A Christmas Party To Remember

This is my first Mikayla Davids book, but it will absolutely not be my last. At the very least, a sequel is coming out soon for this one and I can’t wait to read it. In fact, I’m already on the tour for it – so yay! So you can catch my thoughts on that in just a few weeks on Sept. 20. But I have a feeling I have a date with some more books by Ms. Davids soon too if I can ever clear out some backlog.

About the Book

A family reunion. A shocking secret. A night to die for.

On a snowy Christmas Eve, the Bailey family are gathered at an isolated hotel in the English countryside. They’re reuniting for the first time since the accident that shattered their lives ten years ago.

It’s a time for love and forgiveness. But someone has an ulterior motive…

The perfect daughter

The success story

The single mother

The alcoholic

The husband

The jealous sister

The murderer

As the clock strikes midnight, one member of the party is found dead at the foot of the grand marble staircase.

Everyone is a suspect. But which one of them is a killer?

This completely addictive psychological thriller is packed with chilling twists that will keep you up all night. Perfect for fans of The Hunting Party and The Chalet.

My Thoughts

Our family has a rule – born of various readings about safety – that we don’t believe in secrets. Our daughter will quote this to other people when they talk about secrets. And this book made me so glad we’re not a secret family. Davids drove home the point that secrets breed nothing but destruction and mayhem.

The characters were well developed. I reviewed another psychological thriller recently where I said I ended up not liking any of the characters in the end. This wasn’t quite the same, but close. All of the characters were deeply flawed, selfish in multiple ways, and kept making horrible decisions. Though many of them were trying to make good decisions for their families, they were just misguided. It’s often easy to think we know what the right decisions are when looking at a situation from the outside. But everyone was a liar – except maybe the kids who were adorable. I liked them at least. I liked some of the adults, too, but barely.

The author is amazing at writing complicated, two-faced characters, who seem one way and then turn out to be completely different. That is a depth of reality that is so hard to accomplish but is also so true to real life. People’s public face and their private faces are frequently so different, and Davids captured this phenomenally, even letting us into their heads without letting the secret out early.

The story was compelling, complex, and fast-paced. It was absolutely one of those books you can’t put down. I enjoyed getting to hear the book from different perspectives. I prefer when authors don’t backtrack over scenes with the different POVs, however, Davids did this in a way that offered a fresh, clean perspective over the scene, rather than a rote retelling as you sometimes get.

If you’re looking for a thriller to keep you gripped from start to finish, this will absolutely do that. And if you’re a holiday reader, it’s nice to have the Christmas themes in the background. Though if you’re not big on the holidays, the Christmas scenes aren’t really that intrusive. I frequently forgot that it was supposed to be a Christmas event until someone mentioned it since I got all caught up in the action.

I am so grateful to the author and Love Books Tours for including me on this tour. I can’t wait to dive into the sequel, as well as other books by the author.

Who’s It For

Anyone who loves a twisty, domestic, psychological thriller will love this book. I figured out some of the twists early, but not in the “this is predictable” way. Instead, it was in the “this writer is great at foreshadowing” way. And there were still so many twists and surprises to be discovered along the way.

Content Warnings: There are several subjects in this book that sensitive readers may find disturbing including, but not limited to, domestic abuse, murder, infidelity, pregnancy, physical assault, sexual harassment, stalking, car crashes, alcohol abuse, adult situations, adult language, and more.

About the Author

(Written by the Author)

I’ll let you into a little secret… Mikayla Davids isn’t my real name, it’s just the pen name I write under. I could be the person sitting opposite you on the train, furiously tapping away at a laptop, or the woman scribbling in a notebook on the table beside you in Starbucks. Everyone has their secrets. And this is mine.

But I will tell you I’ve lived and breathed fictional worlds all my life. I’ve been the child who spent hours in the library, the teenager who stayed up turning pages way into the night. Now I’m the secret writer.

I write psychological thrillers about family dramas, complicated relationships, and ordinary moments that can suddenly turn into nightmares.

I hope you’ve been gripped and entertained by my novels. I’d love to hear from you. (You can visit her website for links to her social media and newsletter.)

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