her and made me an immediate fan. I was so hesitant to read this one because I had seen so many mixed reviews but I ended up loving it!

June

My favorite book this month was Business Casual by B.K. Borison. This is the final book in the Lovelight Farms series and I adored it. I love the whole series and this one was the perfect ending.

July

I was super sick the entire month of July so I didn’t read a single book. I am going to put an honorable mention from a different month here just because I can. One of my favorite books this year was Funny Story by Emily Henry. It took me a little while to get on the Emily Henry bandwagon, but I did love this one and enjoyed reading it a lot.

August

My favorite book this month was Past Present Future by Rachel Lynn Solomon. This is the sequel to Today Tonight Tomorrow which I loved. This book is so unique and real that I feel like I want all college kids in a relationship to read it. Something about it has just stayed really vivid in my memory.

September

Love you a Latke by Amanda Elliot was my favorite this month. I was lucky enough to get an ARC of this book and I devoured it. I was raised Jewish so I always have a soft spot in my heart for Jewish stories. Elliot always writes ones I can relate to and this was the perfect Hallmark Hanukkah story.

October

Another book from a series! This is book 3 of the Witchlore series which I picked up the first two books for last year. It’s Truly Madly Magically and I just love this world. I want to live in it and I want to be a part of this friend group. It always gets me into the Halloween spirit and was so fun.

November

Dinner for Vampires by Bethany Joy Lenz was such a while ride. I did listen to this one so it’s my first audiobook to make the list. While I didn’t give it 5 stars (I gave it 4.5), I feel like I’ve thought about it so much more than my 5 star read from November. It’s bananas what this woman went through and I’m excited for my friends to read it so we can discuss it.

December

Honestly ending this year on a bit of a reading fizzle. I listened to two books I didn’t really love, read one romance that was a lot of fun but feels not quite good enough to put as a favorite, and read All This and More. This book was very unique and I liked the philosophical questions that it raised. I think it’s one that will stay in my mind because of how unique it was, but honestly, it was only a 4 star read for me.

The beginning of my year for reading was much stronger than the end of the year which I find really interesting. I also think it’s interesting that I didn’t rank a lot of my audiobooks super high. I would’ve thought that more of them would’ve come out as favorites since I had a lot of favorite audiobooks last year. This was a fun way to look back on my reading this year! It was fun to see that some months didn’t have any 5 star reads where as some had multiple. I also find it fun that I was able to mention books that might not have made a favorites list otherwise.

I do want to throw in an honorably mention of Just for the Summer by Abby Jimenez. It was a top read for me in September and I really loved it. She is one of my favorite authors and if you haven’t hopped on the Jimenez trade, you need to!

Book Club December 2024- The Christmas Fix

By: Lucy Score
Published Year: 2017
Publisher: That’s What She Said
Pages: 390

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): When a late season hurricane hits Merry, Connecticut, city manager and single dad Noah Yates has to inform the already devastated residents that there won't be a Christmas Festival this year. No festival means no tourism dollars. A disaster of epic proportions for his hometown.

But when home renovation expert slash smoking hot reality TV star Catalina King shows up with a camera crew and a budget big enough to put the town back together again, Noah balks. Hard. The last time Cat was in town she stirred up trouble everywhere she went. (Residents are still talking about the town's first and only bar fight.) Noah doesn't need a TV diva capitalizing on his town's tragedy or filling his daughter's head with glitz and glam.

Cat is ready and willing to put Merry back in Christmas mode with a holiday special that will leave everyone believing in miracles and get her friends back in the home they love. But there's one big problem standing in her way. And his name is Noah Yates. He's wrong about her and she can't wait to prove it. Ring those jingle bells because it's on.

What I thought

I am 50/50 on Lucy Score so I was a little hesitant to read this one. I loved Rock Bottom Girl and enjoyed the first book in the Riley Thorn series but then I really didn’t love the second book in the series. I also am sometimes hesitant about Christmas Romance books because I need them to have Christmas magic and not just be a romance set at Christmas time.

Catalina King is the host of a popular renovation reality show. When she finds out that the town of a family whose home she renovated is hit by a hurricane and destroyed, she decides that as a Christmas special she needs to go to this own and help them. She loved the town when she was there the first time around and feels like she needs to help the people get back on their feet. However, Noah, the city manager, is not about it. He is worried she wants to take advantage of her town for views and that she is a fake, attention seeking celebrity. Cat decides she’s going to prove Noah wrong and enjoy every minute of it.

I did love that this was an enemies to lovers trope. Their banter is good and Cat is such a strong female character. I love how she takes charge and is proving to the world that women can do it better. This is the second book in this series and I’m assuming the first follows her twin brother Gannon. I would be curious to go back and read it.

If you’re looking for a romance that has Christmas at its center, this is a good choice. The town of Merry is all about Christmas. I do wish that we had gotten a little bit more at Christmas time and at the Christmas festival, but all of the lead up to Christmas was still sufficiently cheery.

Noah did get a little bit insufferable at times at the beginning of the story. Once he chilled out and stopped with his overly judginess I was cool with him. I liked how supportive he became of Cat. He also had a bit of a dramatic backstory, but it helped to make sense of some of his behavior.

In regards to spiciness, this book is very spicy. So much so that it did make me a little uncomfortable at times. But if you like books with a lot of spice, you will enjoy this one.

What Book Club Thought