On the fifth day of Smutmas, Santa brought to me . . . Cat Daddies, Cozy Christmas Whodunnits, and Cupcake Killers - a review of Alina Jacobs' Holly and Homicide

For Jacobs’ third offering in as many weeks, we return to Harrogate, home of kooky senior citizens, small-town shenanigans, and local women lining up to throw themselves at doughy men who peaked in high school. Feels like home. (Though the Svenssons are here in spirit, don’t expect too much from them other than the occasional name-drop. That said, chef’s kiss for bringing back Lilith - last year’s Christmas Cozy heroine - and her voodoo dolls.)

You can keep your raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens. My favorite things include rom-coms (by which I mean smut), cozy murder mysteries (usually of the British variety) and Christmas (because, Christmas). So, when Alina Jacobs wraps up all three in a neat little bow for the third time - she’s already gifted us with Crime and Candycanes and Sleighbells and Slaughter, also set in the Svensson-verse hamlet of Harrogate - I’m here for it. 

This time around, we get Emmie, the proud, if not struggling, owner of a Christmas-themed cat cafe. (If you’re familiar with other Harrogate-set stories, we are, once more, blessed with The Feral Cat Committee in all their glory. Achoo and Amen.) We also get her cheating (so very cheating, as it turns out) and soon-to-be-dead husband, Brooks, and his baby-mama Oakley. More importantly, we get Marius (whose story I didn't know I needed but am very much, especially in my post-Thanksgiving food coma, thankful for), who has begrudgingly returned to his hometown (who knew?). Here, the ghosts of his awkward pre-teen past still haunt him despite him being the slick NYC lawyer who’s the embodiment of the adage “living well is the best revenge”. 

After Brooks drops dead in Emmie’s cafe (no spoilers needed. It’s Chapter 1, friends), and she’s immediately dubbed the cupcake murderer, her life spirals out of control in small-town, madcap, uniquely Harrogate fashion, which Jacobs writes so well. There are, of course, the requisite horny senior citizens (all of whom are someone’s grandmother or great-aunt), holier-than-thou housewives who never left, and are all, apparently, sleeping with Emmie’s former quarterback husband, and assorted townies, many of whom were featured in other Harrogate tales. Despite Marius’s objections to helping the curvy widow, he finds himself falling for her, obviously, and is soon white-knighting her like nobody’s business.

Of course, it wouldn’t be a romantic cozy Christmas mystery if our couple didn’t point the finger at each other at some point in the story, Not only does it provide fodder for the dark moment that prise them apart before unceremoniously slapping them back together like a hastily made PB&J, but it also makes you wonder if Lilith, local Goth Girl and purveyor of spooky sundries, is right in her assertion that “everyone is a murderer when they’re pushed far enough”. Despite the fact that Marius is a tall drink of water who’s kept her out of jail, saved her business and given her the illusive FIVE orgasms that you just don’t hear enough about in your run-of-the-mill cozy Christmas mystery, Emmie’s all too willing to give him up (momentarily at least) because of a little thing like he maybe killed your dirtbag husband who was his childhood bully before you even met him. Accordingly, Marius also thinks she offed him with some bad buttercream. To be fair, the lawyer firmly believes that “It’s always the spouse” before he even looks twice at the winsome widow.

Things I loved: Moose, Marius’s Bengal on a leash who makes his owner a true Cat Daddy; the literal cat army who bite and claw their way into our hearts; the return of Luke and Salem (courtesy of Lilith); the fact that one of the many women Brooks was cheating on Emmie with is listed simply as “Likes Butt Stuff”; and, of course, the fact that Marius is alpha, and solvent, enough to rent out not just one but two cabins on the fly just so he doesn’t have to take Emmie in his car for their first time. And they say romance is dead. SWOON!

So, while it’s a half-star short of a MUST READ, which is pretty much just me grabbing random strangers by the lapels and shouting my reviews at them, (and this mostly due to the length - I just want MORE out of the characters), it made my Grinchy heart grow a few sizes and fulfilled Jacobs’ 2024 hat trick of holiday-centric comedies.

Rating: 4.5 / 5 Killer Christmas Cupcakes