We all know I love a readathon and one of my favorites to participate in every year is Winterween hosted by GabbyReads! This year, Winterween was from January 9th – 15th and as always, I had a great time participating! Last month I posted my Winterween TBR, so of course, we’re doing a Winterween wrap up to see if I ended up reading all of the books I said I was going to read!
Grab yourself a cozy beverage of your choice, get comfy and let’s chat about the books that I read for Winterween!
As always, Winterween was going on during a very busy week. On the 7th we were back to rehearsals for Beauty and the Beast Jr., the musical that I’m directing/choreographing/stage managing, and of course, in the 2 days of rehearsal we had that week, I was blocking/choreographing the song Belle, which has almost the entire cast in it, so it was a busy week! Luckily though, rehearsal was Wednesday and Thursday and Winterween started on Friday, which meant that after work on Friday evening, I had the entire evening plus the weekend to really focus on my Winterween reads, and that’s exactly what I did.
The first book that I read for Winterween was The Ghostwriter by Julie Clark. I had wanted to read this book when it first came out in 2025 and got it from Book of the Month, but I just didn’t get around to it, so when I saw the prompt to read a 2025 release you didn’t get around to, I knew that this was the one to pick and I’m so glad that I did!
When I started The Ghostwriter, I was honestly just expecting a multiple timeline murder mystery with a complicated father-daughter relationship, but I got so much more than that. I could not put this book down; I loved Julie Clark’s writing style. From the beginning I found her writing to be so engaging. It was easy to get lost in her words and her storytelling. I was so happy to see that this book was dual timeline; I love dual timeline mysteries, and figured that we’d get the POV of Olivia’s father, Vincent, in the past timeline, but I was most interested in the POV of Vincent’s youngest sibling, Poppy. Oh, I absolutely adored Poppy. She was actually my favorite character in the story. Full of hope for the future, unafraid to speak her mind and stand up for herself and fighting for women’s rights in the 70s, Poppy was such a vibrant character and she leapt off the page.
I was so invested and didn’t want to stop reading. I typically stay up pretty late reading — I’ve always had a lot of energy at night and once I get sucked into a book I usually don’t stop until either I’ve finished it or I literally cannot keep my eyes open any longer. I finished reading this one at 3:30 am and have no regrets, I absolutely loved it. What surprised me the most was how emotionally moved I was by this book. I was crying so much towards the later half of the book; the situation that these kids found themselves in was absolutely heartbreaking. So many horrendous things were happening around them and to them and then even by them at some points and I couldn’t help but feel so upset about the betrayals by the people that were supposed to keep them safe and the lengths that these kids had to go through to survive. The reveals were so well done and believable and I loved the complexity of these characters and this story. I absolutely loved this book and it was such an easy 4.5 star read for me. It was a fantastic way to kick off Winterween!
While The Ghostwriter was an absolute success for me, we really came crashing down with I’ll Be Waiting by Kelley Armstrong. I’ll Be Waiting had great potential; the premise was really interesting and could lead to an exciting story, however, I think this fell really flat and didn’t fully deliver on what was expected based on the summary. Towards the end of the summary it says “That’s when she finds the first body” would you like to know what page that happens on? Page 269 of a 324 page book. For me, that’s just too late in the book; I kept going “isn’t she supposed to find a body at some point?” It really annoyed me that it took so long for that to happen. From then on the book kind of went from 0 to 1,000 and at that point I just didn’t care and wanted the book to be over.
There were aspects of the book that I enjoyed. I thought the past timeline was pretty interesting and while I understand how it informed the present timeline, I would’ve preferred the story just be in that timeline. I also thought the atmosphere was pretty good; I liked the majority of the séance scenes. I think this book had a lot of potential and actually think it would’ve worked a lot better if it was a novella and we just dove straight into the intense moments after a little intro to the characters. I was really intrigued by this book at the start, but unfortunately, as the story went on it lost my interest and I just wanted to get it over with. I also didn’t care about the characters at all. I felt such a disconnect that I didn’t care about what they were going through or what they were dealing with; I could empathize but I really had no feelings towards the characters at all and when that happens while I’m reading I know that the book isn’t going to be a success for me. This one will get sold back to a second hand bookstore, and hopefully it finds someone who will love it more than I did!
