The Mistletoe Motive book review


 I discovered Chloe Liese for the first time this year and have since May read her entire backlist and loved all of them. The Mistletoe Motive was no exception to this and another one I read within 24 hours. 

Over the course of The Mistletoe Motive we get to know Gabrielle and Jonathan who have worked together at Bailey’s Bookshop for about a year but don’t find themselves getting along. They have recently learned that the bookshop is at risk of closing though and set a challenge of whoever sells the least books in December has to resign and through this challenge Gabrielle meets a new side of Jonathan that she didn’t expect. 


This is a novella of under 200 pages so while going in I knew I love Chloe Liese as an author I wasn’t sure what I would think of it with it being so short and having less time with the characters. However I was not at all let down by this book and absolutely loved reading it. 


Gabrielle was a character I connected to from early on in the story as large amounts of what she said was stuff that I had also experienced or I enjoyed, like romance novels. I really wanted to support her as the story went on and you could see why she was struggling and  the job at the bookshop meant so much to her. It took us a while to get to know Jonathan however once I had a true feel for who he was as a character he was also a character that I wanted the best for and I could really see Gabrielle and him working out as a couple.


For how short this book is I feel like there was a great amount of depth to both the story and characters. We really got a feel for the side characters particularly the Bailey’s, owners of the bookshop, Gabrielle’s friends and roommates along with a couple of others, which I was not expecting but made the story even better. I think that this depth is one of the reasons that I particularly loved this book instead of just having a good time with it like I have other holiday romances this year. 


I could not have asked for better vibes in this book either from the bookish ones as a consequence of a decent chunk being set in a bookshop and the really strong festive ones. This book delivered as a Christmas romance and a bookish romance both of which I am a massive fan of make this the perfect combination for me. 


I could not stop reading this book at all, reading later than I planned to on Christmas Eve and taking my quiet time in the morning of Christmas Day to finish it. One of the festive romances I most highly recommend and have a feeling I will be rereading year after year. 

Comments

Post a Comment

My Most Read Reviews

As Good As Dead short review

Image
  This is the third book in the A Good Girls Guide to Murder series and I was very excited to see what was going to happen and where it was going to go. This book also didn't disappoint, I didn't expect it to take the direction it did and there were some bits that terrified me but I did still rate it 5 stars.  I had so many feelings when reading this, I loved some bits and how the characters have evolved, terrified about what was going on and then heartbroken by parts of the ending. The characters have grown and evolved so much in this series and I love how much they have grown, I also hope they get a break after everything that they've been through.  This book took a dark turn and I can't say I didn't like it. I don't know if it was my favourite when it first happened, but the way it continued on and led to the ending I loved. I also loved how all of Pip's friends stepped up to help even if they didn't completely know what was going on.  That ending too...
Read more

The Girl in Question book review

Image
  The Girls I’ve Been by Tess Sharpe is a YA thriller that I read a few years back now and really enjoyed, it was fast paced, had me hooked and characters that were easy to root for so when I heard this book was coming I knew I would need to pick it up.  The Girl in Question again follows Nora, Wes and Iris who we know from the bank robbery from the previous book but instead this time after graduating high school they are going on a backpacking trip in the woods when Wes’s new girlfriend gets kidnapped dure to a borrowed flannel. Most of this book takes place over about a week while the characters are in the forest but there are flashbacks to weeks and years previous.  This is a series I would recommending checking out the content warnings for as there are a lot of things discussed and it’s better to be safe.  I really like how this book is written, it’s not something I find in a lot of the books I read but I don’t think the story would work without it. Unlike the pr...
Read more

The Gossip Games book review

Image
This book took me by major surprise and I am so glad that I chose to read it because boy, was it good. I fell in love with this book, the story, the characters, the romance and nearly everything else that was included in it. The Gossip Games follows Gracie who has recently had rumours about her start-up after Dean, her best friend's brother, carried her up to bed and she’s not best pleased. This starts up a competition of sorts between the two to see who can one up the other in a game of flirting and fake dating. This book is a contemporary young adult romance following characters who are in their later teenage years at a private boarding school. The main characters in The Gossip Games are Gracie and Dean, as well as Zara, Dean’s twin sister and Gracie’s best friend, Jesse and Theo, who are Zara and Dean’s cousins, though there are a couple of other characters who feature regularly. I liked nearly all the cast of characters and if I didn’t originally like a character quite often I ...
Read more