A Spell for Midwinter's Heart

A must add to your winter holiday TBR!!At first glance, I was thinking this would have a Hallmark with witches kind of vibe but it was SO much more than that!You do have the classic sort of set up with the FMC, Rowan Midwinter, and the MMC, Gavin McCreery, coming home for the holidays from their respective big cities in CA to the small mountain town of Elk Ridge, WA where they grew up.Elk Ridge is a tourist town that relies heavily on their winter holidays festival to stay afloat. The town prides itself on inclusivity of all backgrounds, cultures, and religions and the festival they hold celebrates and honors all of the different winter holidays. In recent years, visitor numbers have been down and the festival, and in turn, the town is struggling to survive. They’re now facing a buy out from a money hungry corporate company that wants to turn the inclusive winter festival into a capitalist Christmas fest.Rowan comes from a family of witches who’ve been in the Elk Ridge coven for many generations. She herself has a complicated history with her own magic and after one particular incident she swears it off all together and stops practicing spell work. Being back home and facing the enormous task of helping the coven and her family try to save the town forces her to come to terms with her issues with magic and face what she was trying to forget.Rowan and Gavin grew up together and were academic rivals in school. The more they run into each other while home, the more you wonder if maybe there’s more to their history than meets the eye. Sparks are constantly flying when they run into each other and they don’t seem to actually be rivaling each other in the way Rowan remembers and expects.I personally LOVED that the town and this story in general is very representative of all different types of people from different cultures and religions. The story centers a lot around the Pagan celebration of Yule and I really enjoyed learning more about those traditions. The plot had so much more depth than I expected and the characters did as well. Not just the main characters but the side characters too, Gavin and Rowan’s family, their friends, the coven, the townspeople, all of the people we met were interesting and important. Each one brought something personal to the effort to save the town and the festival.I also felt very invested in the mystery of why Rowan had turned her back on magic. It’s very clear there’s a piece that’s missing and this huge question mark looming and I was intrigued and invested every step of the way.I was expecting a fun, easy read but was truly surprised, this was absolutely 5 stars for me. It’s a book I would buy for someone and one I’d keep on my own shelf.Thank you NetGalley and Dutton books SO much!

A Spell for Midwinter's Heart has many of the characteristics of a Hallmark Christmas movie. However, there is one twist - magic. When Rowan Midwinter returns home for the holidays, there is a total lack of snow. Snow is important in her hometown since it sets the scene for their quaint village to attract tourists which they depend on financially. Rowan has been called home by her mother - and the rest of the Coven. Yep, there is a group of witches that keep the village operating and their magic is not working well anymore. Rowan has sworn of magic after a few high school attempts went wrong. What is missing? oh yea, romance. Enter Gavin! What a fun romp through the romance tropes Grab this one for your holiday reading!

This is a lovely paranormal type hallmark romance perfect for the winter break/Christmas season.

Something was just off about this for me. Not sure if it was the stiff writing or the way Rowan was just so full of herself never really considering others. Because of that I found Rowan pretty hard to read about and enjoy, just kept wondering why anyone was choosing to spend time around her. The light spicy scenes seemed awkwardly placed. There were too many town and side characters in the story for it to really work well. Everything just kind of seemed thrown in just to add more stuff.

Thank you for the book (& goodies) @duttonbooks and the free audiobook from @prhaudio #DuttonPartner #prhaudioinfluencerI loved this book SO much. I commend this author for tackling real life issues in a way I felt so seen, sexism, climate change, overall helplessness at the state of the world but also balancing it with a cozy holiday romance?! Like this book got so deep but also made me smile and laugh with its charm and living out the message via the FMC Rowan who feels like she’s responsible for saving the whole world when actually there’s so much value and additive collective benefit with small acts of kindness and resistance in your local community as she experiences when she returns to her small town.And let me tell you about the magical realism worldbuilding- the spirit of every spell cast comes back to you threefold. So like when Rowan is reunited with her high school rival (MMC Gavin) she’s reminded of that time she got annoyed with him and made some strands of his hair turn white which in turn made her whole head of hair white oopsieeee, but also there are suspiciously some things from her past she can’t remember, could some mind magic be at play? And how extra complicated that Gavin’s anti-magic-y dad is in constant conflict with Rowan’s family (bio and found) of witches, 2 groups neither Gavin nor Rowan feel like they truly fit in.Highly recommend this via audio, the narration is perfection. There’s like 2ish open door spicy and absolutely swoony romance!