My third book for Winterween was Monstrilio by Gerardo Sámano Córdova. I’ve been hearing about this book for so long; it was on basically everyone’s favorites lists in 2023 and 2024, but it took me a while to actually pick it up. I bought a copy in 2025 after going back and forth for a bit on if I should buy it or not because I wasn’t really sure if it was my thing, but I am really glad that I ended up reading it.
I thought Monstrilio was a really well written exploration of grief and the lengths that we go to for those that we love. I actually didn’t expect for there to be 4 sections in different POVs, but I’m really glad that there were. I really enjoyed each of the different POVs and that each POV was spanning a different period of time to see how these characters grew, changed and stayed the same throughout the years. I think having each section be in a different POV gave the reader a great well developed view of each of the characters and the story as a whole. I especially enjoyed the POV from Monstrilio and thought that was the perfect POV to end the story on. I don’t think I’ve fully wrapped my head around the story itself, but I did really enjoy my time with this story and am glad that I finally got around to it.
If you’re looking for an atmospheric, fever dreamy book with gothic vibes, then look no further than Hazelthorn by C.G. Drews. This is my second C.G. Drews book and I am obsessed with the way that they write atmosphere! Hazelthorn had so many beautifully descriptive moments and was written with just enough purple prose to make you feel like you’re transported to another world but without feeling superfluous or out of place.
I liked the mystery aspect of this story a lot, especially since it had a locked-room adjacent mystery vibe to it. While I didn’t feel as connected to these characters as I did the characters in Drews’ debut, Don’t Let the Forest In, I was compelled to keep turning the page to see what would happen and with each reveal and twist I did get more invested in the story. My heart really did break for Evander as the story continued; this poor boy who didn’t know anything about his family, couldn’t remember his past, was abused and mistreated and taught to believe that he should be grateful that this rich old man took him in — all he wanted was answers and I wanted him to find them. I also really enjoyed the theme of madness and questioning what was real and what wasn’t real that was threaded throughout the story. I love when a horror book makes you, as the reader, say “wait, did that actually happen? I can’t tell” I think it makes for a much more interesting reading experience.
I would actually love to see this book adapted because I think it would translate so well to the screen. I definitely recommend it if you’re a fan of queer gothic horror!
As the week went on and I was working, I had less time to read and I was worried that I wasn’t going to be able to get to The Spellshop before the end of the readathon, and if that happened I was just going to put it back on the shelf and read it whenever I got to it, but I said “No, I want to complete the readathon and I really want to read this book” so I made the time for it on Thursday and I’m so glad that I did because I absolutely loved this book!
The Spellshop is such a lovely gem of a book and exactly the kind of cozy fantasy that I want to be reading! I loved all of the characters, but I’m sure none of you are shocked to hear that Caz, the sentient spider plant, and Meep, the sentient cactus, absolutely stole my heart. I was obsessed with them and would read a million books about the two of them, they were just the cutest. My favorite thing about this book though, was without a doubt the found family and how everyone on the island really loved and cared for one another. It was so beautiful to see them all welcome Kiela with open arms and include her (and Caz) in the village right away. There was also much more emotional depth to the story then I thought there would be and there were lots of moments that had me getting emotional and even tearing up on occasion.
So much of The Spellshop felt like a warm hug and I loved every second I spent reading this book. I’m looking forward to reading the rest of the books in this series because Sarah Beth Durst created a world that I am happy to return to again and again.
Overall, it was another successful Winterween and I’m so glad that I got to knock 4 books off of my owned tbr throughout this challenge! Though one of the books was a dud, I found some really lovely new reads over the course of the readathon and some authors that I definitely want to read more from!
If you participated in Winterween let me know what you read in the comments! If not, tell me what you’ve been reading so far this month.
Until next time 💜
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