 Hello, hello everyone. My name is Laura. This is my channel Laura's Little Library and welcome to today's video which is my very late December wrap-up. But the December was quite a bit of a slower month I, you know, we moved back home for the holidays and then and I mean that's why I'm currently filming this It is the middle of January and we're about to head back to Minnesota But I wanted to try and get this video filmed and edited as quickly as possible So in December, I only read eight books, which I'm thinking of last year That's still a good number, but looking back on how much I read per month this year It's probably one of my lowest numbers, but that is perfectly okay. That's perfectly fine I still beat my reading goal, which is great And like it was just kind of a mediocre month But I was just so busy with catching up with family getting ready for the holidays There being a blizzard and then driving through the blizzard and then having the blizzard again So and I've done a lot of baking since I've been home So it's just been busy and wonderful. So I'm still gonna talk about the eight books that I read though in December Starting with the one and only five star read of this month Kingdom of the Wicked by Carrie Manus Calco It took me a very long time to read this book And that is because when I first heard the book I was like, okay, I think that sounds interesting But I'm not super into it. I guess like I was like, oh, this is gonna be a really popular book It's probably gonna be overhyped. I'm not gonna enjoy it that much And then when I finished reading Carrie Manus Calco's other series the Stocking Jack the Ripper That's when it clicked to me and I was like, oh my word Carrie Manus Calco She wrote Kingdom of the Wicked. I really liked the Stocking Jack the Ripper series I love the writing and I love the character. So I was like, okay You know the premise is interesting. Maybe I should just give it a try because I like the author and I'm so petty you guys I am so incredibly petty because I love this book. Like I said, it was a five stars I cannot believe I forced myself to wait this long to give in to finally reading it. It was amazing I love the characters. I love the Italian influence the magic so basically what happens in this book is yet you have these twin witch sisters and You know, they're just happily living their life in Italy until one of them actually ends up Murdered and so the other one our main character decides that she needs to solve her sister's murder because no one else is gonna do it And so in order to do so she ends up summoning a demon to help her but After she completes the summoning she realizes. Oh, this isn't just a demon. This is one of the seven princes of hell She summoned Prince Rap. Then they have to go solve her sister's murder. I love this book so much that in January Snake Peak I read books two and three immediately like I actually loved this book so much that I prioritized finishing the series which says a lot if you are familiar with my channel, you know that I am absolutely atrocious at Continuing on series even if I love them. So the fact that I sat and binged this series Means a lot. I was constantly Intrigued also. I just have to say the audiobook for this is Phenomenal there are sound effects. There's music background During the book when a prophecy or something is being read out They do a sound effect on the narrator's voice or when it's a important or intense moment though They will add in little bits of music. So I highly Highly recommend the audiobook because it just elevated the reading experience So much and I am so glad that I own this. I do have the dust jacket for it It is in Minnesota when I travel with hard books I don't like traveling with the dust jackets because I don't like them getting like Wrinkled or ripped or anything like that. So this was a five-star read above and beyond my expectations. I Was just so thrilled the whole way through the next I had three four Star reads which is it's pretty good And I think most of these were pretty shocking that they were four star reads So the first one is these witches don't burn. I've got a couple of like Halloween leftovers in December which is like December is when I want to be reading Christmas books not spooky season, but you know I'm glad I read them and Uh We can move on I read them pretty early in the month so that I could transition into Christmas reads even though I think I read more Christmas reads in November that I did in December Anyway, not the point these witches don't burn this one Surprised me how much I enjoyed it. I felt like this book was a crescendo It started off like good kind of where I expected it to be and then it just got better and better And I was like all my word. This is getting really good. Wait, is this getting really good? Yeah, this is getting really good. Why why just wasn't expecting it from this book It was so surprising. So it was like a four-star. I liked the romance. I liked the mystery plot There were some red herrings in there. There are just these strange witchy things happening around town in Salem so the real witch needs to go and Figure out what's going on. It's YA to the point of like I Was I was almost annoyed that it was YA that was like, oh my word I roll, but By the end of it. I was like wow this character is like grown up and there's maturity happening here and Yeah, it was just really satisfying weirdly enough to read I may or may not read the second book We'll see then there was also the monarchs and this is the second book in the duology The first book was the Ravens. I read that a couple years ago And this one too. I Enjoyed it so much like it the first book ended the plot on its own So it's not like a continuation or a cliffhanger So I didn't know what to expect going into the monarchs But I like I said I enjoyed it I liked the relationship with the characters and the characters relationships with each other there are lots of twists and Like the background we're getting so much more background on our main character So this if you don't know the Ravens follows a sorority That's actually a coven of witches and there are some pretty spooky things happening on Campus that these witches need to figure out without exposing that they are a coven of witches and everyone who's been in this sorority Are all witches like it's like kind of a generational thing. And so that was a really interesting Way to read about it And then the final four star read was not a book that I was expecting to pick up My co-worker picked it up and she was like oh my word. I love this you have to read it And so I read it for her and that was the silent patient By you know Alex Michael ladies Michael ladies Michael whatever however you say that I was surprised that I liked this one It's so it takes a while to to build and I was like I'm getting so much on the main therapist That like what's gonna happen blah blah blah But then as a twist like right before the twist was revealed. I was like wait, what could it be? No, that's not what it's gonna be and then they revealed the twist and I was like Oh my word. That's exactly it Uh-huh Uh-huh So it made me just want to start the book from the beginning again. This book follows this therapist who Wants to talk to the silent patient. This is a woman who murdered her husband and hasn't said a word Since and so he wants to be her therapist and try and get her to open up Etc and so forth like I was I was a little torn off with the ending just I was like oh I wish it had ended like this this would have been a little cooler If they could have extended this certain aspect a little bit longer like