This book kind of reminded me of a cooking show with witches and assassins thrown into the mix. It was interesting but im not sure if i would read it again.

Entertaining and filled with baking goodness.
The story is easy to follow and the characters are well developed.
A baking witch trying to strive in a place where witches are frown upon. Her mishap with uncontrolled magic will take her to a place where her dreams might come true or be killed trying.

This was such a cute book and a fun read! Great magical mystery with realistic and fun characters. I feel like this series can go far and can't wait for the next book to come out. I love Anise's character! Sign me up as a fan of this Light witchy mystery series!

First of all, I want to mention that the thing I enjoyed the most about Deadly Sweet were the strong and powerful females that could kick everyone’s ass if they wanted to. All the women that appeared throughout the book had a special power that they knew how to control perfectly, and everyone was afraid of them. However, the most inspiring thing was that they all took care of each other not only because they knew all of them were important but because after some time they all started to love each other as sisters and that was heartwarming for me.

Here are some of my favorite quotes: Anise said, “I wouldn’t change who I was for a second” and “This ------- really should’ve checked out the women in my corner before she made me her target”. And my favorite that other woman said was “I’ve got you tonight. Let anyone try coming after me”.

My favorite character has to be Wynn, so focused and loyal, I know it was his job to take care of Anise, but I could sense he also did it because he knew she was a nice girl. Anise, our main character, was such an intelligent and creative girl, I loved all the scenes where she used her powers although there weren’t many. The antagonist, I won’t say its name, was pretty obvious for me so that took a little bit of the mystery away but no matter what, it was interesting to see how the people looking for it discover who it was.

One thing I didn’t like about the story was that we didn’t actually get to know the secondary characters, I’m honestly so intrigued by Blaire, Gabi and Anise’s mom. I would love to read more about their story specially Anise’s mom’s one because no one said nothing about it and I’m guessing it had to be something big or else the other women wouldn’t be so harsh on her. However, hopefully we get to know more about all of them on the upcoming books.

In conclusion, Deadly Sweet was a book that I enjoyed mainly because of the incredible characters and there were also great things as power and cooking scenes (which were obvious but still really nice to read). The only thing that I didn’t like was that we didn’t get much depth in the secondary characters and it was a little disappointing because I really liked them.

2.5 stars

This book started out great. Well... not for our main character. Anise is rejected by all the culinary schools she has applied to and due to an accident ends up being arrested... For the reader though, this is all quite exciting, if not still sad. The writing, I thought, started out strong and had me somewhat gripped.

The thing is, at about 30% I was so done with the book. The "let's not tell the main character anything including how to do her job" was so, so irritating. No one on their first day of work isn't told where their uniform is or how they are supposed to do something or, you know, why they have a bodyguard.
I need to breathe here for a second, so I don't keep ranting...

The mystery, I felt, was pretty straightforward. I had guessed who it would be and while there was a minute where I was second guessing myself, I was pretty darn sure I knew who it would be. Why? A theory I'm trying to define but what I'm calling --possible spoiler to who villain is: <spoiler> first boy syndrome! Where the first boy seen is the one the MC will end up with, even if she doesn't really like him at first </spoiler> .

As for the characters.... Anise, our MC, felt a little flat to me towards the end. She's a decent character though and has many good traits. Possibly may be considered a likeable character. Everyone else is pretty much wallpaper though and one-dimensional. These characters like Anise immediately, these ones are a mystery, this one is a potential love, etc. But, I see how with the next book this might change.
Wynn is my favorite though. I know, I have a huge thing for anti-heroes or the scowling, bad boy. I need help because he barely even talked! Like, come on, let the poor boy speak!!! Also, Anise is always with him are you telling me she didn't try talking to him about things while he drove her places? Poor Wynn is another character developed off a set archetype. And yet, I totally fell for it.

I was also surprised on the lack of magic in the book. Anise has little training... will no one train her? No magical classes yet? Lame. Wynn is a bodyguard!! who has mountains of weapons.... So, don't come into this thinking it will have a ton of magic, it doesn't. Lots of baking, though, so I constantly wanted cake.

The final question: will I continue this series? Probably not :/
I want to know the conditions of Wynn's contract and I want to see his character (and others) develop, but I also don't want to be disappointed... So, I might end up just reading other reviews?
We will see... if the next book goes on Netgalley, I remember it and still am interested, then I might pick it up.

