Book Review: Love's A Witch by Tricia O'Malley

Love's a Witch by Tricia O'Malley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book just became my favorite book I've read so far this fall.

Love's a Witch felt like I was watching an episode of Charmed, but somehow the special guest star was Richard Armitage playing Knox Douglas. I don't know why, but he popped into my head when I was reading this book, and somehow it worked SO MUCH.

So Sloane MacGregor and his sisters came to Briarhaven because their grandmother told them to come back. The moment they stepped foot into Briarhaven, Knox came in and...grabbed the suitcase and told them to leave. Like now. Not today, not tomorrow, not next week, now. Sloane got upset and said, 'hell to the nah, we're staying' and told the house to never let him in again.

Ooof.

But throughout the book, we see both Sloane and Knox going head to head on a lot of things, and how Knox is trying too hard to get rid of the MacGregors. But when Sloane's powers come in on her twenty-fifth birthday, things get chaotic and also very romantic when both Knox and Sloane get together and things happen-like Sloane morphing her car into a dragon, mushrooms popping up everywhere, and her nearly burning the curtain down when she kissed him.

The ending almost made me cry when Knox got all of the townspeople that were related to the founding families to help the sisters try and break the snowy curse, and when they do, they find out that it's not over. I'd never thought that I would like Groupy x Grumpy but I did, and I enjoyed myself reading this book so much that I wanted to stay in this world. Tricia O'Malley did a fantastic job with this book, and I cannot wait to read more.

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Book Review: Silvercloak by L.K. Steven

Silvercloak by L.K. Steven
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This might be my favorite fantasy THIS YEAR. L.K. Steven, thank you for this book, and thank you SO MUCH for writing this book. A woman going undercover in a magical mafia to try and nab them? PERFECTION. I was rooting for Saffron to finally get her revenge on the Bloodmoons and to figure out what they're actually doing and stop them. I was hooked the moment I started reading this book, and I needed to know more about why Saffron wanted to bring the Bloodmoons down and to also expose them for what they were doing.

I did get worried that some of Saffron's contacts would get compromised, but the more I read and saw how she tried so hard to protect them, even when they couldn't even touch her because of the magic not working on her. I kept seeing her try and try over and over again to figure out what the Bloodmoons are hiding, while at the same time working with them to get what they want. When they face the Silvercloaks again, some of them are shocked that she's working for the enemy, while some of them knew that she was undercover, so they try not to hit her.

The ending of this book got me SO BAD. i wasn't even expecting it or that Levan, the son of the leader of the Bloodmoons, knew Saffron's secret. I thought she was keeping it on the down low, but that journal entry at the end told us, the readers, that we knew that she was a timeweaver, and that he was going to take her down.

Oh no.

Oh, Saff, girl, you are in BIG TROUBLE.

Especially when Levan and Lyrian are trying to bring back Lorissa.

Oh no, girlie.

Time to run.

I need book two right now to know what happens next, because that ending was BRUTAL. But I loved it nonetheless.

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Book Review: A Demon's Guide to Wooing a Witch (Glimmer Falls #2) by Sarah Hawley

A Demon's Guide to Wooing a Witch by Sarah Hawley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Sarah Hawley, you beautiful human you.

I am loving this series, and I really don't want it to end. I want this series to keep going because of how good it is, and also how fun it was. I was scared of the amnesia trope, but when she did it for Astaroth of the Nine and how it worked perfectly with the story, I loved it to bits. I really didn't like Astaroth in the beginning of the series. Still, with the second book all on him and how he travels with Calladia Cunnington to figure out how to get his memories back, it was SUCH a fun time that I want to read some more before the series ends.

This book touches on subjects like abuse-mental abuse, thanks to Calladia's ex and her mother, telling her that she's not good enough, she needs to tone herself down, and things like that. It did urk my nerves when her mother brought up all of the things that were wrong with Calladia and not love who she is as a person, and I'm glad that in the end, Calladia got her lick back and isn't gonna be around her mother ever again.

Astaroth of the Nine changed my perception of him throughout the book.

