Didn't realize this one was part of an entire series so I was a little lost when I started reading it. The story was fine and the characters were well fleshed out, but I couldn't get into what was going on.

This is such a fun series and the latest installment didn't disappoint! I love how fresh the writing and plot stayed. Definitely recommend.

A sweet finale to one of the funniest superhero series out there! I'll be honest, it's probably my least favourite of the books, mostly because Bea is my least favourite of the three protagonists and there wasn't enough Evie here, but there's still plenty to love, from the wacky supernatural shenanigans to the wonderful sibling and chosen-family relationships. I'd love more books in the series, but this is a lovely wrap up for the Heroine team!

What I like best about Sarah Kuhn’s style with this series is the way she blends fairly serious themes with quirky and unusual heroines. One of the best elements of the sixth book in the series is the chance to hang with Bea Tanaka as she figures out how to believe in herself, believe in her power, and trust that she is a superheroine just like her sister Evie and Aveda. She also learns not to allow others to tell her who she is but to embrace hope, choose love, and break every trope in the book. And in exploring these themes, Sarah Kuhn has created an uplifting and delightful story. 

Bea Tanaka is fun and emotional. I love that part of her journey is embracing her emotions, learning that it’s okay to trust those around you, ask for help when you need it and even that she struggles with the complexities of adulthood. I feel like most women can embrace these issues. I know I have always had a hard time letting go and asking for help, not being 100% in charge all the time and this novel in particular spoke to me, especially as Bea starts out trying to be perfect and tamp down on who her genuine self is. I think more people need to trust themselves and embrace what makes them unique. 

There is also mad sexy romance, loving friends, and warm family moments, both born family and found family. The story is adventurous but it is the emotional ties that resonate with me. This book is glittery, crazy fun but most of all uplifting and delightful because it revolves around love, joy, and hope, just like Christmas and other holidays with family. If you love family, along with demons and magical adventures, check out this book, along with the rest of the series.

Holiday Heroine is the 6th book in the Heroine Complex series by Sarah Kuhn and if there’s one thing I can say about this series is that it’s just fun. From the first page of the first book to the last page of this one, these books have just been filled with supernatural hijinx and a diverse superhero team kicking ass. I do think these are incredibly underrated for what they are, these books always have a romance arc throughout them, AND strong female relationships at the core. I don’t know what else we could ask for!

This book finds Bea having moved to Maui on her own, trying to prove to herself and her family that she can be her own powerful superhero and not need people saving her for once. I absolutely loved the twist that Bea’s issue took form as in this one. Bea is Asian American, and that’s always been celebrated in these books, and this is done in a unique way here with some of the Holiday memories and the demons involved. It’s one of the strongest aspects of these books and it made this one even better.

I’m absolutely flabbergasted that I ended up DNF-Ing this one halfway through. This series has been one of my favorite of the last decade and I’ve devoured each of them in turn but HOLIDAY HEROINE gets so bogged down in the wrap-up it forgets it’s supposed to move. Characters can spin in circles - when stories do it, they, and the reader get hung up. I did try putting HOLIDAY HEROINE down for a few days and then picking it back up but no dice, this one just didn’t work for me and inlet it go at 50-ish %. Huge bummer

Get ready for a wild ride with Holiday Heroine. Christmas and kaijus go hand-in-hand in Bea Tanaka’s second outing.

After making the leap from the family nest in San Francisco, Bea is determined to show her loved ones that she is thriving in Maui. She’s determined to blend in, make no waves, and keep her dangerous powers under lock and key. Yet though she’s made a close group of friends for herself already, Bea desperately misses her boyfriend, Sam, her sister, Evie, and everyone at Jupiter/Tanaka, Inc. When her family shows up for a visit, things start to go terribly wrong. Kaiju are popping up in Maui and Bea’s powers are out of control. When she passes out only to wake up in a mysteriously perfect Christmas in San Francisco, Bea knows she can’t just luxuriate in the holiday rom-com of her dreams. She has to get to the bottom of what’s happening before she loses everything and everyone she loves.

Bea is a vibrant heroine who has tamped down on her sparkly, over-the-top personality. She’s determined to be normal, to resist her powers and the supervillain path they could potentially take her on. She broke my heart more than once because she’s dimmed her light so much. I wanted to see her be the strong, confident, rainbow disco ball of a heroine she’s meant to be. Author Sarah Kuhn doesn’t make things easy on Bea in Holiday Heroine. Our brilliant heroine still has a lot to learn about being herself and it was great to see her bumpy journey to happily ever after. I can’t say much about that journey because it would spoil the story. Suffice it to say Kuhn takes readers on a twisty paranormal adventure.

