Medieval Mistletoe: One Magical Christmas Season

by Catherine Kean

Four new Christmas novellas from best selling Medieval authors Eliza Knight, Laurel O'Donnell, Catherine Kean and Denise Domning.

ONE KNIGHT UNDER THE MISTLETOE by CATHERINE KEAN
Kissing Lord Renfred de Vornay, her late brother's best friend, under the mistletoe was the last thing Lady Liliana Thornleigh ever expected days before Christmas. Seven years have passed since Ren played his foolish prank on her, but she hasn't forgotten that humiliating incident--and neither, it seems, has he. Now a wealthy and respected lord, Ren has important information for her father, but Liliana is suspicious of Ren's reasons for spending Christmas at her sire's castle. As dangerous secrets involving her brother come to light, will her hatred of Ren intensify, or will she finally put the past behind her and accept Ren's love?


PERFECT POISON by DENISE DOMNING
Lord Jocelyn of Freyne returns from war in France injured in body and spirit to face Avice of Lavendon, the bride he spurned the previous year. Angry and hurt, Avice wants nothing to do with him. It will take more than a love potion spiced with Mistletoe to bring them together.


WILD HIGHLAND MISTLETOE by ELIZA KNIGHT
A week before Christmas, snow falls gently on the Highland hills, and once more an adventure awaits the Sutherlands! Dunrobin Castle is overflowing with excitement and holiday spirit because of the upcoming Sutherland clan gathering. Arbella's and Magnus' marriage has flourished, their passion and love growing stronger daily. But when a mysterious missive arrives begging Laird and Lady Sutherland for help in a rescue mission, they leave the safety of the castle, and ride headlong into a trap. Will they thwart their enemy and make it home in time to celebrate the holiday season in good Scottish fashion? Or will warring clans prevail?


MISTLETOE MAGIC by LAUREL O'DONNELL
A confident knight arrives home to find his childhood friend grown into much more then he remembered. The lady of the castle keeps a dangerous secret that threatens all she holds dear. Will Mistletoe Magic save them?

Genres: Christmas, Historical Romance, Historical Fiction, Romance

365 pages, Kindle Edition

First published November 20, 2014

About the author

Catherine Kean is an award-winning, Kindle Unlimited All-Star author of medieval romances whose creative muse has coaxed her to also write in other romance genres.

She wrote her first medieval romance, A Knight’s Vengeance, while her baby daughter was napping, and now has a backlist of over 20 published books. Catherine’s novels were originally published in paperback and several were released in Czech, German, and Thai foreign editions. She’s won numerous awards for her stories, including the Gayle Wilson Award of Excellence. Her novels also finaled in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards, the National Readers’ Choice Awards, and the International Digital Awards (twice).

In 2019, she started writing paranormal romances for the Cat’s Paw Cove Romance series. When not working on her next book, Catherine enjoys cooking, baking, browsing antique shops, shopping with her daughter, and gardening. She lives in Central Florida with two spoiled rescue cats.

Reviews

[Mak ♡ · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eu adorei, mas devo dizer que algumas histórias não me encantou, mas eu li para poder finalizar os livros.. Ficou faltando emoção, mas foi bom.. ​❤ Happy reading, and until the next reading.

[Dawn Dorsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mistletoe Magic by Laurel O'Donnell England 1382
Perfect Poison by Denise Domning Normandy, England 1203. The Seasons/Graiston Series
Wild Highland Mistletoe by Eliza Knight Scotland 1302. Stolen Brides Series
One Knight Under the Mistletoe, by Catherine Kean England 1187

I was familiar with two of the four authors, but as it happens, not with the book series included in these tales, with the result that of course I have two new authors and four new series to follow. Such is the effective marketing strategy of releasing a themed novella collection for free. From the viewpoint of a newcomer to each of these story lines and casts of characters, they are all sufficiently developed to stand alone, but as a reader who does not like to abandon characters once I have gotten to know them, I look forward to finding back stories, fuller stories of peripheral characters, and further treasures in these medieval worlds.

