Annie's Reviews > A Holly Jolly Ever After

Hang on to your peppermint stick vibrators because this is going to be rough...

Holly Jolly Ever After was one of my most anticipated books of the year after loving Merry Little Meet Cute and Snowplace like LA that came out in ebook form this summer. And the first part of this book was pure Christmas Notch, spicy, silly, fun, sexy magic. Kallum is the himbo hero we have been waiting for and was the new standard for book boyfriend material. Love a sexual awakening, and 'help-me-find-my-sexual-awakening'? Yes please. The side characters we loved from the first two books were back and everything was working.

Until our authors committed unthinkable writing sins. Because y'all... choices were made and for two authors so engrained on social media, they should have known better. This way spoilers lay so you've been warned. (view spoiler)[

There isn't much in the world we can all agree on, but surprise pregnancy is pretty much a universal ick so why, WHY would you include it in your book?! There isn't a good way to do it. It makes the characters seem SUPER immature. I'm sorry even I knew that a condom that spent years rotisserie cooking inside of Kallum's phone case was going to be a horrible idea. How do these fully grown humans not get this? And if that weren't bad enough, Winnie keeping the pregnancy from Kallum had me throwing my book across the room. This is not a cute look. It's not enjoyable to read about. And this 'conflict' which was completely self-inflicted went on for 60% of the book! Our "third act break up" took place before halfway and we had to drudge through SO MUCH BOOK of stupidity.

Just as with the fictional rewrite of Santa, Baby (the movie the MC's were cast in during the book), the second half of this book felt like a rewrite that ALSO made no sense, was cringe, and stupid. Santa's sleigh is propelled through the skies at night by the power of magical peppermint ejaculate?! WHAT DID I JUST READ?!?!?!?! WHY?!?! Immediately no.

But if this all wasn't bad enough, we have a fairly descriptive (almost) miscarriage that came out of no where. I don't have children, nor do I ever plan to birth a crotch goblin from my nether bits, but even I was triggered and upset by this content. I couldn't imagine someone reading this who has experienced a miscarriage or who actually has or wants children. And I checked... not a single mention in an author's note or trigger warning. Again, two authors so engrained in social media should know better. (hide spoiler)]

Finishing this book was a labor of hate, because I really did hate everything about the second half. I didn't find a single part of the second half redeemable. So for a book that was trending to be a stand-out five star for the first part, the second part and the egregious choices made by the authors have plummeted this one to 2.5 stars at best. Sorry not sorry.

Will I read the next in the series? Probably... mostly to find out what happens with Teddy and Steph.

TW/CW: purity culture, deconstructing christianity, miscarriage, surprise pregnancy, toxic parental relationships