**Today, I clean. The little cottage I call my home needs a deep clean for the new year. I spend the day going through different items and working on finding each a place. I put the decorations away from the past holiday season and store them away for next year. After a full day of cleaning, I finally sit down with a warm cup of tea and a sigh of contentment.**

Now that we have made it to the new year, we can go back now and discuss all of my December reads. I only managed to read three books in December since some of them took me quite a while to get through. And let me just say: I have some thoughts. A lot of them. So grab a nice warm drink, and let’s get started.

🎄A Far Wilder Magic by Allison Saft

This one actually took me almost a month to get through, but it was my first finished book of December. It wasn’t bad, but it took a while for me to feel invested, and even then, it wasn’t my favorite. I felt like the hunt was the main plot but we were mostly reading about the lead-up to it, which is fine but a bit different from what I was expecting. The characters were not overly interesting, and I wasn’t completely sold on the romance. I think the hunt was an interesting concept though and made for some more suspense. The closer we got to it also allowed us to see the pressure that each character was feeling. Maggie also went through a lot of growth and became more sure of herself as the story went on, and we could also see the development of Maggie and Wes’s relationship from the time they spend together working on the hunt and living together. It made it a bit more believable compared to other books where two characters go from strangers or enemies to madly in love in three days. While this wasn’t my favorite, it was still an okay read, but I don’t think alchemy stories are for me.

🎄The Mistletoe Motive by Chloe Liese

The next book I finished was The Mistletoe Motive. I had actually started A Queen of Ice first, but decided to put it on pause to read a Christmas book since it was getting late in the month. This was a short little novella following two bookstore employees who compete in sales to keep their job. Our female main character, Gabby, does not get along with Jonathan, her coworker in the store, and they couldn’t be more different. Through weeks of competing, they get to know each other a bit more and Gabby starts to think Johnathan isn’t as bad as she thought.

I think the pacing was a bit off in this one. I know it was a novella, but the majority of the book felt like a more slow, steady pace, so it made the end feel very rushed with everything wrapping up in only two chapters. I didn’t exactly feel any chemistry between the characters because of this, especially since it was enemies to lovers. The end felt very abrupt as well and didn’t really have anything to offer, which is a shame because the rest of the book wasn’t too bad. But once the romance started at the very end, we lost the plot and basically just ended the story. I think this book would have benefited from an additional chapter or two for a better wrap-up. I also don’t really understand why Gabby didn’t like Jonathan. He’s a bit more reserved and very different from Gabby, but I don’t see where the hatred stemmed from.

🎄A Queen of Ice by Elise Kova

Once I finished The Mistletoe Motive, I went back to A Queen of Ice and finished reading it. This is the fifth and final book in the A Trial of Sorcerers series. I have talked about it a lot in previous TBRs and wrap-ups, so just know that it has trials, elemental magic, and revenge. I have a LOT to say on this one. I started the series really liking it. The first book was very entertaining and the trials were very clever. Eira was also a character who thought outside the box, making her unique.

In this book, and slowly throughout the rest of them, Eira’s character goes through a lot of negative changes. She treats her friends like loyal followers that need to follow her command even if it makes them uncomfortable. She also seems to change her personality to whoever it appeases. I can’t go into this too much for spoilers, but I think that she doesn’t really know herself. She seems so desperate to rid herself of who she was before that she’s willing to drastically change and cut people out of her life for practically no reason at all. The romance in this one also fell flat for me. There was no chemistry with Eira and anyone really, even platonic relationships with her friends. I also felt that Eira was a bit hypocritical. She blames herself for certain things that happen, then fault other people for having limits in what they’re willing to do. I think that so many of these characters changed for the worse. I will say that Alyss is probably my favorite of the whole series though since she was one of the only characters this didn’t happen to. This one just frustrated me to no end which is a shame because the series started off good. The epilogue of this one is one I did like though. It was nice to see how things ended.

Thank you all for being here for this very long wrap-up. I’m very excited to see what I read this month and how we’ll start the year.

xoxo,

Just another reader