Book 41: Murder on the Christmas Express by Alexandra Benedict

My final Christmas mystery of 2023! This one was pretty entertaining - it's an obvious riff on Murder on the Orient Express, only it's a Christmas Eve train to Scotland that's been delayed. Our main protagonist is a retired police detective who's traveling to the Highlands to see her daughter; their relationship has always been fraught and distant, and now her daughter is having a very difficult delivery of her first baby and so time is of the essence! Without wanting to spoil too much of this book, I will say that there's a lot more sexual assault trauma than I was really looking for in my Christmas murder mystery. It ended up feeling pretty dark in a way I wasn't expecting. Still, with that caveat, it was a good read. 

Grade: B

Book 40: An Heiress for Christmas by Samantha SoRelle

Well, one of the best things I can say for this novella is that it was short, except that its main flaw was also its slightness. Two best friends from Oxford become master and valet when one man's father loses everything and ruins his son's prospects in the process, but then the master needs to get married by Christmas or get cut off by his father, and honestly none of it matters. Perfectly readable but with no real story, and not enough Christmas to make up for it. 

Grade: C

Book 39: A Nobleman's Guide to Seducing a Scoundrel by KJ Charles

The sequel to The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen, this book is just as delightful and captivating as the first one. The focus of this book is on Joss's nephew Luke, who becomes the secretary for Rufus d'Aumesty, a new Earl. They develop a relationship, but Luke has secrets and Rufus has his own problems attempting to fend off his uncle's attempts to strip him of his title and property. Will it all work out???? Indeed. 

Grade: A 

Book 38: The Secret Lives of Country Gentlemen by KJ Charles

Man, I loved this book. Two men who have been sleeping together but don't know each other's real names at a pub in London part on bad terms, only to encounter each other again when one of them moves to Kent after the death of his estranged titled father. Sir Gareth is completely unfamiliar with the smuggling families that control the Kentish Moors, but is introduced to all aspects of it when he discovers that his former bed partner is Joss Doomsday of the Doomsday clan. Hijinks and misunderstandings ensue, and it's just a delightful story from start to finish, with real conflicts that are resolved in satisfying ways. My favorite book by this author in quite some time. 

Grade: A 

Book 37: The Christmas Guest by Peter Swanson

Another Christmas mystery novella! This one is about a woman living in New York in 2019, who always spends Christmas alone, and rereads an old journal that tells the tale of a Christmas in the Cotswolds in 1989 that involved an old country manor house and murder. Halfway through the story, it takes a twist and we discover the real truth, etc. 

I liked this story a lot, but it felt a bit unbalanced--I think it would have been better if rather than the two parts being about equal in length, the first part was longer. I felt like the latter half suffered from being overexplored, and lessened the impact of the Christmas haunting themes of the story. But it was another one that I enjoyed overall, and I'd definitely read another story by this author. 

Grade: B

Book 36: The Christmas Appeal by Janice Hallett

Next up on the Christmas-themed stories, the first mystery of the month! Apparently this is a sequel novella to a very popular full length mystery called The Appeal that focuses on the same amateur theater group in a small English village. This explains why it felt like there were a bunch of references to characters or previous events that never got resolved, but I still enjoyed it quite a bit! It's an epistolary style, with lots of emails and text messages and ads in church programs, and it felt like a Christmas special on a cozy mystery show that would air on Acorn. The mystery and resolution wasn't particularly shocking, but then it fits with the holiday season that way. 

Grade: B 

Book 35: Once Upon a Christmas House by A.D. Ellis

We have once again hit the time of year when I stop pretending there's any chance of me getting to Book Zero and finishing my To Be Read pile in order to read a whole bunch of Christmas-themed gay romance novels and mysteries. First up, we have a classic pretend relationship for the sake of appearing on a home improvement reality TV series, with a side of magical Christmas house nonsense. I will be honest, this is a book that is a much better idea than execution, but I also failed out of five other gay romance novels before I hit this one, so at least it was that level of good! The backstory for the emotional damage one of the protagonists has was extremely silly, and this is definitely a novel that would have been much stronger if it had just been novella-length, but I had a nice time on a December evening reading this, so I can't complain much. 

Grade: C