He shocked me so many times--from learning that he was a half-demon, his mother is Lilith...who writes War of the Roses tentacle AO3 Fanfiction--something I wasn't really for or to learn about--but I found that I liked that about her--and that he needed to find a life witch to help him get his memories back. So teaming up with the witch that hated him so much, Calladia, he goes on a road trip to find the witch that can restore his memories, and also find a way to stop a demon named Moloch, who is currently hellbent on killing him.

Throughout the road trip, from fighting werewolves to falling in love and sleeping in a tent, Astaroth had slowly shocked me and Calladia to the point that they fell in love. The ending was really fun, and for secrets to come out when Astaroth got his memories back and realised that he didn't want to go back to the Demon Council, to represent the demon hybrids and be their speaker in the council. Instead, he wants to be with his warrior queen, whom he had fallen in love with.

...Though there were some things I really didn't need to know about, like him and Lucrezia and Cesare Borgia...didn't need to know that part....really didn't....

But I really do love this book series so much and I cannot wait to read the next one.

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Book Review: The Witching Moon Manor (The Spellbound Sisters #2) by Stacy Sivinski

The Witching Moon Manor by Stacy Sivinski
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

This month it seems like my Libby holds have gas after gas after gas-and reading The Witching Moon Manor made me really happy-just like the first book, it is a happy, warm hug while you sit and enjoy a cup of tea.

The Quigley sisters are reunited again after having their birthday visions and came home, each sister having problems-Anne is the Diviner of Chicago, but even she can't figure out why Mr. Crowley hasn't done his final Task. Violet had an accident at the circus with her husband, Emil, and decided to come home, and Beatrix...well, Beatrix can't write herself a new novel, and she's in a writer's block. So the three sisters come back together to figure things out like they always do, and just like magic, things start to unravel themselves and are put back to rights in their own ways.

Beatrix is having a problem writing her new book. She sits in front of her notebook, but no words have come to her. So she gets up and helps her sister, Anne, only to find herself in a bookstore where she becomes the sole owner thanks to Violet, and she opens a book and starts to read it, thinking that once she gets to the end, she'll see the words The End.

Instead, the words are scratched out, and new words are written...words I have forgotten, but I think they said "There are new endings' or something like that?

Once Beatrix reads those words and is also around Jennings and is slowly falling for him, it turns out that the dusty bookshelf is an enchanted bookstore, and then soon Beatrix is writing again.

Anne is trying to figure out how to keep Mr. Crowley and Philip together in the afterlife once she figures out what Final Task Mr. Crowley has been ignoring/didn't do. She meets his nephew, Vincent, and the two work together to figure out who the ring belongs to. They do butt heads during the whole thing, but then when they do come together, that's when she finds out that thanks to the ring and her new powers, she can walk through the past, and thanks to Vincent's help, she figures out who the ring belongs to, and even though it does belong to Vincent Crowley, it went from Mr. Crowley, Anne, May, Philip's sister, and then Vincent.

Violet was having problems with what had happened at the circus, and she threw herself into helping her sisters with their problems, ignoring her own. When she finally has a chance to sit down and think about what happened at the circus and to poor Emil, she talks to her sisters and drinks some tea, then goes to bed and has a dream that changes everything. Then, when they were together at the end, they all looked at the tea leaves....

...and finds out that someone is pregnant and is going to have a baby by the sign of the birds or something in the tea leaves.

This is my favorite series of all time and I need everyone reading this cozy series.

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Book Review: High Tea and Misdemeanor by Laura Childs

High Tea and Misdemeanors by Laura Childs
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

First time reading anything from Laura Childs, and I don't think it'll be my last time doing so. High Tea and Misdemeanors takes place during a wedding in Charleston, but then a murder happens, and Theo and her friend and tea sommelier (I learned that's a thing now....) Drayton Conneley tries to figure out who killed the bridesmaid and why they are trying to scare the groom.

As Theo and Drayton look into everything, from the guy Jaime worked for once, and told him that what he was doing wasn't going to work, and he lost everything, to a tech startup guy that did the website for the graveyard stroll that Theo's teashop, the Indigo Tea Shop, is hosting in a very famous graveyard. But when this one woman kept coming into the shop, saying that she wanted to open her own coffee shop with her own flavors of coffee, it never clicked until the end, when she led Theo and Drayton to an abandoned warehouse, where she explained everything and why she did what she did to the shed.