[Reading Fanatic · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can't believe this set of four Christmas novellas is being offered for only .99 cents! That's an amazing price; even more so when you realize that the stories included are absolutely fantastic. Admittedly I've only read three of the stories so far; MISTLETOE MAGIC by Laurel O'Donnell, PERFECT POISON by Denise Domning, and ONE KNIGHT UNDER THE MISTLETOE by Catherine Kean. Nevertheless, I loved the first two stories so much, and really liked the third, so even if I end up hating the last story, I'll still be happy I purchased this box set. LOL All four stories are set during the Medieval period; which is a particular favorite of mine.

MISTLETOE MAGIC

This a story of childhood friends who find love. The book begins with an epilogue, where we briefly meet Jaclyn and Alexander as children. The story then jumps to some eight years later. Alexander has been away for a number of years, but returns to participate in a joust that Jaclyn's family is hosting. The winner of the joust will win Jaclyn's hand in marriage, as well as her castle and lands. Jaclyn is not pleased with this arrangement, but her family is in dire need of the funds which the joust will bring. This story is very sweet, with a light, fun element that is added due to the hero's personality. Alexander is happy and carefree, and appears to take nothing seriously. Jaclyn, on the other hand, is all business. She's dedicated, serious, and responsible. The two personalities compliment each other very nicely. What I really liked about this story is the twist the author added to the plot. I've been reading romance books for over twenty years, and by now I've pretty much read it all. I have to say I was pleasantly surprised by the way this story unfolded. It's more than just the H winning the tournament and thereby winning the h's hand in marriage. Overall a very enjoyable read. BTW there is a love scene with some details. However, IMO, it's not overly graphic, nor is any crude language used. Furthermore, it is very easily skipped. For me, this story was a 4 1/2 star read.

PERFECT POISON

As much as I liked MISTLETOE MAGIC, I liked this one even more. It's about a couple who are betrothed as children. When Avice comes of marriageable age, her fiancee, Jocelyn, postpones the wedding and goes off to war. This is like a serious slap in the face for Avice, who is beyond humiliated by the postponement. She is totally convinced that Jos intends to break the betrothal contract. It doesn't help that as far as Avice is concerned, she is "plain and plump" with hair and eyes that are "brown, brown, brown as dirt." LOL Jos, on the other hand, is very handsome. He is also brave, kind and honorable. When Jos returns injured from war, his mother arranges for Avice to stay at his castle for Christmas. Spending Christmas with a man she is convinced doesn't want her, is the last thing that Avice wants to do, but her parents will not listen to any argument she puts forth. The story that unfolds is very sweet and a little poignant. My only complaint is that the whole falling in love and wanting to get married, seemed to happen very abruptly. However, when you take into consideration the love potion myth which is the premise of the story, it makes perfect sense. Despite the suddenness of the ending, this was a very satisfying read for me. It was my first Domning story, but it definitely wont be my last. FYI this is a clean story. I'd rate this book 4 1/2 stars.

ONE KNIGHT UNDER THE MISTLETOE

Of the three stories that I read, this one was my least favorite. The plot is interesting and had a nice twist to it, but there were some aspects of the story which I had to grapple with. In the first two chapters of the story, Liliana and Ren are children, ages 14 and 12 respectively. We get to see how they interact with one another as children, and gain an understanding of the foundation for their relationship. The story then jumps ahead seven years; Ren and Lil are now both young adults and have done a lot of living in the intervening years--at least, Ren has done a lot of living. Ren and Lil are reunited when Lil's father invites Ren to spend the Christmas holidays with them. Lil learns to look past Ren's youthful misdeeds and comes to appreciate and fall in love with the noble knight he has become. The story that unfolds is sweet and engaging; and I really liked Ren and Lil as a couple. However, there were a few things about the story that made me a little uncomfortable, and others that I found a bit hard to accept.

