by Julie Abe
Happy Pub Day!
__
OMG magical Palo Alto! Day trips to Santa Cruz getting treats at Marini’s, riding the Giant Dipper. Ok this settles it. I need a trip to Santa Cruz. Trips through San Jose, Gilroy down south to San Luis Obispo. Love this! I know all these areas and I loved the added magic!
There are a few places mentioned that I need to go and to try! Shuei-Do Manju! I want to go there!! And I really want to go to all those magical cottages but those are probably fictional.
So yes this is exactly the read that I needed this week as I am in a little funk. This had the second chance friendship and high school angst plus magic and friends to lovers that I didn’t know I needed.
These magical stories always seem to be places that are already a bit nature magical but to enchant the Bay Area is sublime to me. Please do it again!! I want to hear more about Remy and Cam or Lia. I love looking for those hidden doors, fairy houses, and crystal shops. But now I will be looking for tea and stationary shops!
This is a perfect summer read and such a sweet coming of age story. It’s enemies to dating/friends to dating, it’s in between that, frenemies to dating?. I love when there is so much childhood history of friendship and then the pain of growing older and apart then being forced back together to work an event. Claps hands love!!
It is also full of really hard topics and the difficulty a family has to endure after and the fall out of the friendships in the wake of the horrible grief wave that takes out a person. We all grieve differently, you can never get over the loss of a parent you just have to learn to live without them. There is always someone to talk to even if you might think you will overburden them with your pain. As in me I am here so DM me. It’s been 5 years since my Dad passed and I still get taken out by a random song he sang to me or a smell of a treat we liked.
❓ Have you been to a beach boardwalk? We used to go to Santa Cruz every summer.
Thank you @stmartinspress and @netgalley for the e-ARC for my honest and voluntary review.
✨Bookmarks from @alicia_marks_it use RADUS15 to save 15%.
Synopsis:
After spending most of high school as the quiet girl, Ellie Kobata is ready to take some risks and have a life-changing summer, starting with her Anti-Wallflower List—thirteen items she’s going to check off one by one. She’s looking forward to riding rollercoasters, making her art Instagram public (maybe), and going on an epic road-trip with her best friend Lia.
But when number four on Ellie’s list goes horribly wrong—revenge on Jack Yasuda—she’s certain her summer has gone from charmed to cursed. Instead of a road trip with Lia, Ellie finds herself stuck in a car with Jack driving to a magical convention. But as Ellie and Jack travel down the coast of California, number thirteen on her list—fall in love—may be happening without her realizing it.
In The Charmed List, Julie Abe sweeps readers away to a secret magical world, complete with cupcakes and tea with added sparks of joy, and an enchanted cottage where you can dance under the stars.
ReadsbyRadus 