Go Luck Yourself

By: Sara Raasch
Published Year: 2025
Publisher: Bramble
Pages: 320

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Someone has been stealing Christmas’s joy, and there’s only one clue to the culprit—a single shamrock.

With Coal busy restructuring Christmas—and their dad now having a full midlife crisis in the Caribbean—Kris volunteers to investigate St. Patrick’s Day. His cover: an ambassador from Christmas to foster goodwill. What could go wrong?

Everything, it seems. Because Prince Lochlann Patrick, Crown Prince of St. Patrick’s Day, happens to be the mysterious student that Kris has been in a small war with at Cambridge. They attempt to play nice for the tabloids, but Kris can’t get through one conversation without wanting to smash Loch’s face in—he’s infuriating, stubborn, loud, obstinate, hot—

Wait—hot?

Kris might be in some trouble. Especially when it turns out that the mystery behind Christmas’s stolen magic isn’t as simple as an outright theft. But why would a Holiday that Christmas has never had contact with, one that’s always been the very basis of carefree, want to steal joy? Can a spare prince even hope to unravel all this, or will Kris lose something way more valuable than his Holiday’s resources—like his heart?

First Impressions

This is the sequel to Nightmare Before Kissmiss and I love this cover and title just as much. Add in the sprayed edges to match the holiday feel and I would happily put this book on my shelf. I would absolutely pick it up based just on the cover and title alone.

What I thought

I said it before and I’ll say it again, I need a never ending series in this world of holiday royals.

Kristopher, the second son of Christmas, is struggling to find his place after his brother Coal steps up with his royal duties as the heir to the Christmas throne. While at school, he pulls a prank on the boy who keeps stealing his study room, only to find out later that he is the Prince of St. Patrick’s Day. On top of that, they discover that St. Patrick’s Day has been siphoning off magic from the Christmas Day joy collector. Kris volunteers to go to St. Patrick’s Day to help the Christmas Court figure out who planted the device under the guise of apologizing to his arch nemesis.

Raasch balances political intrigue and romance unlike anyone I have ever read. She makes me just as interested in everything going on with the royals as I was in Lochlann (Loch) and Kris’ romance. I love a good enemies to lovers story and Loch and Kris have some great banter.

I didn’t quite love this one as much as the first, but I think that was because I got a little frustrated with Kris. He is dealing with a lot of self-image issues and anxiety and I frequently wanted to smack him across the face and tell him to get over it. Now, I think it’s realistic and I wasn’t annoyed with him because of that. Just that here were a few moments where I felt he got a tiny bit too whiny and I didn’t love it.

I did like how Raasch had so much of Coal and Iris in this book still. Kris played a big part in Coal’s book, so I was glad to see Coal still around so much. Plus it let me stay up to date on how he was handling the Christmas scandal from the last book. I am still so curious how this world will continue to function.

This book was honestly the perfect follow up to the first. I loved reading Kris’ story and I need Raasch to write Iris’. I wouldn’t recommend this one as a standalone because I think you need the history of the political scandal from the first story to really understand this one. This is a very fun read, especially as there aren’t many St. Patrick’s Day books!

The Deal (Off-Campus #1)

By: Elle Kennedy
Published Year: 2015
Publisher: Bloom Books
Pages: 400

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): She's about to make a deal with the college bad boy...

Hannah Wells has finally found someone who turns her on. But while she might be confident in every other area of her life, she's carting around a full set of baggage when it comes to sex and seduction. If she wants to get her crush's attention, she'll have to step out of her comfort zone and make him take notice...even if it means tutoring the annoying, childish, cocky captain of the hockey team in exchange for a pretend date.

...and it's going to be oh so good.

All Garrett Graham has ever wanted is to play professional hockey after graduation, but his plummeting GPA is threatening everything he's worked so hard for. If helping a sarcastic brunette make another guy jealous will help him secure his position on the team, he's all for it. But when one unexpected kiss leads to the wildest sex of both their lives, it doesn't take long for Garrett to realize that pretend isn't going to cut it. Now he just has to convince Hannah that the man she wants looks a lot like him.

First Impressions

I saw the special edition on the shelf at the library and it immediately caught my eye. I have had this book on my radar but continually forgotten about it. The first cover isn’t my favorite, but the style of the special edition is amazing.

What I thought

I LOVED this book. Flew through it in 2 days.