First of all, I found it a little uncomfortable to read about how fourteen year old Ren's loins hardened as he spied on twelve year old Lil while she was swimming. Then there was little Lil getting tingling sensations in her belly when she looked at the bare-chested Ren. I laughed when Lil became overwhelmed by Ren's height and broad shoulders. I know I'm looking at this from a 21st Century point of view, and did my best to remind myself of the differences between today and Medieval times. Furthermore, at fourteen Ren was already a squire and involved in daily practice at swordplay, so I'm sure his shoulders would have been much broader than the average fourteen year old today, not to mention that to a twelve year old girl he would probably appear very large and very broad indeed. LOL

That aside, I also felt like the author crammed too many events in too short of a period of time. The story is set at Christmastime 1194, when Lil and Ren are 19 and 21 respectively. Not only has Ren already been married and widowed, but we are also told that he'd gone off on crusade in 1190. He returned three winters earlier, that would make it what, winter of 1191? So my question is, exactly how long had Ren been on crusade? It couldn't have been more than a year, year and a half tops! From what I know of that period in history, men who went of on crusade were gone for years, so it seemed a bit illogical that Ren would be gone for so short of a time. Especially when you consider that the journey alone would have taken months to get to the Crusades in the first place! IMO the story would've played better had more time passed between the childhood events and the reunion between the protagonists. Not to mention that I personally would've been more comfortable with the sexual tension that existed between Ren and Lil as children, had they been a bit older--or the author could've left that out completely as, in my mind, the story wouldn't have suffered in the least without it. In any event, these issues aside, I did enjoy this story, although not as much as the first two. FYI, this is a clean romance. I give it 3 1/2 stars.

So that's it for now. I will update my review as soon as I read the last book, which happens to be the third story. I skipped that one to read ONE KNIGHT. Happy reading!

[Jo-Ann Fitzgerald · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a set of 4 short stories. They are not linked at all except that they are historical in nature and occur during Christmas.

This being said the stories do move along quite well and you can identify with the hero and heroine.

You can identify with each of the couples. I was encouraged by one of the stories which takes a married couple and centers the story on them instead of on a new love. You also do get two stories of childhood crushes turning into love which is always a winner with me.

Easy to read and understand where the authors are going with the plot. I didn't want them to end.

[Linda Adams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved it

I like the actual atmosphere of family working together I just love Mangus I really do he’s one of those characters that is so strong and so loving and there’s two sides of him strong and soft and he really loved his family and he worked hard to keep them safe I recommend this book

[jennifer willing · Rating 5 out of 5]

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[Ann Gonzalez · Rating 5 out of 5]

This collection was truly magical. All four stories were great. It would be hard to decide my favorite. My only issue is that I wish the stories were longer. The characters in each story were well written and passionate characters. I would recommend this set to any Medieval romance fan. One of the reviews I read had gave this only one star saying the content is not clean. It is all well written and nothing untasteful. I'm not sure what that person read, nor the reviewers that didn't care for all four stories. You can't read a few pages and make a decision on the entire book.

[Stasia Bruhn · Rating 2 out of 5]

So was it worth 99 cents I guess. I liked 2 stories the first and the last one..The 2nd and third not to my liking at all..When U buy books from different authors U always take a chance that some U will like and some u will not..It is like a grab bag.Were they incredible stories that made U remember the characters after u had read then no..Were they passable stories that helped u past the time yes..

[Autymn Maas · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book was filled with good stand alone stories following the theme of mistletoe. The only problem it had was that the quality varied from author to author. These are sweet stories that make good quick reads. It lost a star because the third story was not as good as the rest, but still a decent read. This was a well made box set, and made me want to find some other works by the authors.

[Gemma · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mistletoe Magic by Laurel O'Donnell - DNF

Perfect Poison by Denise Domning - 3.5 stars

Wild Highland Mistletoe by Eliza Knight - DNF

One Knight Under the Mistletoe by Catherine Kean - 3 stars.

[Nancy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I thought Denise Domning's "Perfect Poison" & Catherine Kean's One Knight Under the Mistletoe" were especially well-written!! Those two stories were worth the purchase of the 4-book set.