I had a hard time rating Holiday Heroine because there’s a lot I love about the Heroine Complex world. Bea and her loved ones are all unique, well-drawn, endearing characters and I enjoy any time spent with them. But this book did drag for the first half as Bea – and readers – have no idea what’s happening or why. It’s only at the halfway point that things start to pick up. From there the repetition makes sense as Bea has lessons to learn, but unlike every other book in this series I didn’t have a hard time putting this one down, which was a pity. Still, even though this wasn’t my favorite Heroine Complex book I did love the way it turned out. Love in all its forms is key to this story and the way Kuhn flushed out Bea’s relationships with everyone in her life – especially herself – made this story shine.

Holiday Heroine is the sixth and final novel (not counting the one novella) in Sarah Kuhn's "Heroine Complex" series, as series which I have absolutely fallen in love with over the last few years. The series, which began with Heroine Complex (Reviewed Here), features a trio of Asian American superheroines in a San Francisco that faced an unsuccessful demon invasion from another dimension....which resulted in some people getting superpowers and demonic forces possessing odd choices of normal objects - birthday cakes, wedding dresses, microphones, etc. - and causing havoc. In this story we have our three major heroines, Evie, Aveda (Annie) and Bea, as they kick demon butt, deal with their own insecurities about their own lives and their romances, have steamy romances, and form their own families in their own very different ways. The books are incredibly incredibly fun, at times incredibly sexy (with great sex scenes), and each deals with one of the main characters as they struggle with new circumstances and anxieties as they grow and change.

Holiday Heroine is the second of these books to follow Bea Tanaka, maybe my favorite of the heroines, who is almost a YA heroine....she's college aged roughly unlike her older sister and friend, wants to prove herself as independent at times, and is just plain fun in how she approaches life...which got her in trouble when her empathy superpower turned into emotion/mind-altering, led her to being manipulated by a demon into almost supervillainous actions like sacrificing the girl her best friend was starting to like all the way back in Book 3, Heroine's Journey. I loved Heroine's Journey, and it turns out, I loved this second Bea novel, as she deals with a long-distance relationship, what her heart truly wants in her relationship with Sam, Killer Kaiju, time traveling, and the holiday (Christmas) spirit that she loves so much...This is apparently the last installment there will be in the series, and if so, this is a great sendoff - super fun, sexy (oh yeah), and just charming in one last ride with the old characters I've come to love and the new ones here who are just as charming as the rest.

More specifics after the jump. Fair warning: Spoiler for the first five books may be below, but this is not really the type of series to be affected too much by you having too much foreknowledge.



------------------------------------------------Plot Summary-----------------------------------------------------
Bea Tanaka thought going to Maui to join Doc Kai's Demonology Research Group would be exactly what she needed - a chance to prove her independence and her generall all around adultness separate from her beloved sister Evie (and might-as-well-be sister Aveda), where she could explore her own emotion based superpowers and her love of scientific experimentation (and creative thinking) in a cool hip new place. But while she's loved the people she's met on the Island, things have been far harder than Bea expected - the demon threat on Maui is more tourist-hallucinations than actually real and her powers (especially after a recent combo spell with Scott and Aveda) have been kind of out of control, leading her to be constantly afraid of using her mind-altering abilities for supervillainous purposes....like luring annnoying tourists away from her own favorite food spots.

And then there's being away from her boyfriend Sam (now very occupied with taking care of his parents) and best friend, leaving her with no one she feels comfortable talking about this whole thing. She's responded to this all by limiting her communication with her San Fran friends to cards about her love - and I mean LOVE - of Christmas and various Christmas movies, but it hasn't helped her insecurity and fear that everything is falling apart in her attempt to have a normal happy and totally non-supervillainous life.