Hannah is a music major. Garret is the star of the hockey team. Hannah is one of a handful of students who passed the Ethics midterm. Garret is not. When Garret sees that Hannah passed, he tries to charm her into tutoring him so that he can continue to play hockey. She is having none of it, until he comes up with an offer too sweet to turn down. She tutors him, he uses his social status to get her crush to notice her and make him jealous.

This book is sort of enemies to lovers and has the banter that I love. Hannah and Garret’s chemistry was amazing. They both have their issues and it was beautiful watching them open up to one another. I appreciated that their relationship wasn’t surface level and it had me rooting for them the whole time.

The book does warn that rape is a central plot point. I think that Kennedy does a nice job handling it. It never felt overly graphic or cheapened to a plot twist. I also loved the other hockey boys. They were perfectly ridiculous in the fun way that college boys can be. It makes me look forward to reading their stories in the rest of the series.

One other thing I really liked about this book was how Hannah and Garret had their own stories in addition to their romance and relationship. Everything about this book felt fleshed out and not just fluff. While there were some minor things that annoyed me, like the constant referrals to how tiny Hannah was but how amazing her boobs were, overall this book might become a new favorite.

I can’t wait to read the next books in the series. They’re also making this into a show and I’m really looking forward to it. I’m not a hockey fan, but even though hockey is central to the story, you don’t need to know anything about it. I would recommend this to anyone looking for a light fun romance with banter.

Book Club March 2026

By: Emilia Hart
Published Year: 2025
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Pages: 337

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): 2019: Lucy awakens in her ex-lover’s room in the middle of the night with her hands around his throat. Horrified, she flees to her sister’s house on the coast of New South Wales hoping Jess can help explain the vivid dreams that preceded the attack—but her sister is missing. As Lucy waits for her return, she starts to unearth strange rumours about Jess’s town—tales of numerous missing men, spread over decades. A baby abandoned in a sea-swept cave. Whispers of women’s voices on the waves. All the while, her dreams start to feel closer than ever.

1800: Mary and Eliza are torn from their loving home in Ireland and forced onto a convict ship heading for Australia. As the boat takes them farther and farther away from all they know, they begin to notice unexplainable changes in their bodies.

A breathtaking tale of female resilience, The Sirens is an extraordinary novel that captures the sheer power of sisterhood and the indefinable magic of the sea.

What I thought

While the cover is pretty, I wasn’t very excited by this book when I read the summary and I feel like it met my low expectations.

This book has 3 different POVs across 3 different timelines. Mostly, we follow Lucy in February 2019. She leaves school to go spend time with her sister after a bad sleepwalking event. We also have the perspective of Mary from the 1800s. Lucy is seeing Mary in her dreams, so all of the stories we get of Mary are supposedly what Lucy is dreaming. Finally, we have Julie’s POV in 1999. Julie is Lucy’s older sister and Lucy finds Julie’s diary, which is what we get. When Lucy does show up to Julie’s house unannounced, Julie is missing. So there is a mix of mystery of why is Lucy dreaming about these women and where did Julie go?

I found this book to be so boring. There is so much going on, yet none of it sucked me in. Comber Bay has had multiple men disappear, which, based off of the title of the book is obviously due to supernatural forces of Sirens. Yet for some reason Hart writes the story as if we’re supposed to not know how/why these men go missing. Then there is the mystery of why Lucy is dreaming about Mary and why she is sleepwalking. Again, I found the reason to be very obvious and predicable. I think the only thing that semi-surprised me was finding out where Julie has been. And it wasn’t even that I was surprised by where, but more so why she was gone for so long.

If this had not been a book I was reading for book club, I could’ve stopped reading it at 50% and not felt any regret. It’s not that it’s necessarily a bad book, I just found the story to be so slow and predictable that I was never drawn to pick the book up. I also feel like Hart tried to create too much mystery and suspense and could’ve made it more exciting by pulling things back a little bit.

What Book Club Thought

This was interesting. My friend who picked the book felt very similar to me. She struggled with reading it and also felt like she would’ve stopped reading it had it not been for book club. One of our members liked the book except for the chapters about Mary, whereas another member really liked the chapters about Mary and less so about present day. We had a lot of discussion about plot holes with the whole siren/mermaid storyline as well as the fact that it kind of felt like this could’ve been two different books because of the disconnect with the past and the present. We did have a lot to discuss because of the issues we had with the book which did lead to good discussion about the plot and the conflicts within it. While I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this book because of how I felt, if you or your friends are into this type of story, it could lead to some interesting discussion.