it wasn't perfect, but it was pretty good I don't know if I want to read the maidens by this author because I heard a lot of people love one book but not the other and the maidens didn't really capture my interest, but We'll see We'll see next spooky season how I feel moving on to three star reads I had three three star reads and the first was the witch haven So this was a really hyped up book It is about a woman who kind of gets into a little bit of trouble and instead of getting arrested She is taken to the witch haven where she can learn about her magical ability She's safe from the fact that she kind of murdered this dude with her magical power She didn't know she had is the first book in a was a duology trilogy Hmm, I don't know. There's another book, but this book was just super hyped up. Everybody was loving it, but honestly I didn't love it. I didn't love it. I didn't hate it, but I didn't love it I think it was overhyped. I think my expectations for it were too high the school I wasn't super thrilled with it didn't feel like anything Unique or like rich in its own magic system or anything like that. I was like Okay It's happening and the main character kind of felt like the same way of like this isn't really what I wanted to learn But the way that they go about learning what they want to I was like Don't really care. Can something happen? Please and there was just a lot of various things that were happening and I was like Not super thrilled by it. Not near as good as I expected it to be so I was I was quite bummed about that one But like it was still a solid book. Honestly, I think if it wasn't hyped up so much No, I actually don't think I would have liked it more other two or three star books were also Halloween witchy books So I have not the witch you wed by April Asher and This book I was expecting it to be one thing because the title is not the witch you wed So I expected it to be like they got married and they didn't and it bummed me out so much So it follows our main character who is a witch but doesn't have any actual like magic so because of that she will not be inheriting the like High like leader of the witches that her grandmother is it's gonna go to her sister But she is still required to mate with an either another supernatural creature Walk in our werewolf male main character and now these characters have Previous history and it didn't end well. I'm not normally one for second chance romance I mean, I felt like that element was meh, but like I was told this was gonna be a fake dating and It just I don't know it didn't feel like fake dating But it also just wasn't anything else You know like I thought and it was well written and I did like the characters and kind of the chemistry What happened between them? Like it was a solid book I think I just had my own vision of what this book was gonna be that they were going to be Fake dating getting married and then falling in love and it just wasn't that and I don't know. I just didn't enjoy it as much as I had hoped but it was still really good I would still recommend this definitely and then the last three star book that I read was paybacks a witch I feel like it lost sight of what it was partway through the book You know where I feel like the whole premise what the summary tells you this book It's gonna be about just kind of disappeared partway through and just didn't reappear at all So paybacks a witch is about this Witch who finds out, you know her boyfriend was like cheating on her and was not Very good. And so she kind of gangs up with these other two women that he had romantic history with and they all decided to Do some payback, you know get a little revenge scheme going at the same time that the major families of this town the major witch families of this town are having this like competition of Who is going to be like the top? clan for the next X amount of years and the thing is is that again, it was a well-written book. It was a good book But it lost sight of itself because it was like, okay, they're gonna get revenge on this guy But basically how they're gonna do it is by not letting his family win the competition which is like Kind of how competition works and Then it was more focused on our main character Falling in love with one of the other girls and their romance rather than actually Payback revenge on the guy And I mean the love story was cute and I liked the characters and they had decent chemistry But I wanted more revenge. I want a more payback. I wanted more like bad-ass. You're not gonna mess with us And I just felt like that was lacking, but it was still like a solidly written book So it was a three-star, you know, it was average and the eighth and final book that I read in December Was window shopping by Tessa Bailey and this was a two-star book This follows two main characters. We have Stella who was very recently released from prison And she is standing outside of this Super big department store that is like the number one department store. Oh la la and she is Criticizing to this stranger the window display because that's where her passion is. She loves window displays Little does she know that he is actually the manager of this store and he invites her to apply for the job of being the window dresser This is grumpy sunshine workplace romance and I was not thrilled with this at all. I loved the premise I thought the window dressing was super unique and I was excited for just money Christmas vibes and I didn't like the chemistry The the guy is the sunshine, but I feel like he just wasn't Sunshine-y like the only sunshine thing about him was his appearance like how he would wear these Christmas bow ties But other than that, he was just constantly like worried about her Annoyed with his family Figuring out like he didn't seem very sunshine-y and then Stella was like not Grumpy either. She was just like Nervous about everything because she had just got out of prison and she's young She didn't think she would find a job let alone her dream career. And so she's not grumpy She's just cautious on how to re-enter the world and like I wish it was more grumpy sunshine You know and she you can't be a grumpy Grinch if you're like Decorating windows for Christmas, you know, let's just not How that works and so I was definitely Missing that and the chemistry between the character was kind of good kind of not like It was a little just not quite there Like it was very clear that this was an earlier written novel that of this author like she she had she has Growth to go from here and I read her other book my killer vacation and that book Was much better. So I can definitely see the growth between this book and Those were the eight books that I read in December the final month of 2022 Thank you all very much for watching if you like to give it a thumbs up Feel free to subscribe as I post videos on Sundays and Wednesdays Theoretically January is a little bit of a mess. I'm just kind of Editing videos and posting them as soon as they're done So you definitely want to subscribe and hit the bell to be notified when those videos are going up But come February, I hope to be getting back into my regularly scheduled Postings also, I have social media linked down below You can see what I'm reading as I'm reading it in my kind of more immediate thoughts on my Instagram And I post book reviews there as well Comment down below how your last month of 2022 when were you able to do a lot of reading because of days off for the holiday or not so much because you were Visiting and hanging out with family like me. I would love to hear from you But until I see you all in the next video, I wish you happy reading