But when Bea starts seeing first small kaiju, she finds herself drastically thrown for a loop - she's lost a week of time, during which Sam claims they broke up, and things just don't seem to make sense. And then a giant one shows up to threaten Bea and her family...and Bea finds herself soon caught in a loop of Christmas-esque moments where something has gone seriously seriously wrong. This isn't the holiday rom-com she imagined for herself, and if Bea isn't careful, it's going to end with somebody seriously hurt....and Bea utterly heartbroken.....
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Holiday Heroine returns the story to Bea, last seen in Heroine's Journey. In that book, Bea struggled with the fact that she desired to be a heroine even though her siblings feared to let her in the dangers of the job, struggled with her always feeling a bit alone with her dad having left her and Evie and her mom having died young, and with the temptations to use her emotion/mind-altering powers in dark selfish ways to get what she wanted...something exploited by the demon at the end of that. In the end of that book, she came to realize that she had a family who loved her, as well as friends - and one boyfriend she romantically loved in Sam, and that she didn't need to be a heroine alongside her sibling-figures...and her sibling figures also learned that she had to be allowed to also take risks on her own. And so she took off at the end of that book for Maui, believing that working there on Doc Kai's spinoff demonology task force would help her figure herself out.

A year plus into Maui and well, Bea hasn't quite done that and now has a whole new set of anxieties: She's made a whole bunch of new friends, but she still feels separated from Sam....who himself feels stuck at home taking care of his parents (who may or may not need him)...as well as the rest of her family. Her powers, after teaming up with Scott at the end of Hollywood Heroine to do a combo-spell, are reacting in strange ways, seemingly allowing her to mind control even stronger before with less control than before...scaring Bea and making her try to lock those powers down to avoid once again being supervillainousy. And now that she feels like her family and friends have accepted her independence...she's afraid to admit her power-issues or anxieties to them, especially as they seem to be so proud of how successful she is on the surface. So Bea bottles up these feelings, and limits her communications with her family and loved ones, basically only sending Sam messages about her favorite Christmas movies (which are all made up but are absolutely hilarious in Kuhn's hands).

In another writer's hands, this plot setup could be frustrating - here's another protagonist heroine who is bottling inside her feelings (like the prior two books' protagonists) when she should be willing to trust in the love of her loed ones, who is going to get herself into trouble by not seeking others' advice until finally trusting in those people helps her avert mere disaster. But while there are some elements of that here, there's a lot else, and Kuhn spices it up with some fun characters, zany new powers, and amazing situations. We have Kaiju, Christmas movies, fun new characters with their own quirks, scientific reasoning, and oh yeah, some real real hot sexy moments. And Kuhn even acknowledges the repetitiveness in ways that both make sense and subvert your expectations, with a moment between Evie, Aveda, and Bea at the end that is so perfect it just ties the last three books in this series altogether. And so she manages to tell a great story that directly attacks the notion that women of color have to be resilient and sacrificing for the good of others....in a hell of a fun way.

I mean, I shouldn't lose track of the fact that this is a book about a girl with superpowers trying to save her loved ones from Kaiju, traveling possibly through time repeatedly to save the existence of said loved ones, all with some zany zany Christmas spirit along the way throughout both San Fran and Maui. That's there too. And it's why Kuhn's book can be both so fun and so poignant, with great characters and themes, and just makes me so happy to have enjoyed the ride six books and a novella deep.

I love this series, it’s a lot of fun and really cute. But Bea isn’t my favorite character. She would have exhausted me when I was in my early twenties, she’s a caricature of the squirrelly barely adult going scattershot through life with terrible communication skills. Still a cute book and her side of kind of dumb for a bright person is tolerable because these are light cheery books. I was old and crotchety even in my twenties though. Ok, by my teens … so take my opinion of her flightiness with several grains of salt. Still a cute series well worth reading if you want a cute urban fantasy.

I loved this final installment of the Heroine Complex series. Sarah Kuhn really knows how to stick the landing.

The third installment of the new series, sixth overall, is from Bea’s point of view. In this book, we get a whole new style of storytelling for the series. Saying pretty much anything more about it will be a massive spoiler but the new plot point really worked for Bea’s character and our familiar, lovable Tanaka-Jupiter clan. Sarah Kuhn’s characters are so well developed and complex but still reliable. And even after years of getting to know them, there’s always something new to look forward to. This is a vastly underrated series that has just gotten better with each installment!

Thank you to NetGalley and DAW Books for the eARC in exchange for an honest review.

There's a lot to love about this book, but there are also a lot of places where the story feels disjointed, where incongruities are handwaved away, or where key details are infodumped. Overall, it feels like the seams are showing. Kuhn is so talented, and this universe is so much fun, but I have to wonder if there was some hiccup in the editorial process. It feels like there were structural problems that were partially addressed, but in a way that means the reader can see the stitches. I was distracted enough by that that it was hard to get swept up in the story.