The Nightmare Before Kissmas

By: Sara Raasch
Published Year: 2024
Publisher: Bramble
Pages: 357

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): Nicholas “Coal” Claus used to love Christmas. Until his father, the reigning Santa, turned the holiday into a PR façade. Coal will do anything to escape the spectacle, including getting tangled in a drunken, supremely hot make- out session with a beautiful man behind a seedy bar one night.

But the heir to Christmas is soon commanded to do his duty: he will marry his best friend, Iris, the Easter Princess and his brother’s not-so-secret crush. A situation that has disaster written all over it.

Things go from bad to worse when a rival arrives to challenge Coal for the princess’s hand…and Coal comes face-to-face with his mysterious behind-the-bar hottie: Hex, the Prince of Halloween.

It’s a fake competition between two holiday princes who can’t keep their hands off each other over a marriage of convenience that no one wants. And it all leads to one of the sweetest, sexiest, messiest, most delightfully unforgettable love stories of the year.

First Impressions

When I first heard about this book it sounded like so much fun. Royals? Halloween? Christmas? Then I saw the cover drop and felt a little less enthused. Something about it just looked so cheesy. But then my friend bought it and I knew I needed to read it.

What I thought

This book was so much more than I expected!

Nicolas, “Coal”, is the heir to the Christmas throne. Hex is the heir to the Halloween throne. In this world, each holiday is its own kingdom with its own royals. King Christmas/Santa comes to an agreement with the King of Easter that Coal should marry Iris by Christmas Eve. Neither Iris nor Coal are into each other in that way. In fact, Coal’s brother Kris is the one who has a crush on Iris. When Halloween comes to object to the union of Christmas and Easter, Santa offers them to opportunity to bring Hex to the castle to try to win Iris over. Little does he know, that Coal is more of Hex’s type.

So I definitely expected there to be a fun romance between Christmas and Halloween. What I didn’t expect was the political intrigue and palace deception! I enjoyed the depth to the story and am fascinated by all of the holidays and how their politics play into their existence.

Coal is, of course, the slightly uninterested/reckless heir to the throne. A few years ago he made a big mistake with the best of intentions, and ever since then he has stepped back from his role as heir. However, now that he is being forced to marry his friend, he finds himself learning more about what is really going on behind closed doors.

The romance with Hex was so good. Their chemistry was immediate and leapt off the page. I do wish we got more of Hex’s backstory and maybe even an opportunity to see him in his element, but I loved him with the whole gang. In fact, I enjoyed every character in this book and can’t wait to read each of their stories. I know the next book focuses on Kris and I’m a little sad it wasn’t Iris first, but I’m looking forward to jumping back into this world.

While the cover may be cheesy, this book is anything but. If you’re looking for a Christmas story with a little bit of meat on its bones, I highly recommend picking this one up.

This book felt like a meatier version of Red, White, & Royal Blue. I feel like RW&RB focused more on the romance and not as much as the politics whereas this one had the political story more fleshed out with just as much romance. I cannot wait to see how the holiday royal worlds develop and see how Coal manages with taking over Christmas.

This Book Made Me Think of You

By: Libby Page
Published Year: 2026
Publisher: Berkley
Pages: 416

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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): When Tilly Nightingale receives a call telling her there’s a birthday gift from her fiancé waiting for her at her local bookshop, it couldn’t come as more of a shock. Partly because she can’t remember the last time she read a book for pleasure. Mainly because Joe died five months ago…
The gift is simple – twelve carefully-chosen books from Joe, one for each month, to help her turn the page on her first year without him.
Tilly sets out on a series of reading-inspired adventures that take her around the world. But as she begins to vlog her journey, her story becomes more than her own. With help from Alfie, the bookshop owner, her budding new following and her friends and family, can Tilly’s year of books show her how to love again?

First Impressions

I love the cover of this book. Give me a book about books and I will immediately pick it up. When I read the summary it reminded me of PS I Love You by Cecelia Ahern which I loved (both the book and the movie). The concept immediately spoke to me and I knew I needed to read this book.

What I thought

This book was exactly what I expected it to be and was wonderfully executed.

Tilly lost her husband 6 months ago. In January, she received a call from the local bookstore letting her know that her husband’s birthday gift to her was a year of books after he was gone. Tilly has to come to the book shop each month to pick up the book. While doing so, she slowly starts to crawl her way out of grief as well as rediscover herself.

