Two of my favorite things—holiday reads and Tessa Bailey! 🩵🩵 This one has a super cute premise—Beat and Melody (yes you read that right) set off to reunite Steel Birds, the band their mothers were in in the 90s. Oh yeah, cameras are following them everywhere because it’s a reality show, and oh yeah their mothers haven’t spoken since 1993. 😂
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What I liked:
🎶 Adorable characters
🎶 Spicy with a little *ahem* kink 🌶️🥵
🎶 Open communication, mostly
🎶 Funny
🎶 Super readable
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What I didn’t:
🎶 Not overly Christmassy (this can be a good or bad thing depending on what you like—I like a lot of Christmas in my holiday books. This one was more about the characters and less about the season)
🎶 A little cheesy
🎶 The soulmate thing was a little overdramatized
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I really enjoyed it and would definitely recommend! Thanks to NetGalley and Avon Books for the e-arc!

I 👏🏼 ATE 👏🏼 THIS 👏🏼 UP

tessa bailey remains firmly planted on her throne. this was such a feel good spicy read and i never wanted it to end.

The main characters are quirky, fun, honest about their feelings and rarely hold anything back. The side characters are HILARIOUS. It took a bit longer to get to the sexy times than i was anticipating but LORD was it worth it.

highly recommend going into this one blind and just enjoying the ride 😂

read if you want a spicy christmas rom com!!!

Thank you to NetGalley and Avon for allowing me to be an early reader!

This was my first novel by Tessa Bailey, and it had all the best qualities of a good romance film - steamy, sweet, clever, and comforting. Beat and Melody are the children of rock legends, and they’ve reluctantly signed up to reunite their feuding rockstar mothers for one last gig, all while being filmed for a livestream reality show about the process. But Beat and Mel, and their incandescent chemistry, quickly become the stars of the show and the focus of an adoring public.

It pains me to say that I wasn’t in love with this book. I’m giving it 3.5 stars. Instalove is a hit or miss subgenre for me and this just didn’t do it for me. I didn’t connect with the characters and the story just was a bit of a “eyes crossed while reading” vibe. I found their names interesting and different though.

I’m a huge TB fan but have struggled to connect with her holiday storylines, this one included. Thank you for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

Must Read a Christmas Book in July 🎄

“Wreck the Halls”by Tessa Bailey was perfect.
Beat and Melody are the children of the lead singers of a band that tragic to their fans broke up years ago. Beat in a situation needs some cash so he joins up with Melody for a reality tv show to see if together they can get their moms back together to have a band reunion. Melody is quiet, keeps to her self with all the insecurities while Beat shines in the spotlight. Together the fans love them but will they be able to put the past behind them and achieve a Christmas Miracle. 🎁

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Fun Rom Com read that is a quick easy read for the Holidays. Enjoyed both of these characters and how they brought the best out in each other.

Release day~ 10-3-23
#julesbookshelf #bookstagram #romcombooks #tessabailey #wreckthehalls #christmasbooks #arc #netgalley

if there's one thing you can count on from tessa bailey, its an obsessed mmc and a cheesy love story. beat and melody reconnect 14 years later as they team up to film a TV show to reunite their moms, who were once in a popular band together. forced together, beat and melody confront the obvious attraction they have for one another while simultaneously dealing with the rising popularity of the show.

wreck the halls follows bailey's typical romcom formula with beat being absolutely in love with melody since the time they met 14 years ago, melody being the shy and sweet fmc, and top notch dirty talk. the spice in this book was some of tessa's best work, but the story overall was pretty average. i honestly couldn't get over their names even by the end of the book, especially beat's. a short and sweet story i needed!

Thank you netgalley for this eARC in exchange for my honest review.

I'm a Tessa Bailey stan and will read anything she puts out. Have I LOVED all of her works? No. But I know that they're all going to fun rides even if they're just okay, like this one. Insta love is something I don't usually pick up, and I didn't realize that was the major trope; because of that, this book was off-putting to me. I'm a slow burn kinda girl, or at least a medium burn. Was it cute though and funny? Yeah, but it's not going to be a book I rave about. Love you, Tessa, but this one was a miss for me.

i usually don’t love book where it’s an instant love connection and everything moves super fast, but it worked in wreck the halls. the book was so whimsical and truly an escape into a romance book! beat and melody are tasked with trying to reunite their mothers for a christmas eve concert after their massive break up 30 years ago. it was spicy and funny but i didn’t find myself loving beat as much as some of her other characters

Tessa Bailey does it again in this wonderful rom-com. I loved Beat and Melody's story with their moms. This book is about family, friends, and meant to be love coming together at last. Such a nice holiday rom-com!