That said, I love the mini-kaiju, they are adorable and precious, and I want my own horde.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.
After five books of excellence (more or less), Heroine Complex hits a snag with Holiday Heroine. I was so excited for this one for a number of reasons, not the least of which that I finally got approved for a review copy! But I found myself sadly let down.
But let’s start with the good. As Bea moved to Maui at the end of her previous book, you get some Hawaiian flavor this time around. While I have mixed feelings overall of the vast majority of genre fiction narratives about Hawaii being tourist/newcomer based, Sarah Kuhn seems to have knowledge of the local culture to the point where she can present enough information from those characters’ perspectives to share with Bea as she becomes ingratiated in her new surroundings. Reading about the characters eating malasadas and going to an ABC Store was absolutely delightful.
And I do continue to love the relationships between characters. While I do have issues with how it manifests at points here when the supernatural elements come into play, the pure family stuff is delightful, like Evie finally having her baby.
But the monster stuff was so freaking weird and confusing. The way it results in a kind of time warp/AU threw me, and it really dragged getting to the point. It tries to tie in her serious issues with her love for the holidays and romcoms, but it just didn’t work in execution.
I’m sad this is the book that closes out the second trilogy (and possibly the series overall), especially after hyping it up so much in my mind and it not really delivering. But despite the lackluster supernatural elements, it does deliver on the character work and relationships, which have always been a highlight of the series anyway.

Holiday Heroine is one of my favorite reads from the Heroine Complex series. I have been excited for Bea's story from the very first time I met Bea. So her own perspective was always going to get me in the gut. But what I didn't expect was how much Bea's story would resonate with me. Bea struggles to see and accept herself. If you ever thought you were your worst enemy, Bea is for you. She's so convinced that her powers should be feared and that she is this chaotic nightmare which needs to 'grow up'.

I felt like this desire to be different, to think the worst of us, and to have trouble accepting ourselves is so universal. Her struggle to see herself and her abilities resonated deeply with me. For anyone who has felt like they weren't okay the way they are will no doubt see themselves in Bea's journey. At the same time, Holiday Heroine examines the ethics of powers and mind manipulation. As this is a popular power, I loved seeing Kuhn examine the ramifications and self-doubt with this power.

"The sixth book in the smart, snarky, and action-packed Heroine series continues the adventures of Asian-American superheroine Bea Tanaka as she takes on demons in Hawaii.

Nobody loves Christmas like Bea Tanaka - so when her family visits her for a special holiday celebration, she's beside herself with joy.

After years of chaos, questionable decisions, and flirtations with the supervillain path, Bea is finally thriving. She's got a sweet, new gig hunting demons in Maui, she's working hard to hone her powers, and her big sister Evie is proud of her at last. In fact, everyone is so proud of her that she can't tell them the truth: she's feeling lost and adrift. She and her boyfriend Sam Fujikawa are struggling to make their long-distance love work, and her powers are displaying some intriguing new elements - elements that could lead her down an evil, mind-controlling path once more.

When her family's holiday visit is disrupted by otherworldly monsters rising out of the Maui ocean, Bea throws herself into the battle - until she's suddenly and mysteriously transported to the perfect Christmas back in San Francisco, surrounded by her family and an excess of merrymaking.

As she finds herself trapped in the bizarre holiday rom-com of her nightmares, Bea must unravel a treacherous demon plot, save the world from unspeakable evil, and resist the siren song of a supervillain destiny. And hey, maybe she’ll find time for a little holiday cheer after all...."

Hawaii AND holiday rom-com? Sign me up.

I’ve really enjoyed the Heroine Complex series over the past few years, and I’m a bit sad to let these characters go. However, we have to say goodbye eventually and it was nice to see where they all end up. Holiday Heroine was a decent finale that wrapped up Bea’s story nicely.

After moving to Hawai’i to gain her independence, Bea is thriving — or so she wants you to think. In truth, she’s lonely and homesick, especially with all the issues she’s been having with her long-distance boyfriend Sam. When the entire crew comes to visit, a beach trip goes awry after a giant monster attacks them. Then Bea suddenly finds herself transported to months in the future in San Francisco. She must uncover who’s behind the attack, as well as learning more about her new time-travelling power.

Although we’ve seen snippets of Bea in the last two books, it was interesting to return to her point-of-view and see how she’s actually very lonely. She’s also been stifling herself in the name of “maturing herself,” toning down her loud energy to conform more. Her bright personality still shines through though, and I was glad to see how she eventually realizes that she’s at her best when she’s herself.