Deadly Sweet by Lola Dodge

First book in the Spellwork Syndicate series

3 stars

Anise Wise is tired of hiding from the humans of the world. It doesn’t that matter that witches are a well-known magical species, humans hate and fear them. All Anise wants to do is bake and create cakes that could allow her to have a bakery one day. The problem is that she keeps getting rejected from colleges and she and her mother are barely scraping by. When an incident arises and Anise finds herself in Taos to be an apprentice to her great-aunt Agatha. The catch? Agatha’s last apprentice went missing and Anise finds herself the target of a powerful and out of control warlock. Dodge’s newest series opener is a lot of fun. This is a fun witch novel that takes an interesting approach by making witches common knowledge to regular humans. This incites fear, but it also creates the dynamic of witches being seen as tourist attractions. It makes the story a little bit more complex than the run of the mill witch story, but this story doesn’t go beyond that. It is a very simple story and it can be a bit predictable. While the story is predictable, Dodge attempts to make Anise’s passions the centerpiece of her magic- baking is at the story’s centerfold. The baking makes this story unique and fun. Dodge isn’t the best urban fantasy writer, but the story is fun and I’d definitely recommend it to fans of witch stories and characters who bake.


Whimsical Writing Scale: 3

The main character is Anise. She isn’t the most original character, but her love and passion for baking made me love reading her PoV because she had a purpose outside of hunting a big bad guy like most UF heroines. It made her dynamic. She isn’t the most fleshed out character, but her passion is so strong that it makes her story fun to follow. Mainly, I’m just rooting for her because I want to see her bake more deserts.


Kick-Butt Heroine Scale: 3.25

There are two potential love interests in this story. One is a huge character, but I don’t know if their relationship will blossom into more, but I’m betting that it will in later novels because of this guy’s role in her life as a protector. The other well, he isn’t a love interest anymore, but for the sake of not spoiling this incredibly short novel, I’ll leave it at that.


Swoon Worthy Scale: 2

The Villain- I called this one from the moment this character was introduced. Mainly because SPOILER [Dodge seems to depict all men with tattoos as villains. At the beginning of the novel, Anise is nearly assaulted by an older man covered in tattoos. The villain is covered in tattoos. (hide spoiler)] It made the story arc incredibly obvious and I wasn’t surprised in the least.


Villain Scale: 3

The characters are all just kind of there. None of them feel concrete and I didn’t feel attached to any of them and I feel like it is because there are so many characters being introduced and mentioned that the few that should’ve been fleshed out were briefly touched on, but not further expanded upon. I’m sure Dodge will expand upon the friendships that Anise made in the next novel, which I really hope she does because the character friendship could be a lot of fun.


Character Scale: 3

This is a fast, quick story that I definitely recommend if you are in the mood for a quick read to past the time that doesn’t require a lot of concentration and thought. Magical baking is really what sealed the deal for me when it came to this story and I think it will be a lot of fun for readers, especially younger readers who are getting into the paranormal genre.


Plotastic Scale: 3.25

Cover Thoughts: I love this cover. It’s purple and the cake looks scrumptious. I’m a definite fan of it.

Thank you, Netgalley and Inkmonster, for providing me with a copy in exchange for an honest review.

So the description states if you loved Hex Hall this is recommended and I absolutely loved that series even though the ending did not go how I wanted it but that's a different story.

This book is about Anise Wise, a witch. Being a witch is extremely rare and the fact that Anise can bake with her magic is even more rare. But enchantment is frowned upon in society. Because of her status as a witch, she cannot live her dream of going to pastry school and receives a rejection letter in the mail.

In pops Aunt Agatha with an amazing offer for Anise, if she becomes Agathas apprentice she inherits the family bakery at the end of her training. Sounds like a sweet deal, right? Wrong.

She has to move to Sedona and her aunt has got some shady stuff going on in the local magic community. The last apprentice was assassinated and now Anise has to find out who it is before she's assassinated.



So this book is a little bit of almost every category. Ya, NA, mystery, magic. Anyone who knows me via real life or even on Instagram knows I LOVE baking. As a matter of fact I'll be starting school next fall to get my associates in baking (SO EXCITED!!!) So to find a book that was not only interesting but had baking talk in it too made me sooooooo happy! So I loved that there was baking and magic in the book but the mystery aspect was a bit obvious. Overall I would rate it 3.75 stars for baking and humor.

As a young witch in a world where witchcraft is frowned upon, Anise struggles to fit in. She wants to be a world class baker, but can't even be admitted to school because of her abilities. When she accidentally burns down the county fair, she's sent to live with her Great-Aunt  who owns a famous witch-only bakery in Taos, a city steeped in witchcraft and folklore. Anise is excited to finally start her baking career, but someone else has other plans for her.

