christmas book haul 🎄❄️☃️🎅🦌[soooo many new books and 2026 ARC's]

This is like one of my favorite horror books that I've read this year. It's about a serial killer who is like on the loose in a retirement home and it reads kind of like a slasher, but our protagonist is this woman named Rose in her 70s and I just loved her so much.

It was really fun. It was really cute. I would highly recommend.

And unfortunately, I did try to read this one this month and I decided to DNF it around like 50 pages in. But, I do think this will be one that I'll come back to eventually. It was just a little bit too heavy and kind of like outside of my comfort zone for what I'm in the mood for right now.

Don't Let the Forest In is like my favorite book that I've read in the year of 2025.

And even though I wasn't the biggest fan of Hazelthornne, this is still one that I am so highly anticipating for next year.

I mean, Heartwood, I'm so glad that I ended up buying this book because this was an easy five-star. One of my favorite books that I've read this year.

this is from the author Sheay Earshaw, which is the author of A History of Wild Places, which was one of my favorite books. Like an easy five stars for me.

This is the author of How to Fake It in Hollywood, which I did not really enjoy.

This is the one that's like a Gilmore Girls inspired romance. And I thought this one was really good. I ended up only giving it around three stars though.

And this is a romance book that I did really enjoy. I think I gave it around like three and a half stars.

I feel like ever since loving Julie Chan is dead as much as I did. I'm a lot more open to reading thrillers that involve influencers

Neil Sharpson, who is the same author as Knockk Knockock Open Wide, which was one of my favorite horror books when I read it last year.

This one is actually being described as like perfect for fans of Lights Out, which is another dark romance book that I read this year that I really enjoyed. It was such a guilty pleasure read of mine.

I thought this was so fun, silly, stupid. I mean, I ended up giving it three stars, but I do think it's a solid recommendation for fans of Lights Out.

Unfortunately, I did not end up loving this one very much myself. I only ended up giving this one two stars, but everyone else really seemed to be liking this one a lot in the book club, so I'm glad that this one worked for other people.

This is his newest manga collection of short stories. And I read this one this month and I really enjoyed it.

I actually did read this book this month, and it was a glowing five stars for me. Like, I absolutely loved this.

I actually tried to start reading this book at like the beginning of October and I couldn't really get into it, but I thought maybe I'll just save it for another time.

And something that I loved about this book was the Iceland atmosphere. Oh my god, it was great. It made me want to drop everything and go to Iceland.

This one was really interesting and really atmospheric, but it definitely was not my favorite from Rachel Hawkins.

So, I read both of these this month. Really enjoyed both and I will talk more about these in my wrap-up.

Whereas like the names, unfortunately, this is one that I've actually DNFED very recently. I got over a 100 pages into this one and for some reason I am just not connecting with the writing in this story at all and I'm so bored which is such a bummer because I bought this book because I really thought it was going to be my thing.

So, I read both of these this month. Really enjoyed both and I will talk more about these in my wrap-up.

This is definitely one of my most anticipated horror books of next year because of how much I loved We Used to Live Here by this author.

this one is actually the sequel to You've Reached Sam, and that was a book that I read a number of years ago. And even though I didn't love You've Reached Sam as much as a lot of other people seem to, I still thought this one looks really beautiful and like one that I could enjoy.

this is actually from the same author as You Again, which is a romance book that was like really, really, really popular. And I just didn't really care for it.