December 2023 Book Club

Due to how busy I’ve been, this is the first time I’ve read my IRL book club’s book and attended the discussion since September. I’m glad I was able to go because not only do I love my book club, I look forward to December’s meeting all year.

We met in-person last Wednesday evening to discuss December’s book, THE CHRISTMAS MURDER GAME by Alexandra Benedict. There were thirteen of us who met together and only one person didn’t read the book. Here are some highlights of our discussion:

• Most of us listened to the audiobook. One person both listened and read the physical book.
• Most of the group really disliked the book, rating it 1 or 2 stars on Goodreads. The rest of us were so-so about it, rating it 3 stars.
• Those of us who rated the book 3 stars thought it held our interest which kept us from being bored.
• Some of us thought the premise sounded promising, and most of us thought the execution was too convoluted and felt forced.
• One person wanted there to be more types of word clues rather than just anagrams. Most of us thought the author tried too hard thinking up the anagrams which made the writing clunky and irritating.
• Several people said the time setting was confusing. Sometimes it felt modern day (e.g. cell phones, internet) and other times it felt victorian (e.g. corsets, View Spoiler »kissing cousins, « Hide Spoiler word usage).
• Most of us knew who the antagonist was right away. However, none of us guessed the ending.
• Most of us didn’t care about the protagonist or any of the other characters, whether they were murdered or they were the murderer.

The discussion was pretty lively considering none of us really loved THE CHRISTMAS MURDER GAME. We often talked over each other trying to get all our thoughts out, which isn’t always the case at our meetings.

The rest of our book club was our annual Christmas party. For the party, we each bring a treat to share if we can. This year we had a wide variety–homemade shortbread cookies, peppermint Oreo ice cream pie, oranges, muddy buddies, tortilla chips with seven-layer bean dip, and potato chips with homemade dip. It was all really yummy.

We also have a book exchange. We each bring a wrapped book, one of our favorite reads from the year, and then we play a white elephant type swapping game. Once each book is unwrapped, we play one more round so everyone has a chance to “steal” the last book unwrapped if they want it.

We had quite a few awesome books up for grabs. I would’ve been happy with any of them. I brought MEET ME AT THE LAKE by Carley Fortune and I ended up with MIDNIGHT AT THE BLACKBIRD CAFE by Heather Webber, which looks interesting. The other books up for grabs were:

• THE ADVENTURES OF AMINA AL-SIRAFI by Shannon Chakraborty
• THE BLUE ZONES by Dan Buettner
• THEY BOTH DIE AT THE END by Adam Silvera
• MY BEST FRIEND’S EXORCISM by Grady Hendrix
• CHICKEN SISTERS by KJ Dell’Antonia
• THE REMARKABLE JOURNEY OF COYOTE SUNRISE by Dan Gemeinhart
• ALL MY RAGE by Sabaa Tahir
• SMALL THINGS LIKE THESE by Claire Keegan
• BEAST OF NOOR by Janet Lee Carey
• DAISY DARKER by Alice Feeney

Next month, we’re reading REMARKABLY BRIGHT CREATURES by Shelby Van Pelt. I’m excited to read this one.

Anyway, have you read THE CHRISTMAS MURDER GAME? If so, what do you think about my book club’s discussion about it?