I was extremely disappointed with this title from Tessa Bailey. First of all, Beat was not particularly well-written and the way he spoke to and about Melody frustrated me. He was over-protective and Melody proved time and again that she was capable of taking care of herself and he still acted like she was a helpless child. Melody was a great character and I liked what she was about. However, her job as antique book repairer served no actual purpose and seemed unnecessary to the plot. It was just a placeholder job.

The sex scenes felt awkward and Beat's whole identity seemed wrapped up in his sexual proclivities, which were not particularly kinky or weird. The reality tv angle helped a little with the will they won't they for the tv audience, but felt a little flat.

I thought the mom's were a little interesting, but the relationship could have been salvaged much sooner had Beat just spoken up much sooner. The stakes of his blackmail didn't seem like that big of a deal as the book got rolling.

There were also no major ties to Christmas outside of when it took place and a few brief asides. That could have been played up much more for both comic and plot effect.

Melody was the saving grace of this book and even she did not do enough to make it super interesting. Disappointment all around for me.

I liked it! Melody really shined in this book. Her character was so roll-with-the-punches and hilarious with the one liners, I enjoyed her a lot. She was especially likable knowing she was a dorky teenager who grew out of her awkwardness, who doesn't love an underdog! Beat starts off fun loving and carefree but half way through the book he is very sensual and intense. I think I liked him better in the first half before he was pouring his heart out. It’s messed up, I know ok don’t judge me!

*Spoilers below*

Likes - I liked the banter, It was hilarious. The side relationship with the producer and the cameraman added a little more intrigue. The back and forth with Octavia and Trina was pretty good. The SPICE was great. The Snowball Fight! The Doorman who gets easily distracted by candy bars.

Dislikes - It didn't really feel Christmas-y. I feel like Fletcher got off WAY too easy. I wanted to read more about the concert when it finally happened! Beat’s “issue” felt like it was resolved too easily. It comes off as this MAJOR thing for him and by the second/third hookup he’s fixed up.

Side note - was anyone else stressed the whole time they were going to accidentally leave their mics on?! Every time they had an off camera scene I was thinking to myself “I just know that dam mic is still on!”

This was an enjoyable romantic romp! I loved the characters and the plot. It was a cute story with characters that I really liked. This was a book that I couldn't put down once I started reading it. Give yourself a present and read this holiday romance!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
🌶️🌶️🌶️


𝗥𝗲𝗮𝗱 𝗶𝗳 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗲𝗻𝗷𝗼𝘆:
- Christmas in NYC
- Dual POV
- Insta-Love
- Family Feuds

Tessa has done it again but now with a Christmas touch! Think Daisy Jones meets Hallmark Christmas movie vibes.

Filled with banter and laugh out loud moments, Wreck The Halls will make you swoon. Melody and Beat have undeniable chemistry with tons of tension which makes for big payoffs when the spice hits.

This is a Christmas romance and there are plenty of those cheesy moments that you expect (and love) with this genre. Along with the romance, I enjoyed the conflict that arose and wasn't dragged out for the entire book.

While Wreck the Halls is a fun and spice filled Christmas romance, there are some heavier topics discussed.

I'm always down for a Tessa book because she always delivers on fun and spice and Wreck The Halls is no exception.

Well, this started great and ended with me rolling my eyes while making gagging sounds, so we're taking the average of my opinions and giving it two stars. But seriously, the first half of this book was so strong, and I'm genuinely mad about where we ended up.

This book follows Melody and Beat, the offspring of an estranged fictitious famous rock duo that has had a recent surge of popularity. Hoping to capitalize on this, a network proposes a reality TV show about reuniting the band, that, instead of following the typical reality TV format, will be livestreamed. They agree for ~plot reasons.~ And you guys, this first part ate. It had the energy of a mid-2000's Disney Channel Original Movie, but with adult characters and a lot of smut (and I mean that 100% as a compliment). It had the larger than life circumstances and the fame-adjacent characters and the clear-cut mission and the set changes and, and, and—it stopped working for me part way through.