I loved the concept of this. Having lived through grief, I can be a little critical of books here that is s central plot point. I felt like the way Page wrote about grief and Tilly at the beginning of the book was more relatable and realistic. As the book went on it felt a little too picture perfect. I wish there had been more conflict of Tilly dealing with her grief and less about her dealing with love. Even though I know in this story they’re intertwined. There were moments I loved, like when she went to visit her in-laws. But then that fell by the wayside and was never mentioned again.

I also loved the book recommendation throughout the book as well as the books that Joe leaves for Tilly. Each one is thoughtful and I liked seeing how they influenced Tilly to move forward in different ways. Alfie was one of my favorite characters. I enjoyed how his story connected with Tilly’s but that he had his own things he was dealing with. There was a minor miscommunication trope towards the end of the book I feel we could have easily done without, but I did appreciated how things worked themselves out.

Is this my favorite book I’ve read that has dealt with grief? No. But did I enjoy the story regardless? Absolutely. It doesn’t mock grief or deal with it poorly. I just feel like it occasionally faded to the background.

This book was so cute and well written. I feel like it would be a great book club book. If you enjoyed PS I Love You, I think you will enjoy this book. I also would say if you’re a reader who likes books about readers, this would be the book for you. I’m curious to look into more of Page’s books because I did enjoy her style a lot.

And the Crowd Went Wild

By: Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Published Year: 2026
Publisher: Avon
Pages: 352

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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): After a mortifying—and very public—humiliation, Dancy Flynn is desperate to find sanctuary far from the crowd. But where can a washed-up sex symbol hide? How about making an unannounced appearance at the secluded lake house of the sweet, sensitive high school boyfriend she hasn’t seen in almost twenty years?

But Chicago Stars quarterback Clint Garrett is no longer the kid Dancy remembers. Now he’s a gridiron superhero, still holding a massive grudge against her for breaking his teenage heart. With no room in his life for either complexity or distractions, he banishes Dancy to a refurbished old railroad caboose tucked away in the woods…and out of his sight.

Except Dancy’s not good at staying invisible. Her efforts to rebuild her career clash with Clint’s desperation to regain his focus, all made more challenging by a rescue dog, a local woman in trouble, a meddling mother, an ex with an agenda…and the sizzle of rekindled emotions.

As Dancy attempts to get her life on track and Clint tries to get his groove back, can these two one-time lovers navigate their rocky pasts and complicated present to find themselves…and each other?

First Impressions

Susan Elizabeth Phillips was one of the first romance novelists that I read. I remember picking up her books in high school or college and really enjoying them. She really opened the romance world to me. I was excited when I saw that she was coming out with a new novel as I haven’t read anything by her in a while. I do love the cover as it’s not the very common cartoon cover that has taken over the romance world, but I don’t know if it would’ve caught my eye off the shelves.

What I thought

This book is the latest installment in her Chicago Stars series. This is a football romance series that I’ve read at least a handful of in the past. They aren’t connected in a way that you need to read one to understand the other, but more that there are characters that pop up from other books.

Dancy is an actress who is on the brink of a breakdown. Clint is the quarterback for the Chicago Stars. Dancy and Clint dated in high school until she broke his heart. Now 20+ years later, she shows up at his door as a safe place to hide after her ex humiliates her at an event.

I don’t know if my tastes have changed, but I found this book to be a little boring and predictable. There was also a little bit too much going on in terms of dramatic events. Like there’s a storyline about a character who is with an abusive man and Dancy saves her from him, and even though that’s essentially one scene, he then has a chapter or two from his point of view. It just seemed very unnecessary to the rest of the book.

I did like the chemistry between Dancy and Clint but I didn’t quite understand it. They haven’t spoken since high school and now she just randomly shows up at his house for refuge? And then they are immediately attracted to each other again? It threw me off. But I did like how their relationship developed and how they addressed the issues that they had.

I was a little disappointed with this book given how much I remember liking her previous ones. I didn’t dislike it enough that it has turned me off of her as an author, but it wasn’t one of my favorites. I think it was a very basic romance novel and I wish there had been something to give it that extra spark.

Book Club February 2026- The Favorites

By: Layne Fargo
Published Year: 2025
Publisher: Random House
Pages: 437

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Summary (Provided by Goodreads): She might not have a famous name, funding, or her family’s support, but Katarina Shaw has always known that she was destined to become an Olympic skater. When she meets Heath Rocha, a lonely kid stuck in the foster care system, their instant connection makes them a formidable duo on the ice. Clinging to skating—and each other—to escape their turbulent lives, Kat and Heath go from childhood sweethearts to champion ice dancers, captivating the world with their scorching chemistry, rebellious style, and roller-coaster relationship.