For a moment throughout the whole entire thing, I thought it was the bride's ex-fiancé that did it, but when it was revealed to be the coffee shop operator, I was both shocked...and annoyed. I really didn't want it to be her, but good lord, she made it so hard for me to see that it was her the whole time. I was hoping that it was someone else, but when Theo's boyfriend came through at the end, after telling her multiple times not to get involved, she did anyway.

Throughout the book, everyone kept asking her if she was going to get involved and solve the mystery. Even though Theo said no, she got involved anyway, and that's when she solved the case, while also going through the police via her boyfriend :) All in all, it was a really good book, and I cannot wait to read more from this author.

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Book Review: A Witch's Guide to Fake Dating a Demon by Sarah Hawley

A Witch's Guide to Fake Dating a Demon by Sarah Hawley
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I saw someone on The Nest on OwlCrate read this book and decided to put this on hold...and I'm so glad that I did. This book was so good, so funny, and I wanna read the rest of the series, because how can something like this-a witch and demon-actually work? I thought it couldn't be done or that I had to do it, but when I first read this book and saw how funny it was, I loved every bit of it.

Mariel accidentally summons Ozroth the Ruthless...because she was trying to summon a bag of flour. Mariel tries so hard to get rid of Ozroth, only for him to be her fake boyfriend when her mother comes by to see how her summoning is doing. Since Ozroth is a soul bargainer demon, he tries so hard to get Mariel to sell her soul on some simple things, but she refuses at every turn.

Ozroth is having problems himself. Ozroth made a deal gone wrong, and now he has a soul inside him that is making him do human things, like sleep for eight hours, eat, and actually drink tea. But the more he's around Mariel and sees how good she is, and how her magic just shines, and how her family pretty much treats her like shit, Ozroth decides to help her with her magic and for her to understand it...only to fall in love with her...hard.

When his mentor, Astaroth, calls him, trying to get him to make Mariel take the deal, Orzoth tries...but instead, at the end, fails, and Mariel makes a deal with Astaroth instead without knowing it, losing her soul in the process....and made it go directly to Ozroth instead. As soon as Ozroth got the spell, that's when it clicked for him, and he returned her soul back, and then everything is well...

Or it?

Thanks to Mariel's bestie, she kicked Astaroth's ass back to the demon world....or did she?

Now I need to read book two to know what happened to him and how he'll survive.

This book was right up my alley, and I enjoyed every bit of it. It made me laugh, and I gasped at some parts. I now want to reread this series every single spooky season because of how good it is.

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Book Review: Murder by Chessecake: A Golden Girls Cozy Mystery by Rachel Ekstrom Courage

Murder by Cheesecake by Rachel Ekstrom Courage
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Murder during a St. Olaf Wedding that Rose is hosting? Perfection.

I flew through this book the moment it arrived on my Libby. It was really funny, had that old Golden Girls charm that we all know and love, and I crackled greatly at the many St. Olaf stories that Rose has told from the show, from Mean Old Lady Hickenlooper to the Headless Boy to everything in between. I thought-no, I feared. Greatly. That I wouldn't like this book. A Golden Girls Cozy Mystery? Nah, I wouldn't like it.

But the more I read it, the more I found that I really enjoyed myself. I wanted to read more of the Girls going throughgh everything they could to figure out why poor Dorothy's date had fallen dead on one of Rose's perfect cheesecakes. I felt like I was right there with them when they discovered it, and then going through the whole mystery of who killed the guy and what led to his death. From going to Wolfie's, dealing with Rose's family from St. Olaf that came to Miami for the wedding, to the funny ending, this was a book I really fun time and I really need everyone to read it.

In fact, I think it was this book that made me do my 30th rewatch of the Golden Girls because it was that funny, made me worry about the girls as they figure out who killed Dorothy's date, and also who put him in the freezer, face down onto Rose's cheesecakes.

I wanted to eat a cheesecake after reading this book. Alas...I didn't get a chance to. But one day I will.

Loved, loved, loved this book so much.

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