Look, I usually like the part in the book where the characters who are clearly supposed to be together end up together, and that was great, but then the fun zippiness ended and it became almost exclusively insta-love and angst. Tessa Bailey found every single way to work in "I can't live without you" sentiment (the word "soulmate" was bandied about unironically and frequently) and it became the entire story. It became grating. I wanted there to be plot again. Instead, we had people who had known each other for at most two weeks existing simply to hyper fixate on each other.

And now, for some spoilery gripes. Read on at your own risk. To start, I had to laugh that Beat's "kink" was built up as being some huge depraved thing and it ended up being so thoroughly vanilla. Next (and this is spoilers for the ending, you have been warned), the band is reunited and we get literally none of it?? None of the actual concert?? Instead we have Melody running off to find Beat and being overly sappy some more?? I felt so, so cheated. And last (FINAL WARNING FOR SPOILERS), the proposal? After they've known each other FOURTEEN DAYS? Nope, I was done, no more.

So, what started as my favorite Tessa Bailey novel to date turned into.... very much not my favorite. I genuinely loved the first half, but when I closed the book I was mad at both myself and the characters. Anyway, I'd say pick this up if you like a holiday romance, smut, insta-love, and want main characters who are obsessed with each other. Otherwise, maybe pass for now.

🎸 Their parents are former rock n roll band mates, turned enemies
🥰They are strangers who feel like they’ve known each other forever
🤑 They’re each getting paid one million dollars to reunite their moms on Christmas Eve
🎥 All while a reality streaming show films theit every move.
😒 He’s being blackmailed
🧐 She’s not sure if she can fully trust him
😲 Oh. And he’s got an edging kink.

Tessa Bailey does it again. The reason she’s been my go to romance author for a year is I know I can trust her to turn out light hearted romances that make me smile, laugh, swoon, and get my heart rate going…. Wreck the Halls is no different. This holiday story gives us a lot of layers, with two MCs who have been destined to fall in love since birth, their mothers, once band mates and now enemies, a black mailer, and a kink the MMC is afraid to share… it’s fast pace, but with a lot of heart and depth to our characters. And of course the spice is top notch, especially with the added layer of edging. I’d expect no less from our queen of spice!

This was really fun! Tessa Bailey can be a hit or miss author for me, but I enjoyed this. Even though I read this in the middle of Summer, I liked the Christmas vibes and cheer. This wasn't anything new or lifechanging, but it wasn't trying to be. It was the perfect swoon-worthy and light read.

I love a good Christmas in July book and this one gave me what I wanted. I've read and loved everything Tessa Bailey has ever published and this was no different. I loved Beat and Melody and their messy family history. The moms were my favorite. If you love Tessa Bailey, you will definitely want to read Wreck the Halls.

4 🌟 Christmas in August! I loved not only Melody and Beat but also their mothers Trina and Octavia.

I went into this not really expecting to love it. I didn't care about the premise of children of rock stars trying to get their parents to reunite the band no matter how many times I had heard it teased by TB.

But it turns out I didn't have to care about that to care about these characters. Pretty quickly Melody stole my heart just like she did the hearts of everyone in this book. She's normal and quirky in a way that wasn't irritating and actually felt relatable. I so appreciate a quirky heroine that doesn't feel try-hard. She always said what she was thinking and 99% of the time it was hilarious.

And Beat. There is so much I could say about him. I'm a sucker for a hero who kinda hates himself and doesn't think he deserves the heroine. Their mutual affection for each other was infectious and oh my gosh so hot. The chemistry between them was flying off the dang page.

And I actually did end up caring about their moms. And I loved them both for totally different reasons and did end up rooting for a band reunion. The moms definitely added tons of levity. The bonfire scene...iykyk. I giggled my way through this. Mostly though, I just loved seeing Melody and Beat grow as people and together. Their love was so sweet and real and very swoon-worthy.

This is definitely the kind of "Christmas romance" that you could read any time of year. Pretty much the only Christmas vibe was the setting and some snow in NYC. This was lighter on the Christmas vibes than Window Shopping.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC. All thoughts and opinions are my own.