📖📖 Book Review 📖📖 Apparently inns have a pattern of being full around Christmas time and this one took a hilariously different turn than the original story we know! A hilarious hodge podge cast of characters makes for a read that will have your cheeks hurting from laughter and merriment. A Jingle Bell Mingle is an untraditional holiday take that will brighten your season and keep you turning the pages furiously!

Review is on Goodreads and will be posted on instagram closer to publication date and on Amazon when published!

Julie Murphy and Sierra Simone have combined their steamy, witty, and creative powers to release a book that's on fire with extra hotness that hits the roof! Whoop! Too hot to handle, but I'm always up for a challenge!

We’re returning to a small town in Vermont, with a Christmas setting and two blazing characters: an adult film actress/one-time movie director/make-up artist/new screenwriter whose project is bought by Hope Channel (like many in the industry, she juggles multiple roles) and Isaac Kelly, a former band boy, now depressive, sullen, still hot but heartbroken, living in the town's historic mansion. Their common ground: creative blocks that stop them from progressing in their jobs. Another big common ground: the legendary threesome they experienced and never forgot two years ago.

A great part of the book's opening is witnessing the first book’s legendary characters, Bee and Nolan, through Teddy Ray Fletcher’s POV as he attends their wedding. Sunny and Isaac’s paths cross that weekend as guests, leading to shameless flirting that turns into another steamy one-night stand in Sunny’s dilapidated hotel room, which could double as a North Pole movie set with its terrible heating, insulation, and wiring system.

When Isaac discovers the room’s horrible condition, he invites Sunny to stay at his mansion during her time in Vermont. What harm can be done when two people share a massive place with numerous rooms, each having their own little corners to get lost in? Isaac's theory is they will barely see each other, so why not help a hot friend who already had two unforgettable one-night stands?

This arrangement might help them destroy their creative blockages. Sunny can be inspired by the Christmas spirit of Vermont, and Isaac can finally find his muse to write and compose more memorable songs.

The grumpy and the sunshine start living under the same roof without thinking about jingle-mingling, but how long can they resist their attraction when they already know the pure passion they share?

This is absolutely another entertaining sequel of this humorous, spicy series! If you enjoyed the first two books, don't skip this one, which promises extra fun and steamy scenes with high chemistry between the main couple! You can also devour it as a standalone without diminishing the fun level.

The opposite attracts, the grumpy meets sunshine tropes blended in a steamy romance and Christmas spirit perfectly. The duo set the chapters on fire and made the readers hyperventilate in a good way! Highly recommended as a unique holiday book for those who enjoy spice and a creative sense of humor!

Many thanks to NetGalley and Avon and Harper Voyager for sharing this spicy holiday romance’s digital review copy with me in exchange for my honest thoughts.

A Jingle Bell Mingle
by Julie Murphy, Sierra Simon
Pub Date: Sept. 24, 2024
Thanks to the authors, publisher and NetGalley for the ARC of this book in exchange for my honest opinion.
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Julie Murphy and USA Today bestselling author Sierra Simone who gave us A Merry Little Meet Cute comes a new holiday rom-com—’tis the season for second chances!
I received an eARC of A Jingle Bell Mingle without realizing that it is the third and final installment of the A Christmas Notch series. I highly recommend reading the first two books before reading this book. I was definitely playing catch up with the cast of characters (that’s on me though, I plan on reading the first two books now that I’ve read this one). I have read one of the books, but it was a while back.
Sunny and Isaac are great together. I really liked their relationship, but I wish they would’ve admitted it sooner. That would be my only complaint. Everything else was great. There are some more serious emotions and topics, which just add to the depth of the characters. This book wraps everyone up so nicely. In a beautiful bow. It was a fun, enjoyable Christmassy read.

Just as a note this is part of a series and is book 3, HOWEVER I did not read the first 2 and felt like it's not really necessary. The only part that truly made me wonder what was going on was how the book started like it left off from something, and I realized then that it was part of a series. But the book does a great job at explaining the characters and how they know each other that I never once felt I needed to go back to the first 2 before I read this one.

The book follows 2 perspectives, that of the FMC, Sunny and the MMC, Isaac. Sunny is a part time port star, makeup artist, and now newly screenwriter who has come to Christmas Notch for a wedding and stayed to work on her story. Isaac on the other hand has moved to Christmas Notch to live alone and away from everyone he knows to hide after the death of his wife 5 years ago, while also trying to work on a Christmas album. Both characters have issues they need to work out but find each other quickly becoming roommates with benefits. The storyline and character development was great throughout the whole book, although I secretly wish we would have gotten the realization for both of their feelings towards each other earlier in the book I did thoroughly enjoy it.

Thanks to NetGalley, Avon, and Harper Voyage for the ARC in exchange for my own opinion.

A Jingle Bell Mingle was a really fun conclusion to the Christmas Notch series. If you want a spicy Christmas romance, the authors once again delivered! I was happy to see Isaac happy after all this time.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC!

A fun and enjoyable addition to a Christmas book series I adore!
I loved finally digging into Sunny’s character and the deep emotions that we explored with this pairing. Spice was exquisite as always from this author pair.