I initially picked up this book because of the title. Deadly Sweet has a cute but ominous feel to it and that sounded like an interesting dynamic for a novel. Once I discovered the book was about baking, I knew I had to read it. My sister in law is a great baker and the idea of mixing baking and magic seemed to make so much sense. I was worried the book would lean too heavily on magic or baking, but not mix the two very well, but that was definitely not the case. The elements go hand and hand and in the eyes of our narrator, Anise, one can not exist without the other.

First off, the setting for this book was a beautiful breath of fresh air compared to the stories I've read for the last couple of months. While I've loved all the books I've reviewed on here, they seem to follow a formula for their settings. We're in the regular world and there is a magical world secretly in the shadows, usually with some scenes at a high school. This was completely different. We're immediately told that witchcraft is real and everyone knows about it, although it's not welcome in most places. Also, while there are some college-esque class scenes, the majority of the story takes place outside of a school, which was a welcome change from the "formula".

All of the characters in this story really jumped off the page. They were vibrant and dynamic. The element of magic and other special abilities helped with this, but they also just had strong personalities. Anise's aunt, Agatha, for example is a mostly minor character but she commands a presence in every scene she's in, from her dialogue to her mannerisms. She's strong-willed, rebellious and intense. Each character is similarly well done, thought there are obvious variations in personality. I did wonder if the cast of this story was too large. We're introduced to a number of characters who are exciting and likable, but we only see them once or twice. One of Anise's friends we're introduced to and she has a big personality, but then as the plot progresses we only see her one or twice. It's a strange decision by the author, but this book is the first in a trilogy, so she may become more central later on in the series. 

The plot for this book definitely matched my initial impressions of the title: cute and ominous. There's a lot of dark magic, looming evil and impending threats in the story. There's definitely some scary and thrilling moments, but overall this is a sweet story about baking, family and friendship. The plot is good and compelling, but not the reason I invested in reading this book. The plot was fairly simple and one-dimensional. I also predicted most of the plot twists. I was more interested in the relationships of the characters and the setting, than the plot itself. 

Deadly Sweet is a fun, sweet story about baking, magic and friendship. It's a quick read that is perfect for those of us with a general interest in baking and love for fantasy. Expect a vivacious and large cast of witches with unique setting. Order a copy on Amazon, Barnes or Nobel, or as your local bookstore to buy a copy for you.

This was just the right amount of witchcraft and baking. While I wish the set-up for the sequel was done more throughout than at the end, it exceeded my expectations for witchy-baking books, a thing I didn't know I needed really.

The pace was super fast, the characters were bland & uninteresting. MEH.

I received an advance copy of this book from NetGalley & Ink Monsters, but this does not shape or influence my review.

Anise Wise is a young witch with a passion for baking and problems controlling her powers. She's sent to live with her Aunt Agatha, a powerful witch living on the Vortex in Taos, New Mexico. Here, Anise is to become Agatha's apprentice and attend school to become a full fledged pastry chef. Shortly after she arrives in town, she becomes the target of several attacks, and discovers Agatha's previous apprentice has gone missing.

The story kept me interested at every turn, with lots of unique touches (love the witch handshake and the ritual descriptions), and the author authentically captures the feeling of being a teenager. Taos works brilliantly as setting here, and feels like a character in this book. I would have enjoyed some more baking-specific descriptions, and I want more Fondant in the next installment!

Overall a fun way to spend a few hours, and I'm looking forward to the next book in the series!

This book is great I love the cooking/magic genre. I could not stop reading it. Can not wait for the next one.

*Spoilers ahead*

I absolutely loved this book. By the time I got through maybe two chapters, I was already excited to read the second book. This book is a perfect blend of magic, baking, and adventure. Spoiler: Seth was the warlock, and I kind of saw it coming, but that was more of my cynicism than the writing giving it away prematurely. I can’t wait to read the second book and find out more about witchy baking and the backstory of all the characters in Taos.

I received this copy from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The number one thing that drew me to this book was that cover. It is sickly sweet and yet there seems to be this sinister feel to it. I had to know what this was about. Turns out it is a magically baking book. Just what I needed.

Do not read this book if you are already hungry. There are so many delicious baked goodies in this and the descriptions and the love of our main character for baking are so good. I wanted to go bake or at least I wanted to eat all the baked goodies mentioned. I mean I am lazy. I’d like an Anise in my life who would bake all the things for me.

