I've had Burial Rites by Hannah Kent in my 'to be read' pile for a number of years now. It's time I finally read this historical fiction novel as I am a fan of the genre.
Burial Rites is set in Iceland's stark landscape where we find Agnes awaiting execution while staying at an isolated farmhouse. Agnes has been convicted of brutally murdering her former master.
Which book will you start reading in 2025?
I love reading, so I enjoyed participating in the 2024 Yuletide Spirit Reading Challenge and Readathon this year!
I read a total of 5 books between November 25th through December 31st. Below is a list of all the books I read during this timeframe. Click on link to read my reviews for each book.
Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl. Top Ten Tuesday was originally created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.
2024 was a great year of reading for me. I read so many fabulous books this year, that it was tough narrowing down my favorite reads for the year! In fact, I kept changing my line-up of favorite reads for 2024 as it was that challenging to decide on my list of favorites! With that said, here are my top ten favorite reads for 2024.
I've included both fiction and nonfiction to my list of favorite reads this year, which only added to the difficulty of selecting my favorite reads for 2024! Click on links below to read my reviews.
1. The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich
2. Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
3. The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo
4. The Wednesday Wars by Gary D. Schmidt
5. The One by John Marr
6. Overkill by Paul A. Offit MD
7. Chasing the Sun by Linda Geddes
8. Eloquence of the Sardine by Antony Sugaar & Bill Francois
9. Animals Make Us Human by Temple Grandin
10. The Dali Legacy by Jean-Pierra Isbouts and Christopher Heath Brown
Which books became your favorites this year?
I hope you are happy and well!! May you be spending your Christmas holiday with loved ones, enjoying the food, merriment and holiday cheer! May you also receive a few great reads under the Christmas tree this holiday season.
I wish Jolabokaflod was a tradition here in the USA... Or at the very least a tradition in my family each Christmas Eve! Do you celebrate Jolabokaflod in your home?
I listened to the unabridged audio version of A Nutcracker Nightmare by Christina Romeril, which is narrated by Rebecca Gallagher. It's the second cozy novel in the 'A Killer Chocolate Mystery' series.
This is another enjoyable cozy mystery novel with a wintry/Christmas theme to it. I also enjoyed the high school class reunion theme as the setting where the murder takes place! It was the perfect setting for knocking off that one classmate from high school that was a jerk and whom everyone despised. So, when this particular classmate is murdered at the reunion, it's makes it difficult to narrow down the killer when everyone disliked the person so much. Then another victim is killed along the way as well.
Loads of red herrings to be found and some good amateur sleuthing too by the main character, Alex. Once again though, I figured out the killer early on... I'd say about 84% into the novel itself is when I figured out who killed both victims in A Nutcracker Nightmare!
For the most part I enjoyed this cozy mystery novel overall. It was nice to have a refresher as to who some of the characters were from the last novel that were also in this novel as well as some of the background of the small town/village where the story is set. This way readers who read the first novel a while back have a chance to become reacquainted again with the characters and setting as they read the second novel.
I didn't care much for the narrator for A Nutcracker Nightmare. The voices Rebecca Gallagher used for some of the characters weren't well rendered in my opinion.
I also felt like Alex, the main character, was off in a few scenes. Alex plays amateur sleuth and in at least one scene she just peppers another character with one question after another in trying to find clues to in order to help identify the killer. The scene(s) felt stilted/unnatural as to how two people would interact in really life.
Below is the publisher's summary for A Nutcracker Nightmare by Christina Romeril from the Goodreads website:
When twin sisters Hanna and Alex head to their high school reunion, will they bite off more than they can chew when they find a former classmate’s dead body?
Hanna and Alex, owners of the Murder and Mayhem book and chocolate shop, are busy preparing for the Harriston High School’s reunion weekend. They’re eager to see old friends—and perhaps avoid old foes. One person they can’t avoid is Kyle, the former star quarterback, who is busy using his entire playbook to try and score with Hanna. He even uses his status as a judge at the upcoming chocolate competition to threaten her if she doesn’t play nice. At the reunion, the twins soon bond with their fellow classmates over their nostalgia of their youth—but the party is put on hold when Alex finds the dead body of none other than Kyle himself, bludgeoned to death by a nutcracker that the sisters admired earlier in the night.
Hanna quickly becomes the prime suspect—everyone saw her slap Kyle across the face at the reunion dance. She’ll need her sister, their sleuthing canine, Watson, and their old friends and colleagues to help break this case wide open. While looking through old yearbooks and taking a stroll down memory lane, Alex uncovers a few secrets about Kyle, now, it seems like everyone had a motive to kill him: Is there a football team secret Coach Fenton was covering up? Could the mayor, Everett, have a skeleton or two in his closet? And for some classmates, maybe time doesn’t heal all wounds.
When the suspects start becoming the victims, Alex and Hannah know that they can’t melt under the pressure—they must find the killer before they become just another yearbook memory.
I am giving A Nutcracker Nightmare by Christina Romeril a rating of 3 stars out of 5 stars.
Until my next post, happy reading!!