I love a good holiday novel to put me in a good mood. I was confused when I starred reading because I did not realize that this was the last book in a series. There are some series that I feel you can get into pretty easily without reading them in order. This was not one of those novels for me. That is my fault though for not realizing it was not a standalone. The book was a little long for me, but I am assuming it is because all the storylines from the series were being wrapped up. I think I would have enjoyed it more if I read the 2 before. If you are a fan of the first two books, I think you will really enjoy the spice and humor, humor, and feel good moments in this story.

Thanks NetGalley and Avon/Harper Voyager for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Such a cute Christmas holiday book. Super fun and easy read that I simply enjoyed. I definitely thought this book was great. Good character development and plot throughout. Highly recommend this next installment of meet cute and Christmas vibes.

I was a little confused when I started reading this book, but only because I had not read the first two in the series. I should have done that first. Overall, I enjoyed this story and now have to go read the other two! Thanks for this ARC!

3.75

I received an eARC of A Jingle Bell Mingle without realizing that it is the third and final installment of the A Christmas Notch series. I highly recommend reading the first two books before reading this book. I was definitely playing catch up with the cast of characters (that’s on me though, I plan on reading the first two books now that I’ve read this one).

After a few hook ups, Sunny and Isaac become roommates with benefits. Sunny is struggling to write a screenplay and Isaac is having a hard time writing new music without a muse. They agree to help each other out, Isaac will help Sunny find more information about a story and Sunny will set up Isaac on dates to find his muse. Isaac only has eyes for Sunny, who doesn’t understand how Isaac could want her as his muse.

I loved that Sunny and Isaac were both complex characters going through their own shit. Sunny lost her parents and has a strained relationship with her sibling. Isaac lost his wife and is struggling to understand how he could possibly love someone else after losing the love of his life. This definitely isn’t a super fluffy Christmas book and I really liked that about it. This book had a lot of depth which some Christmas romcoms can sometimes lack.

There’s a lot happening in this book and for me it was a few too many things happening at once. There’s already a large cast of characters to keep track of, though I think if I read the first two books I would have less of a problem with it.

Overall, this was enjoyable and I loved Sunny and Isaac as individuals and their chemistry.

Thank you so much to Julie Murphy, Sierra Simone, Avon Books, and NetGalley for the eARC. A Jingle Bell Mingle comes out on 9/24/24.

I really thought maybe there was going to be more angst in this or maybe a little more drama. Overall I loved the story of Sunny and Issac and nothing is better to me then a Christmas love story. I’ll keep coming back to this series for more.

I received this eARC not realizing that it is the third book of a series. I started reading and was a little lost, so I definitely recommend reading the first two books in the series first if you have not!
After reading the first two I was able to dive into this one with all the necessary background info and was rewarded by finally getting to read about Isaac and Sunny’s story.
Isaac is an ex-boy band member, grieving his dead wife, five years later. Sunny is a makeup artist, sometimes porn star and now screenwriter.
I really like learning some of the back story on Sunny, and the spice between the two characters was great. Throw in a healthy dash of fun and playful and you’re in for a hilarious, yet cozy read.
My only complaint is the speed of the relationship/admitting of feelings, however it’s absolutely still worth a read!
Thank you to NetGalley and Avon and Harper Voyage for the eARC!

Thank you to Netgalley/Avon and Harper Voyager for this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Rating: 3.5/5

Who doesn’t love a holiday book! This was really cute and was definitely an easy read. I do wish I read the prior books in this serious beforehand though. Otherwise, very cute and fun!

Thank you to Netgalley/Avon and Harper Voyager for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I’ll start by saying that I highly recommend reading the other books in the series before starting this one. I did not and was very confused by all the characters. Sunny was a fun FMC and I liked Isaac but this story fell kinda flat for me. A decent read (maybe even better during the holiday season) but I needed more from the characters to really enjoy it.

Thank you NetGalley for the chance to read this ARC.

I did not read the other books in the series, but after meeting the couples I want to read them even more now.

Overall I enjoyed the story, there were just some parts that were not for me, but that’s okay too. Some parts were sad, some parts were funny, but overall it was just a heartfelt story. I loved them slowly falling without realizing it, and solving the mystery for the movie Sunny was writing.

Satisfying conclusion to the Christmas Notch trilogy! We finally get Isaac’s story with Sunny, to round out our INK trio of 90’s boy band babes. This series is so playful and fun, with lots of laughs.

Both Isaac’s and Sunny’s character development left a little something to be desired and felt pretty rushed at the last minute, but to give the authors some credit, that isn’t unusual in a contemporary romcom. What I would love to see is more of Teddy and Steph’s storyline - I can’t get enough of it.

Thanks to NetGalley, Sierra Simone & Julie Murphy, and Avon & Harper Voyager for an ARC of the ebook!

Thank you to NetGalley for the advance review copy in return for an honest review. I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
It was really fun having the whole gang back together but the overall book was just okay. I really liked the first one and I feel like it’s had just kind of faded as they’ve gone on.

Have yourself a Merry little smutmas 🎶 🎵. I loved this book so much. Talk about Hallmark after dark 🌶. I loved the characters, the plot was intriguing and believable, and the holiday cheer was lovely. These collaborative authors make me believe in the magic of love and Christmas.

I always make sure that if it’s part of a series I read the previous ones. I did so in this one and it didn’t disappoint!

If you have not read the other titles in this series, it is highly recommended that you read them before starting this title. Several of the characters and scenes carry over into this book, so you might be a little lost.

Sunny and Isaac have amazing chemistry together and I fell head over heels in love with them both!!