Until a shocking incident at the Olympic Games brings their partnership to a sudden end.

As the ten-year anniversary of their final skate approaches, an unauthorized documentary reignites the public fascination with Shaw and Rocha, claiming to uncover the “real story” through interviews with their closest friends and fiercest rivals. Kat wants nothing to do with the documentary, but she can’t stand the thought of someone else defining her legacy. So, after a decade of silence, she’s telling her story: from the childhood tragedies that created her all-consuming bond with Heath to the clash of desires that tore them apart. Sensational rumors have haunted their every step for years, but the truth may be even more shocking than the headlines.

What I thought

I originally read this book at the beginning of 2025 and it ended up being one of my favorites of the year. I originally listened to the audiobook which was fabulous. When I realized that my book club pick was lining up with the Winter Olympics I knew I wanted to pick a book that was on theme. Since I have loved The Favorites so much the first time around, I wanted to share it with my friends. The one difference between my first read and my re-read is that this time around I read a physical copy. I found that reading the physical copy made the book feel a lot quicker than listening to the audiobook. Neither was felt better, but I did really enjoy the fact that the audiobook was a full cast. Here is my original review of the book.

Kat Shaw has wanted to be an Olympic ice dancer her entire life. When she and her skating partner/boyfriend get accepted to a camp being held by the best US ice dancer female skater, they feel like it’s going to be their first step towards greatness. But scandal and drama erupt behind the scenes.

The story is told in alternating chapters. The first perspective is Katerina and the second is told as documentary interviews with multiple people’s points of views. I listened to this on audiobook and it was told with a full cast of narrators. I would absolutely recommend listening to this because it’s one of the best audiobooks I’ve listened to, but I’m sure it would be just as good as a physical book.

This is also apparently a retelling of Wuthering Heights. I don’t remember much about Wuthering Heights other than it was a bit nuts, I didn’t like it, and I thought Heathcliff was the worst. After reading this book, I do still think Heath is the worst. I got so frustrated with him in this story, but I didn’t dislike him as much as in the original. He did have some redeeming qualities in the end in this version.

I am a big ice skating fan, so I know there is a lot of drama within the sport. I loved how this story played into that. Johnny Weir, an American male figure skater, voiced one of the skaters in the story. He ends up having a skating gossip blog and he played it so well. I felt like it could’ve easily been real life behind the scenes of the figure skating world.

If you’ve read my blog for a while, you know it’s rare that I can’t predict where a book is going. This story took so many twists and turns I truly had no idea. They would end up at a competition or a certain plot point and I would look down and see I still had like 5 hours left in the book when I thought that’s where the story was going to end. It was so fun to be on this wild ride.

What Book Club Thought

Four out of five of us really enjoyed it. Two of us re-read it and loved it both times, though one book club member said she found the characters more annoying the second time around. One book club member did not finish the story. She had tried to read it once before and gave it a second try but stopped at the same part. The funny part was that we were then spoiling a lot of the twists that happen in the later parts of the book and she definitely seemed a bit intrigued. The part she said she got stuck at, I could understand being really frustrated with the characters and how unlikable they are in that moment. I would say that if you are someone who gets stuck on something like that to push through. The drama is absolutely worth it.

This was a fun book to discuss with other people. I would highly recommend it as both a book club pick or as a read if you are in the Olympic Spirit

2025 Reading Round-Up

We made it through another year! I normally try to slide in a separate post about my favorite reads from each month, but did not have the time to do so this year. I will slide that into this roundup instead.

As always, I challenge myself to read books by diverse authors each year. I also like to compare my reading stats from last year to this year. In 2025, I read a total of 92 books. I DNF’d 3 books. Definitely read more this year than last year! 49 of the books I read were physical, 17 were digital, and 26 were audio. My audio books were up by almost 10 this year which I think helped increase my overall reading. I l also kept track of how many books I read were from the library this year and that came out to be 30 of my physical books. I didn’t count the audio as all of my audiobooks are from the library. My average rating was up from last year to 3.79 from 3.71 but I only had 5 5 star reads, whereas last year I had 9. This makes two years in a row that I’ve dropped in the amount of 5 star reads I’ve had. I don’t know if I’m getting pickier or if it’s because StoryGraph uses quarter star ratings? I had 8 books that were under 3 stars and the month I read the most books was in May again!

Now to compare my diverse author stats from last year.

