If you’re like me, when it comes to holiday stories you usually expect a romance or even a cozy mystery (or maybe a ghost story that teaches the meaning of the season). But that isn’t the case with the book Eight Very Bad Nights. Nope, this book is billed as Hanukkah Noir! Yeah, I’d never heard of it before either, but dang if it wasn’t entertaining. This book features a collection of crime/thrillers stories all centered around Hanukkah. I wasn’t familiar with all the authors but seeing both Lee Goldberg and Gabino Iglesias was more than enough to get my attention. As with any collection there were definitely some stories I enjoyed more than others, but overall I enjoyed them all to some degree. It’s quite the eclectic collection, each story having it’s own identity, own tone, from dark and gritty to rather humorous. In fact Tod Goldberg’s intro to the collection had me laughing, reminding me of a how a sarcastic old high school friend of mine often talked about the holiday. The book features multiple narrators and they all do a great job narrating their assigned stories. I'm not sure this is exactly the book to get you into the holiday spirit, but it will entertain you. I’d like to thank RBmedia | Recorded Books and NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to and review an advanced audio copy of Eight Very Bad Days.

https://www.amazon.com/review/RHV74E15HQKOH/ref=pe_123899240_1043597390_SRTC0204BT_cm_rv_eml_rv0_rv

4.5 rounded up

Well rounded anthology of twisty gritty and sometimes humorous crime stories at Hanukkah.

As with most anthologies some of the stories are really good and memorable and some were forgotten as soon as the next one started. But it’s a great and unique time.

I will say after reading some other reviews of this book. The term Hanukkah Noir should be enough to let you know that this isn’t cozy warm fluffy stories. It’s about crime and some the stories end abruptly leaving you kind of surprised and (for some of us honestly a little delighted). But maybe check cw before picking it up if crime and curse words will affect your rating or your experience with it.

Thanks to Netgalley and RecordedBooks for an alc.

2.5 stars

Some of these stories were so bleak and miserable, if they'd been any longer, I'd have walked away. Some were good but ended suddenly and reminded me why I'm not a fan of short stories. I should stick with what I like.

Also, very little Hanukkah was in these stories. It seemed more of a coincidence than anything tying them together.

I loved the idea of this book. A collection of noir short stories related to Hanukkah. What’s not to love?!

As expected with collections of short stories, they were not very consistent - some I enjoyed more than others. That said, none really grabbed me, and I found a few were tough to get through. I really enjoyed the inclusion of Jewish customs, but some of the story connections to Hanukkah fell a little short. Overall, while I love mysteries and crime fiction, this wasn’t a hit for me.

The narrators for the short stories were fantastic and really brought the stories to life.

Thank you to #NetGalley and #rbbooks for an ALC in exchange for an honest review.

An interesting collection of seasonal Hannukkah criminal fiction. Some stories are better than others but I had fun reading them. Narrators were fantastic. I enjoyed how much they added to the stories.

I received an arc from Netgalley and the publisher.

Dark Hanukkah, Jewish representation- YES PLEASE! But woof I did not care at all. Only made it 30% in. Not in the mood for boredom.

2.5⭐

The concept for this sounded really interesting which is why I picked it up. Now the execution of the book leaves a lot to be desired. In all cases with a collection of short stories it's hard to find consistency in the stories. The book started strong and then it hit a bit of a slow patch in the middle and then ended strong. Some stories were really great and I really enjoyed them and then others felt like they shouldn't have been in the book. I did skip the story "If I Were a Rich Man" by Lee Goldberg since it was just excessive sexual content.

I honestly found myself slightly disappointed with the lack of Hanukkah in some of the stories since it's meant to be "Hannukah Noir". It was also a lot more spicy than I expected to be which did affect my rating a bit. I do think this will find an audience but unfortunately I wasn't a fan.

All narrators were great in here, they all did a great job!

Wildly entertaining, this is a wickedly good collection of shorts ideal for listening to in between reads, when you only have a few minutes spare, or indeed (as I did) all in one binge.

I was so excited to read this as Jewish fiction doesn’t get the exposure that Christian stories do especially around the holidays. I became quickly disappointed when all the stories weren’t actually about Hannukah or were only very loosely tied. This falls with the person who complied this, Tod Goldberg. I think a real disservice to the title and description of the book was done.

The stories quality was also really uneven story to story. In any anthology you’re going to like some more than others. That’s to be expected but this was beyond that. I also didn’t realize I was going to be getting as much smut as I got.

So while I’m not going to go out of my way to tell people about it o so think it has value purely because of a lack of other anthologies available on this topic..sort of.


I will say the best part of the book was the intro by Tod Goldberg which was cheeky and a nice laugh.


I am thankful to have gotten an audio ALC for free from Netgalley and Recorded books to enjoy which gave me the opportunity to voluntarily leave a review.

My rating system since GoodReads doesn’t have partial stars and I rarely round up.

⭐️ Hated it
⭐️⭐️ Had a lot of trouble, prose issues, really not my cup of tea (potentially DNF’d or thought about it)
⭐️⭐️⭐️ Meh, it was an ok read but nothing special
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Really enjoyed it! Would recommend to others
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ Outstanding! Will circle back and read again