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A review by indiekay
Yule Love Me on Christmas by Riley E. Smith
4.0
Holiday Romance Readathon 2023: 14
So I REALLY liked this, but there were a few tiny things that I wasn't a huge fan of that stops me from giving it 5 stars:
1) The audiobook narrator is GREAT, but there's no pause after each chapter ends, so it'll be like "Melody wiped the tears from her eyes and went back insideCHAPTER SIX", which was ALWAYS disconcerting.
2) Melody is very Christian and has a hard time wrapping her head around all the Wiccan stuff, and gets very "omg am I sinning by enjoying myself??" which worked for the character, but I just did not enjoy that at all and it made me super uncomfortable having to listen to it. And as much as I didn't like that aspect, I also think realistically she would have been having MORE of a conflict of faith and been less accepting of everything going on around her. I dunno, I think this story would have probably worked a lot better if she'd been brought up in a religious household but wasn't that religious herself, because it would have made it easier for her to accept all the Yule traditions.
3) On a similar note, Melody has a promise ring that Aoife mentions once or twice, but the two of them never actually have any kind of conversation about it? That feels like an important thing they probably should have talked about. There's no sex scenes in the book - and I'm 100% fine with that - but I was unsure whether they had sex and it just was closed door or if they slept in the same bed without having sex. So a conversation about their sex expectations would have been great.
4) Last thing: the "I love yous" were WAY too sudden. They apparently hadn't talked to each other much before this holiday, just had crushes, and then suddenly after like less than 2 weeks they love each other??? Nooooooo.
Okay, that all said, here's what I did love:
1) I don't know much about Wiccan religion and Pagan traditions, and the only other Yule book I've read is Three Kings by Freydis Moon which really only mentions Yule in passing, so I found all the Yule traditions really interesting. I saw some reviews saying this book felt like Wiccan 101, and yeah the author went a bit too into detail on some stuff, but I still liked it.
2) Aoife's family were really fun and I enjoyed all of them (except Owen, who came on WAY too strong with his flirting with Melody, that it felt like sexual harassment at times.)
3) I think the writing was pretty strong and both main characters were very likeable. I'd read another book by this author happily.
So I REALLY liked this, but there were a few tiny things that I wasn't a huge fan of that stops me from giving it 5 stars:
1) The audiobook narrator is GREAT, but there's no pause after each chapter ends, so it'll be like "Melody wiped the tears from her eyes and went back insideCHAPTER SIX", which was ALWAYS disconcerting.
2) Melody is very Christian and has a hard time wrapping her head around all the Wiccan stuff, and gets very "omg am I sinning by enjoying myself??" which worked for the character, but I just did not enjoy that at all and it made me super uncomfortable having to listen to it. And as much as I didn't like that aspect, I also think realistically she would have been having MORE of a conflict of faith and been less accepting of everything going on around her. I dunno, I think this story would have probably worked a lot better if she'd been brought up in a religious household but wasn't that religious herself, because it would have made it easier for her to accept all the Yule traditions.
3) On a similar note, Melody has a promise ring that Aoife mentions once or twice, but the two of them never actually have any kind of conversation about it? That feels like an important thing they probably should have talked about. There's no sex scenes in the book - and I'm 100% fine with that - but I was unsure whether they had sex and it just was closed door or if they slept in the same bed without having sex. So a conversation about their sex expectations would have been great.
4) Last thing: the "I love yous" were WAY too sudden. They apparently hadn't talked to each other much before this holiday, just had crushes, and then suddenly after like less than 2 weeks they love each other??? Nooooooo.
Okay, that all said, here's what I did love:
1) I don't know much about Wiccan religion and Pagan traditions, and the only other Yule book I've read is Three Kings by Freydis Moon which really only mentions Yule in passing, so I found all the Yule traditions really interesting. I saw some reviews saying this book felt like Wiccan 101, and yeah the author went a bit too into detail on some stuff, but I still liked it.
2) Aoife's family were really fun and I enjoyed all of them (except Owen, who came on WAY too strong with his flirting with Melody, that it felt like sexual harassment at times.)
3) I think the writing was pretty strong and both main characters were very likeable. I'd read another book by this author happily.