Sergeant Delicious (2020) Annabeth Albert I shouldn’t have started off today with a Josh Lanyon short story. No other short story was going to measure up (unless it was another Josh Lanyon short story, which I don’t seem to have on my TBR pile.) Xavier is going to be discharged in just a few weeks. […]
Angels Sing (2019) Eli Easton (Daddy Dearest) Jamie Bailey has been a single dad since he was eighteen. He still managed to go to college, but stayed in his small town to help his uncle run his bookstore (after all, his uncle gave him a job when he was an eighteen-year-old single father trying to […]
Tic-Tac-Mistletoe (2020) N.R. Walker Hamish Kenneally is moving to the US. His sister has been there for four years, and there is nothing for him in Australia, so he has a two year visa, is going to remote work, and see if a change will do him good. But he arrives in the US just […]
Love All Year: A Holidays Anthology (2020) Stacey Agdern, Hallie Alexander, Savannah J. Frierson, Felicia Grossman, Farah Heron, Celestine Martin, Ekaterine Xia This is an anthology of romances set around holidays that are NOT Christmas, Thanksgiving, or Valentines Day. Three Stars in The Sky by Stacey Agdern It Happened One Yule by Celestine Martin Queen […]
Glass Tidings (2016) Amy Jo Cousins Eddie Rodrigues is back on the road, heading to Texas–like he should have in the first place. But a breakdown and then witnessing a hit and run leaves him stuck in the small town of Clear Lake, an unwelcome guest of a man who owns a Christmas shop. Grayson […]
Gifts for the Season: Winter & Christmas MM Charity Anthology (2020) This is an anthology of short stories, which are always to have some stories that don’t work for me. The issue with this anthology is that there were short stories–most of which were quite good–and there were tales that could not stand alone outside […]
Tales from the Folly: A Rivers of London Short Story Collection (2020) Ben Aaronovitch This is a collection of Rivers of London short stories. About half the stories are are Peter stories, the others features other characters from the world, including Abigail and Dominic Croft (from Foxglove Summer). PART ONE: THE PETER GRANT STORIES The […]
Ben’s Bakery and the Hanukkah Miracle (2018) Penelope Peters Adam Bernard has spent the last ten years caring for his father and coaching his pee-wee hockey team. He could have made the NHL draft, but caring for his father was more important than hockey. But now his team has been invited to a tournament in […]
Unappreciated Gifts (2014) Patricia Briggs from A Fantastic Holiday Season: The Gift of Stories I thought I’d finish up my read of the Alpha & Omega series with a re-read of the Asil short story, Unappreciated Gifts. Someone in the Pack has decided that Asil is lonely and needs some companionship. So they set him […]
A Very Henry Christmas (2017) N.R. Walker (The Weight of It All) This is a novella / short story set a year or so after the end of The Weight of It All. It’s just a cute story of Henry throwing an elaborate Christmas Eve party for their friends. Unlike the original story, we do […]
A Kiss for Midwinter (2012) Courtney Milan (Brothers Sinister) Set in England in 1863 I re-read the previous book in this series because I was wanting to re-read this story. Dr Jonas Grantham wanted more than anything to become a doctor. Right before he left for medical school, he followed the town doctor around to […]
Candy Hearts (2020) Erin McLellan (So Over the Holidays) Benji Holiday is over Valentine’s day, and so has accepted his sister’s invitation to join her friends for a Valentine’s weekend, but when he shows up, he discovers that the party was delayed due to a power outage. William O’Dare is hosting the annual Valentine’s day […]
A Holiday By Gaslight (2018) Mimi Matthews Set in England in 1861. Sophie Appersett has decided that although Mr Edward Sharpe is handsome as well as wealthy, they do not suit. After months, she still knows nothing about him, other than that he and his best friend made their money in an investment that paid […]
So This is Christmas (2016) Josh Lanyon Adrien and Jake are finally living together, in the house he grew up in. (T)he first rule of cohabitation is Thou Shalt Not Diss the Other Dude’s Kinfolk. But before they can spend the first night of their new life together, they have arrived back from London with […]
So This is Christmas (2016) Josh Lanyon Adrien and Jake have returned early from Christmas in London with Adrien’s mother and her husband. Adrien goes to work, only to discover the store not open, and his (step) sister in bed with his Angus, his employee. “Anyway, you think Angus is going to sue me for […]
Mr. Winterbourne’s Christmas (2018) Joanna Chambers Set in England in 1823 Lysander Winterbourne has spent the last year and a half being Adam Freeman’s estate manager, and although both are happy with the situation, neither truly knows how the other feels, and thus fearing an inevitable end, is unable to let the other know how […]
A Christmas Dance (2014) Alissa Johnson Set in London in an indeterminate historical time. William Renwick, Earl of Casslebury has decided it’s time for him to find a wife. It was his sense of responsibility that had necessitated his most recently constructed plan. He would marry a young lady of good blood, excellent reputation, pleasant […]
Midwinter Intrigue (2017) Tracy Grant Set in Scotland in 1818 The 14th Malcolm and Melanie Rannoch book is a short story. It’s really an interlude between the previous book and the one that follows, that gets them from Italy back to Britain (in this case, Scotland). It also ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, […]
A Kiss for Midwinter (2012) Courtney Milan Set in England in 1863. Lydia was a secondary character in The Duchess War and this is her story–how she found true love despite her past. Dr Grantham also appeared in The Duchess War, although far less than Lydia, but he is still interesting even in those brief […]
Kitty’s Greatest Hits (2011) Carrie Vaughn Il Est Ne – Wolfsbane and Mistletoe (2008) A Princess of Spain – The Secret History of Vampires (2007) Conquistador de la Noche – Subterranean Online (2009) The Book of Daniel – Talebones #39 (2009) The Temptation of Robin Green – The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance (2009) Looking […]
A Fantastic Holiday Season: The Gift of Stories (2014) edited by Kevin J. Anderson & Kieth J. Olexa I picked this collection up solely for the Patricia Briggs story, but once I saw some of the other authors, read through the stories that interested me (but skipped the ones that didn’t grab me after a […]
The Beat Goes On: The Complete Rebus Stories (2015) Ian Rankin ‘Dead and Buried’ (2013) ‘Playback,’ ‘The Dean Curse,’ ‘Being Frank,’ ‘Concrete Evidence,’ ‘Seeing Things,’ ‘A Good Hanging,’ ‘Tit for Tat,’ ‘Not Provan,’ ‘Sunday,’ ‘Auld Lang Syne,’ ‘The Gentleman’s Club,’ ‘Monstrous Trumpet’ from A Good Hanging (And Other Short Stories, Featuring Inspector Rebus) (2002) ‘My […]
Newford Stories: Crow Girls (2015) Charles de Lint Ah, the Crow Girls. Crow Girls Twa Corbies The Buffalo Man A Crow Girls’ Christmas Make a Joyful Noise “Crow Girls” first appeared as a limited edition chapbook (1995). This is the introduction to the Crow Girls, who are some of my favorite characters. But it’s not […]
The Dark Side of The Road (2015) Simon R. Green I have an off-and-on relationship with Simon Green’s stories. Some I love very much (Nightside) while others, I just can’t get into (The Secret Histories). But finding it on sale, I decided to give this new book a try. Ishmael Jones lives under the radar, […]
A Kiss for Midwinter (2012) Courtney Milan Set in England in 1863. Jonas Grantham is a doctor–it has been his dream. And once he became a doctor, he vowed never to allow anyone to act against his principles as he did when a doctor he was following all but attempted to murder the pregnant young […]