Bookish Product Review and Giveaway: Novelly Yours

Happy Cyber Monday everyone!
We're working on a few posts this week to help out with your Cyberweek shopping, though this one's more a review than a gift guide. Stick around til the end, because there's also a giveaway.

So a few weeks ago Rose Red asked me if I'd like to review some wax melts from Novelly Yours for the blog. And we all love free stuff, right? I have one candle from the shop which I got as a gift, but hadn't actually ordered anything before. I was somewhat familiar with the products though, having seen them so many times on Instagram, and I was pretty excited to try them out. Which is a long way of saying that I received these products for free for review, albeit indirectly.

Novelly Yours creates candles and wax tarts inspired (mostly) by books and movies. The shop has scents inspired by Harry Potter, Disney Princesses, The Lunar Chronicles, and lots of other popular YA books. Here are some of the ones I tried: 

Night Triumphant, inspired by A Court of Mist and Fury smells of citrus, seamist, and jasmine. I really liked this one in the package! I love citrus scents, but when burning it smells more like soap. I think that's the jasmine that overpowers the other notes. It has a nice clean scent, just not what I expected.

Beast's Library, inspired by Beauty and the Beast, smells of leather, books, and fireplace. For me it had a sandalwood-y, masculine scent that lasted long after it stopped burning.

Villainous, inspired by Disney villains, smells of storms, forest, and fire. It had a strong woodsy scent that reminded me of Christmas at first, but turned more smoky after a while. I burned it for 2-3 hours at night and could still smell it in the morning. This one was probably my favorite of the scents I tried.

I've Put a Spell on You is a seasonal scent inspired by Hocus Pocus that smells of leather, fire, leaves, and storms. It smells similar to Villainous but much more subtle. I felt like the scent was stronger when it wasn't burning, but this is only one of the scents I tried that did that.

Thoughts on the product

In general, what impressed me most is the complexity of the scents, the way different notes come out once burning like the way perfume smells different after you've worn it for a while. Most of the candles I've purchased in the past have one scent that stays the same whether lit or not. 

I also like how long the fragrance lasted after I blew out the candle. In one case, I could still smell it the next morning. For comparison, I burned a Bath and Body Works candle for the same amount of time. The candle's fragrance permeated farther, but it's a big, 3 wick candle. And the scent faded almost as soon as I blew it out.

Because I didn't pick the scents I sampled, I'm not sure I'd buy any of them for myself. But I was impressed enough that I ordered some candles for Cyber Monday. I got Harry Potter-inspired Fred & George and Wizards Pub, and the seasonal Swirly Twirly Gumdrops.

Thoughts on candles vs. wax tarts

I've mostly burned candles in the past, but I can certainly see the appeal of an electric warmer if you have small children or cats. (I used a cheap tea light warmer so there was still a flame involved. My kid is finally old enough to understand "fire bad.") The problem I had was changing scents. It's much easier to blow out one candle and light another than it is to scrape wax out of the warmer. I think if you plan to stick with a favorite fragrance or a few similar ones, the wax melts will work fine. I wanted to try several different scents for this review so it was kind of a pain to switch them out.

We've got a few extra wax melts to share! The giveaway includes Gansey, Manibus, and Cabeswater, all from the Raven Cycle collection and Jasmine's Garden. (The warmer is not included.)

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