Book Reviews

Book Blurb

What happens when a Xmas wish causes more pain than joy?

A laid-back fairy with a mission for payback, but Garland likes disgraced-diver July Spicer far more than he should. He’s meant to make July miserable for failing to stop a kid being bullied, but a Christmas fairy is about happiness, not revenge.

When his exiled fairy brother also shows an interest in the money-hungry Olympic hopeful, Garland’s moral compass spins out of control. Stuck between attraction, obeying his creator, and his conscience, will Garland follow his heart or suffer the consequences of disobedience?

Book Review

‘Christmas in July’ is the third book in the “Festive Djinn’ series and this one has a vengeful Christmas wish at its center. I am slowly beginning to realize that Nick/Santa Claus is not the “good guy” in this world – slowly only because I have been very reluctant to believe that this is how the author designed the DeMMonica World. As fascinating as the idea is, I have found it hard to let go of all my previous ideas about who is good and who is bad. And while it is an interesting intellectual exercise, I have to admit that I have not found the consequences altogether pleasant.

 

While I was not sure throughout most of the book whether I wanted to continue the series, the concept of turning around the usually benevolent Santa Claus/Nick versus his demonic brother Krampus/Arioch into its opposite was just too fascinating for me to give up. Then there were the main characters who acted out the bigger guys’ desires and they definitely kept me hooked.

 

Garland is one of the four oldest djinns Nick created and while he normally gains energy from making people happy, he has now been tasked to take help Rick revenge against July, who was one of the boys who taunted him in high school. Garland does this by taking over Rich’s body which led to so much confusion for me, because I was never sure whether it was Garland doing the hurting or Rick. I felt that most of the relationship building between Garland and July was done under false pretenses. Only in the last quarter of the book did I feel the story was actually getting somewhere because most of the issues began to be resolved.

 

July is an ambitious diver who gets into trouble not of his making and is banned from the Olympics because of a falsified drug test result. He now has to work for his father’s pool cleaning company but secretly still wants to compete. I found him difficult to like in the beginning because he is extremely prickly and has built some very thick walls around his emotions. But as I began to see what was behind that self-protective behavior, July became much easier to understand and like. The author did a great job revealing his true character bit by bit.

 

There was also a tantalizing peek into more of the background of the DeMMonica world. Ther seems to be a supernatural council that is supposed to supervise the use of different types of magic and any excesses these magical/supernatural creatures create. I hope to find out more about this in the next book.

 

If you like complicated worlds with unexpected dynamics, if revenge wishes are your thing, and if you want to know how Garland gets himself into and then out of some major trouble, then you might like this novel.

 

 

 

DISCLAIMER: Books reviewed on this site were usually provided at no cost by the publisher or author. This book was purchased by the reviewer.

 

Additional Information

Format	ebook
Length	Novel, 464 pages
Heat Level
Publication Date	01-December-2022
Price	$3.99 ebook
Buy Link	https://www.amazon.com/Christmas-July-Festive-Djinn-Book-ebook/dp/B0BK5G5V4X