e-Audio, 12:23:54
Narrated by: Ellis Evans
Release Date: October 8, 2024
Published by: Macmillan Audio
Read from: November 23-24, 2024
Royals and Romance, #1
Source: Library’s Libby
Content Warning: Sexual Content, Abandonment, Emotional Abuse, Grief, Death, Cursing, Car Accident, Vomit, Alcohol
For Readers Interested In: Holidaze, Romance, Paranormal, Adult, 2sLGBTQIA+, Sparkly CoversRed, White & Royal Blue meets The Nightmare Before Christmas in a sexy, quirky romcom where the golden-hearted Prince of Christmas falls for the totally off-limits Prince of Halloween.
Featuring beautiful ruby sprayed edges!
Nicholas “Coal” Claus used to love Christmas. Until his father, the reigning Santa, turned the holiday into a PR façade. Coal will do anything to escape the spectacle, including getting tangled in a drunken, supremely hot make- out session with a beautiful man behind a seedy bar one night.
But the heir to Christmas is soon commanded to do his duty: he will marry his best friend, Iris, the Easter Princess and his brother’s not-so-secret crush. A situation that has disaster written all over it.
Things go from bad to worse when a rival arrives to challenge Coal for the princess’s hand…and Coal comes face-to-face with his mysterious behind-the-bar hottie: Hex, the Prince of Halloween.
It’s a fake competition between two holiday princes who can’t keep their hands off each other over a marriage of convenience that no one wants. And it all leads to one of the sweetest, sexiest, messiest, most delightfully unforgettable love stories of the year.
*MY THOUGHTS*
I’m not gonna lie… When I first heard about this, I really thought it wasn’t a real book. I thought it was some weird sort of fever dream? I mean the prince of Halloween and the prince of Christmas falling in love? Like what? But in all honesty, once I read it, I was hella glad I did. This book slapped and I can’t believe I almost missed this one!
Ok so the important part about this was the characters. Coal was definitely Christmas through and through. But the problem was he was too radical. He seemed to want to get things done immediately at all costs with no thoughts so I could understand how he constantly got into trouble. But sometimes, things weren’t his fault and Santa was actually the one who needed to be watched. This book was a lot of politics and I thought that would turn me away from it, but it actually intrigued me more.
The trope was forbidden romance and I can’t lie, I was hella upset. Christmas and Halloween don’t have to be dueling with each other. (Maybe I’m just salty because they are both my favorite holidays lol) But man, they were so good together! Christmas was way more *ahem* aggressive than Halloween was which I thought was strange, but it really was cool to see them change it up in some ways. It wasn’t predictable at all.
The plot of this was crazy! The big plot twist made me get up and pace around for a little bit. Because why in the world would this person let this happen? I loved it! Not something I saw happening and it had me glued to my seat! There’s a sequel that’s already on Netgalley too with St. Patrick’s Day, but I don’t want to read the synopsis yet. Although I do have my suspicions on who it’s going to be about.
This was surprising all around! This review doesn’t do this justice at all, but I don’t want to give anything away. I hope y’all read this and find out about all the weirdness that was actually a really cute love story with some holiday goodness going on in the midst in of some holiday wtf lol
Overall, I give this