For 2024
Black- 5
Asian/Indian- 11
Latinx-2
White- 39
Male- 9

For 2025
Black- 7
Asian/Indian- 7
Latinx- 2
White - 61
Male- 11

I think what’s interesting is that I read a bigger variety of authors in general this year. I had some series that counted as the same author multiple times, but I still overall had books by a lot of different authors compared to last year. I also did a better job at reading physical books from off of my shelf compared to years past. I didn’t do quite as well as I did last year with reading books by authors of color. I felt like I was doing really well at the beginning of the year, but then seems like I lost it in the back half. I did have a few authors that I read multiple of their books, so maybe that’s also why I felt like I was reading more diversely than I did.

Now onto the fun part of my favorite books of the year! I will do a breakdown by which book was my favorite from each month.

January

This is a tough month! I had two books I rated as 4.75 stars, but ultimately think I will pick Let’s Call Her Barbie by Renee Rosen. I recommended this book to both of my parents as well as multiple other people, which is why I am picking this one as my favorite for January. I also went to a local independent bookstore where Renee did a talk which was really cool. I’ve read a few of her other books, so it was fascinating to hear about her writing process.

February

Ok, well… I thought January was hard but February I can’t pick. These were my two favorite books of the entire year. Interestingly, they were both audiobooks too. The first is The Favorites by Layne Fargo. I LOVED this book. It was an entire cast reading and I thought it was so well done. I even ended up picking it as a re-read for book club in 2026. My second favorite book was Know My Name by Chanel Miller. This was a memoir and was just wonderful. It was moving and frustrating and I think about it frequently. I want other people to read it so I can talk to them about it, but I also know it’s very heavy so I always recommend it with caution.

March

Wild Side by Elsie Silver might have been my favorite this month. I started reading the Rose Hill trilogy last year, and this book ended up being my favorite of the series. They’re just so light and fun and I need that when in the depths of winter.

April

Mrs. Quinn’s Rise to Fame was another audiobook that topped my favorites. I enjoyed this one so much I recommended it to one of my friends and she chose it for a book club pick later in the year. It was fun to read this one and then get to relive it and talk about it with my friends.

May

It was interesting because even though I read the most books in May, I didn’t have any 5 star reads. My highest rated book this month was The Love Haters by Katherine Center. But honestly, looking back, a lot of the books I read in May were kind of forgettable. Enjoyably in the moment, but didn’t hold up over time. Center is one of my favorite authors though, so I did really enjoy her latest book

June

June on the other hand might’ve been my slowest reading month, but had the highest average rating. My favorite book this month was Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid. You can’t go wrong with TJR and this book felt so unique. I loved the space aspect and the romance felt so fresh to me.

July

This month was another kind of meh month for me. My highest rated book is Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi. It was a very interesting book and the formatting of it was unique. I liked it a lot but again, feels a little like a book I’ve forgotten about as the year has gone on.

August

August had two really good reads. I think I’m going to pick The God of the Woods by Liz Moore. I don’t read a lot of mystery/thriller books so I was hesitant with this one. Especially since it was so hyped up, I didn’t expect it to live up to expectations. I enjoyed it so much more than I expected and it was so different from a lot of what I normally read.

September

My favorite from this month was A Witch’s Guide to Magical Inkeeping by Sangu Mandanna. I am a sucker for cozy witchy books. This one was cute and fun and exactly what I needed to get me into the Halloween Spirit. I think it cemented Mandanna as an auto-read author for me as well.

October

I feel like we’ve got another meh month here! My highest rated book came in at a 4.25 and was Wild Card by Elsie Silver. I liked this book in the series and felt like it was a good final book. I don’t know if I would categorize it as one of my favorites of the year, but compared to the other books I read this month, it would be.

November

This month I would pick The Lost Story by Meg Shaffer. I listened to this one and while I rated it a 4 star initially, I think as it has sat with me I would rate it a little higher. The story is different from anything I’ve read and I loved the magical realism of it. I think I even recommended this one to my dad.

December

My final favorite book of the year was If It Makes You Happy by Julie Olivia. I had high expectations for this book and it met every single one. This would easily make my top 5 books of the entire year. I really want to go back and read other books by Olivia because I enjoyed her writing a lot.

Looking back at 2025, I find it interesting how so many of my favorite books of the year came at the beginning of the year and also were audiobooks. The middle/end of the year I didn’t feel like I hit a slump, but looking back I didn’t read a ton of standouts. I would be curious to look back at my favorites month by month from last year to see if it is similar.

Thank you for joining me in another year of reviews and Roundups! Hope to see you here again next year!