I was glad to see more of Bea and Sam! Their romance was one of my favorite parts of her first book, and I enjoyed every scene they had together. Even though their relationship had some low points in this book, I liked that they got to relearn each other and why they love each other.

Honestly though, I was fairly bored while reading the majority of this book. I loved the first half of the series, but now that I’ve read all six (and the novella), I’ve come to the conclusion that the second half basically rehashed everything we saw in the first few books. They follow the same characters so of course they’d experience similar things, I know, but at some point the latter half of the series felt stagnant and repetitive.

I thought this book would be better since Bea’s was my favorite out of the original trilogy, but sadly I grew bored very quickly. So much of this book was literally just reminding you of events that happened in previous books. As much as I usually appreciate reminders of previous events, I didn’t need to basically read them and what the characters were feeling during them all over again.

This is partially due to my mood though so I don’t want to discourage others from reading this series. I still recommend it! I just think the first half of the series is a lot better, but if you’re in the market for Asian-American superheroes and a tightly knit found family, you may enjoy the Heroine Complex series.

Alright so I don't want to spoil the series so I'm just going to gush about the series in general.
I have said this a million times; this series is so underrated! I didn't find this series until the 3rd book came out but now I eagerly await the next book every year. I am constantly trying to get people to read this series.
I have always loved super hero stories but I get so tired of the same straight white men as heros so this series is such a breath of fresh air. Not only does this series follow women on color who kick ass. We also have a main character and several queer side characters.
This series is also so much fun! Yes each book deals with serious subjects as well but there is always so much fun as well. There is also some great fight scenes like any good hero series needs.
Seriously just do yourself a favor and read this series! You will not regret it! If you enjoy super heros or strong women or you just want an alternative to the same old Marvel or DC formula this is for you.

**Note: there may be minor spoilers for books 1-5**

The Heroine Complex series is always such a joy to read. Beatrice (Bea) Tanaka is one of my favorite characters of the series. And after the events of Heroine’s Journey—where she uprooted her life with a big move to Maui—I was hoping for another book from her perspective, to further explore her character directly. That’s essentially what this book delves into, and it does it so well. And with a good dose of holiday rom-con themed hijinks (and nightmare scenarios), time travel and its perils, and an abundance of otherworldly chaos, the sixth and latest installment—Holiday Heroine—to date is one of my top-favorites.

I liked Kuhn’s approach to both the old and new characters. The cast has always been colorful—big personalities, plenty of drama and mishaps—but the series has centered on their deeply personal issues and the strength of their relationships (both platonic and romantic). For me, it’s one of the highlights.

I also enjoyed the holiday themes. Rom-coms are always fun, and I liked how many of the hallmark aspects were incorporated throughout the story.

As Evie’s younger sister, I was used to Bea being in proximity to the core characters and main events of the series. The hub of supernatural activity has, for much of the series, remained in San Francisco, but the past two books have expended on that. And with her being so far away, there was somewhat of a noticeable absence. With the change in location, she clearly viewed it as a chance at independence and proving how mature and in control she was of her life and over her superpowers. Even the best laid plans, however, can have their hiccups, and once the latest threat was established, it proved that there was a lot left Bea had to learn and accept about herself.

I liked the way Sarah Kuhn handled Bea’s doubts. Outwardly, she was a confident and smart character, but inside she had a lot of turmoil and conflict associated with her powers to unpack. It affected her relationships, and made her vulnerable in unexpected ways. The frank realness of that particular end of the story was refreshing.

Holiday Heroine was the perfect mix of action, super heroes, and romance. If you’re a fan of this series, you’re going to love this one.

Disclaimer: this copy of the book was provided by the publisher (DAW Books) via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review, thank you!

For a sixth book in the series, the writing is still going strong. I was enjoying what the story was heading. The characters felt like the characters from previous entries and I enjoyed the way they were written. I loved the idea of being trapped in a holiday rom-com and it was a fun concept. Overall it was a fun and well done story and it worked as a sixth entry in the Heroine Complex series.

"And then I felt something hard smack me in the shoulder and the ocean absorbed my body, the waves towing me under. I choked as my lungs clogged, my arms pushing fruitlessly against the weight of water. My mind fought hard, mentally punching whatever it could even though it didn’t know what it was fighting against. And then I didn’t feel anything at all."