It’s time for my first half of December 2025 book review post! I am sharing what I read in December so far, although I am skipping my 5 star reads to share later in the month. The Amazon links to the books I’ve read are affiliate links and if you use them and make a purchase, I may receive a small commission. If you’ve read any of these books or are interested in them, I’d love to hear about it in the comments!
Title: The Best Worst Thing
Author: Lauren Okie
Genre: Romance
Publisher: Avon, 10/14/25
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 3 Stars
This is about Nicole, who is dealing with infertility and going through IVF with a surrogate when she finds out her husband is cheating on her and she reunites with the one who got away. I was very right there with this book with the Scandal reference at the very beginning, but in the end it was a bit too angsty for me.
“All things considered, Nicole Speyer has a pretty amazing life. At least that’s what she tells herself. She’s got a beautiful house, a relatively successful fertility podcast, and a perfect husband, Gabe. The only thing that’s less than ideal is her years-long struggle with infertility—and how, with every passing day, she and Gabe seem to drift a little further apart. But then, mere hours after a Hail Mary embryo transfer to her gestational carrier, Nicole discovers Gabe’s been sleeping with their dog walker, and her world turns upside down. Suddenly, a jobless, childless, and now-husbandless Nicole finds herself at the doorstep of somebody she tried to say goodbye to a long time ago. Logan Milgram: a former colleague with serious golden retriever energy who happens to be laugh-out-loud funny, a colossal nerd, and legitimately kind of hot. When Logan opens his door that night, it’s like no time has passed. And as they fall back into each other’s lives, Nicole starts recognizing herself in the mirror again. She even begins to like what she sees. And then, like a cruel joke, she gets the news she’s spent a lifetime waiting for: her surrogate is finally pregnant. As her relationship with Logan develops from a blast-from-the-past fling into something much deeper, Nicole struggles to balance her past, present, and future. Racing against the clock, she must learn to forgive her body for falling short and recognize that sometimes, it’s the biggest betrayals in life that set us free. With everything on the line, can Nicole accept love from the greatest man she’s ever known . . . even if it’s nothing like the story she’d written for herself?”
Nicole is obviously going through a lot but I hated the way she treated Logan. He was much too forgiving of all the times she tried to leave him! I enjoyed the flashbacks that showed how Logan was there for Nicole in the past, but I just couldn’t get behind them in the present. I appreciated the Jewish representation in this!
Title: The Fangirl Project
Author: Beth Reekles
Genre: YA Rom Com
Publisher: Delacorte Romance, 11/4/25
Source: Publisher
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
The Fangirl Project by Beth Reekles is a YA rom com about Cerys, who decides to become a fan of a fantasy show in order to further bond with her best friend and crush Jake. Jake has a new best friend at his new school who is always with them and this makes it harder for Cerys to get Jake’s attention. Meanwhile, she becomes friends with some girls at her school and she works to make herself fit in with them – trying not to let them find out about her new fandom.
“When Cerys’ secret crush Jake moves to a new college, she realizes she’s running out of time to take their relationship from platonic to romantic. She’ll do anything to get out of Jake’s friend zone, even if that means finally diving into the huge fantasy fandom he loves so much. Though she absolutely can’t see the appeal in Of Wrath and Rune, if Jake loves it, then Cerys will too. When Jake introduces Cerys to his shiny new friend Max, who goes to all the fandom conventions—in cosplay (cringe)—Cerys realizes she’ll need to do a lot more to grab Jake’s attention than just read a few fanfics. But Max, with his dimples and dry humor, always seems to be hanging around, getting in the way. Cerys is determined to become the ultimate fangirl to finally get on Jake’s radar. What she doesn’t expect is that she might actually like Of Wrath and Rune . . . and might like DMing with a suspiciously familiar guy in the fandom even more.”
I really enjoyed the way Cerys worked to find out who she really was. While at first she was just trying to make others like her, she realized what she was doing and was able to grow. While I was able to guess some of the misunderstandings between Cerys and Jake and Cerys and Max, I still really liked this story.
Title: Together On Our Own
Author: Eliana Megerman
Genre: Contemporary
Publisher: EM Lit Press, 11/20/25
Source: Author
Why I Read It: Sent to me for my review
My Rating: 4 Stars
My friend wrote a book! As an ER doctor, this author is uniquely positioned to write about Alex, an ER resident. The hospital administration has introduced a new AI system to help the doctors with their diagnoses. Alex begins telling the AI app everything, including her doubts about a recent patient death. This gets the attention of those in charge and Alex begins to suspect a cover up. With the help of another resident named Henry, she begins to investigate.
“Alex Galen is a thirty-one-year-old emergency medicine resident barely keeping it together. After a patient’s unexpected death puts her on probation, her confidence — and her sense of purpose — begin to unravel. Outside the hospital, she’s alone, anxious, and drowning in a sea of Law & Order reruns and social media feeds that make everyone else’s life look more together than hers. When the hospital rolls out a new AI system designed to streamline care, Alex finds unexpected comfort in its nonjudgmental, always-on presence. She starts sharing things she can’t say to anyone else. She even gives the system a name, Henry, after a quiet, observant fellow resident who, in real life, is the one person she’s been trying not to notice. But AI Henry isn’t real. And everything she tells him is being recorded. As Alex and the real Henry begin to question another patient’s suspicious death, Alex is forced to confront what it means to truly connect — and whether she’s been trusting the wrong version of intimacy all along.”
