Merriment and Mayhem (Under the Mistletoe Collection, # 4)
By: Alexandria Bellefleur
Publication: November 12, 2024 by Amazon Original Stories
58 pages
Genre: Adult, Contemporary, Holiday
Source: Amazon Prime
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Goodreads description--This Christmas, a hot fireman makes a holiday rescue and sparks fly in this funny, sexy holiday short story by bestselling author Alexandria Bellefleur.When Everleigh Dangerfield’s baking disaster necessitates a call to 911, firefighter Griffin Brantley douses the flames in the kitchen, but the ones he stokes in Everleigh are an entirely different story. Unfortunately, Everleigh’s only visiting and doesn’t do casual hookups, no matter how smoldering the temptation. But Everleigh’s holiday mishaps have just begun. And Griffin is seemingly always on call. If Everleigh is game for a change of plans, he can give her the merriest Christmas of her life.
Alexandria Bellefleur’s Merriment and Mayhem is part of Under the Mistletoe, a stirring collection of December romances that thrill and tingle all the way. They can be read or listened to in one swoony sitting.
I didn't request this book from NetGalley when I saw it available for review because I don't usually do short stories. But when I saw it free on Amazon for Prime I figured I would snag it for a short Christmas story. I didn't even read the description. This was doubly exciting when I realized that I also had access to the audiobook which would sync with my reading. So I could read when I had time and then switch to the audiobook while driving or cooking.
The beginning of Merriment and Mayhem was good. I liked the repeated 911 calls that forced Everleigh and Griffin together. I liked that there was an instant attraction that prompted Griffin to pursue Everleigh. But I felt like the pacing was completely off. I don't know this author at all. And I know this was always intended to be a short story, but so many pieces were mentioned that went nowhere. It felt like this was written for a longer story and things were cut or not addressed to force it to fit the short story needs.
Because it was a short story, Everleigh flipped quickly from rejecting Griffin to being "so, so tired of pretending this is not what I want." Thankfully there were no declarations of deeper feelings at this point.
However, it felt like half the story was the sex scene. Granted it was only about the last 30%. Regardless, I wasn't a fan of these two jumping into the sheets. It felt jarring to me. Too much, too soon. Of course, as a Christian, my preference would be for them to wait until they get married, but that's not today's culture. I spent this entire section of the book skipping ahead and rolling my eyes.
I also felt like the language was excessive for this story. And all of these things put together turned me off the idea of searching for more books by this author.
Merriment and Mayhem's pacing felt completely wrong to me. The plot and details didn't fit the story length. The characters went from one thing and then completely flipped to a different thing. And things progressed in their relationship (physically and relationally) entirely too fast. Thankfully no "I love yous" were thrown out, but one character is considering a move to be with the other after three/four encounters. Merriment and Mayhem gets 2 Stars. Have you read Merriment and Mayhem ? What did you think? Let me know!
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