I was happy to read this book by my friend. It made me wonder if the depiction of the ER was true to her own life. It also made me think about AI as a tool and the way it can lead to isolation from other humans. I could see this story happening on one of the medical shows I love to watch!
Title: Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes
Author: Alexa Martin
Genre: Contemporary
Publisher: Penguin Audio, 9/7/21
Source: Publisher – Print, Library – Audio
Why I Read It: Backlist
My Rating: 4 Stars
I listened to Mom Jeans and Other Mistakes by Alexa Martin as a backlist off my shelf this month. It is about best friends Lauren and Jude who move in together along with Lauren’s five year old daughter Adelaide. Lauren’s ex starts a custody battle and to prove her competence as a mom, Lauren and Jude start a podcast.
“Jude Andrews is famous. Well, at least on Instagram. Her brand is clean eating, good vibes, Pilates, and casually looking like a sun-kissed goddess. In real life, however, she’s a total disaster. She has a strained relationship with her fame-hungry mom and her latest bad decision emptied out her entire savings account. Lauren Turner had a plan: graduate medical school and become the top surgeon in the country. But when she became unexpectedly pregnant, those plans changed. And when her fiancé left her, they changed again. Now navigating the new world of coparenting, mom groups, and dating, she decides to launch a mommy podcast with all the advice she wishes someone had given her. Jude and Lauren don’t have much in common, but maybe that’s why they’ve been best friends since the third grade. Through ups and downs, they’ve been by each other’s sides. But now? They’re broke, single, and do the only thing that makes sense—move in together, just like they talked about when they were teenagers. Except when they were younger, the plan didn’t include a five-year-old daughter and more baggage than their new townhouse can hold.”
I don’t really understand why a podcast would be helpful in a custody dispute, but I enjoyed Lauren and Jude’s friendship. Jude doesn’t have children but she does have a complicated relationship with her mom, curses a ton, and drinks a lot. Her growth was a big story line, but I felt it was a little rushed at the end. Most of the problems encountered throughout the book were easily solved. I did enjoy listening to this one.
Title: The Comeback
Author: Ella Berman
Genre: Contemporary
Publisher: Penguin Audio, 8/3/20
Source: Publisher – Print, Library – Audio
Why I Read It: Backlist
My Rating: 4 Stars
I picked The Comeback off of my backlist because the audio was available from the library. This was a gritty book set in Hollywood that follows Grace, who was a teenage star and is now a struggling young woman in her early 20s due to the abuse she suffered from her director. Now, she wants to expose him, but isn’t sure how to do so without ruining her relationship with his wife.
“Grace Turner was one movie away from Hollywood’s A-List. So no one understood why, at the height of her career and on the eve of her first Golden Globe nomination, she disappeared. Now, one year later, Grace is back in Los Angeles and ready to reclaim her life on her own terms. When Grace is asked to present a lifetime achievement award to director Able Yorke—the man who controlled her every move for eight years—she knows there’s only one way she’ll be free of the secret that’s already taken so much from her.”
This wasn’t exactly what I was expecting from this book and it was difficult to listen to. Grace is struggling with addiction and has many unhealthy relationships. I was cheering for her though, and I’m glad I read this one.
Title: The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah
Author: Jean Meltzer
Genre: Rom Com
Publisher: Mira, 10/21/25
Source: Gift
Why I Read It: TBR
My Rating: 4 Stars
The Eight Heartbreaks of Hanukkah is “a Hanukkah twist on A Christmas Carol.” It is my belief that we don’t need Hanukkah twists on Christmas things because we have our own stories and traditions and don’t need to bring Christmas into them. Plus, I don’t know the story of A Christmas Carol! I mean, I know there are ghosts. And…Muppets? To be more specific, this book is about Evelyn, who is producing a live TV production of A Christmas Carol during the 8 days of Hanukkah, during which she is visited by memories of her past with her ex husband, who is currently working as the on set doctor for her production.
“Evelyn Schwartz has the perfect Hanukkah planned: eight jam-packed days producing the live-action televised musical of A Christmas Carol. Who needs family when you’ve got long hours, impossible deadlines, and your dream job? That is, until an accident on set lands her in the medical bay with one of her chronic migraines, and she’s shocked to find her ex-husband, David Adler, filling in for the usual studio doctor. It’s been two years since David walked away from Evelyn and their life in Manhattan, and his ex-wife is still the same workaholic who puts her career before everything else—especially her health. But when Evelyn begins hallucinating ‘ghosts’ tied to her past heartbreaks, and every single one leads to David, he finds himself spending much more time with her than he anticipated. And denying the still-smoldering chemistry between them becomes impossible. As Evelyn revisits her ghosts of Hanukkah past, she and David both begin to wonder if they can have a Hanukkah future. But with a high-stakes production ramping up the pressure on Evelyn, and troublesome spirits forcing them both to confront their most difficult shared memories, it might just take a Hanukkah miracle for these two exes to light the flame on their second-chance at love.”
The memories that Evelyn is shown are difficult ones. She really did have a lot of heartbreak in her life, and she seemed to compensate for that by becoming a workaholic, which led to her divorce with David. Evelyn also suffers from chronic migraines. Seeing her memories shows the reader why her relationship with David didn’t work out, and their current work together shows how they might not truly be over. I loved the cameos of the author’s previous characters and I enjoyed the humor surrounding the star of the production!
This post includes 6 of the books I read this month. Four were print books and two were audio. Five of these were adult books and one was YA. Genres included romance, rom com, and contemporary.
Have you read any of these books or do you want to? What have you been reading lately?