While most of this focuses on the magical baking as that is the talent of our main character and the world that she is taken into, there is a lot more to this world. There are various talents out their like necromancy. I felt that this was not developed enough in the background. There seem to be little talk about rules. There seem to be a lot of different talents but little shown of how they work. I just wanted to know and see more of that. We got to see so many witches and yet I got such little idea. The same of this goes for the guardians and their contracts. However I have gathered this is an element of the next book.

I have to say that the plot wasn’t very special. Of course there was a villain that was after Anise. It was also way too obvious who that was going to turn out to be. With this idea of magical bakeries there was just so much more that could have been done I think.

Even so I liked Anise who was really just an ordinary girl who had to work hard to gain any approval. I am glad she made friends but it was kind of sad this was through her mother’s friends to be honest. It would be great to see her make a friend that she made out of her own strength. Her interactions with her guardian were amusing but I did find her angry at him was misdirected. It wasn’t like he had a choice at being her guardian. He was assigned.

Anise, like her mother, is a witch, but she's grown up in the "normal" world.  Witches are generally distrusted, feared, and downright discriminated against, so she's gotten used to hiding her true self and moving frequently.  After an accident, however, Anise is sent to live with her great aunt, who owns the only magical bakery in the country, situated in a community of witches.  There, of course, she finds out that many things her mother told her were lies, that she needs a lot of remedial bakery training, and she needs to have a bodyguard whenever she leaves the house.  Because, oh yeah, the last bakery apprentice is missing and may have been killed.

Anise is in college, so while I think that would technically make this new adult, it reads much more like a young adult novel.  There's bit of a Princess Diaries vibe, since she goes from working at the local grocery bakery to being the heir apparent to her great aunt's bakery, making friends with the daughters of Syndicate members, and being important enough to have a bodyguard following her around.

I'm a pretty big fan of the Great British Bake Off, which is a good thing, because a large part of the book is about Anise baking, or taking pastry classes, or thinking about baking...  Personally, I loved the descriptions of baking and how magic affected it.  There's not as much about the rest of the magical system, which I suppose could be explained away as Anise is more interested in nailing down pastry basics so that she can earn a place at her great aunt's bakery.  Since this is the first in a series, I'm hoping there's more about the actual magic side of things in later books.

“Your power feels like pink sugar. Or tapping a spoon through the crust on a really good crème brûlée. But there’s a redder, bready vibe to it, and—” Her stomach rumbled again. “I shouldn’t have skipped breakfast.”

I loved Anise's love of baking.  It's very clear that it's her motivation in life, even so far as leaving her mom and moving to a strange place.  She's also, refreshingly, normal.  She doesn't suffer from too-stupid-to-live syndrome (she lets the grown-ups handle the bad guy), she worries about homework and making friends, she's not the most powerful whatever.  She's also not a super-special snowflake - she quickly finds out once she gets to Agatha's bakery that while she might be very good for a home cook, she's got a long way to go to measure up to her great-aunt's standards.  While she's understandably disappointed, she takes it all in stride and throws herself into her community college pastry chef courses.

Another thing to love about this book - most witches are female, so there are gobs and gobs of strong female characters, both in her mother's generation as members of the Syndicate, and Anise's age.  Anise, helped along by some baked goods, quickly makes friends with the daughters of her mother's friends.  Besides one snippy bakery employee, there's blessedly little woman vs woman jockeying, which is a relief.

As for cons, the mystery bit is ridiculously predictable.  Also, if you don't care about baking, you're probably going to be bored.  It's everywhere in this book, from descriptions of the things Anise is baking to the prose (at one point, her thoughts fly away "like baking soda on the wind.")  Anise has pastry on her mind, and while I enjoyed it, I can certainly see where someone who's less culinary minded would find it trying.

Overall, this book is adorably sweet and a whole mixing bowl of fun!  Recommended for fans of baking and magic!

This book was a lot of fun to read. It made me crave sweets more than once while reading.

I love the baking/cooking puns with some of the names. The synopsis is slightly misleading, her aunt didn't "pop out of the woodwork", it was more of a huge misstep on Anise's part that leads her to contact her GreatAunt. But, that's the only thing.



The way the plot unfolds was done really well. There was nothing that I saw that hinted at who it was targeting her. It wasn't hugely shocking when it was revealed, but I didn't expect it to be who it was. There wasn't really any romance in this book, and the flirtation that was going on didn't involve who I thought it would, and that was nice. Though with how the book ended, that might change.



Some of the time, the dialog didn't fit, to me, with how people their age would talk. They are minimum 18-19 years old, because they are in college, but sometimes they talked like they were closer to 15-16 years old. I know that's only about a 3-year difference. But people can grow a lot during that time, especially "young people".



I felt that there was a good balance between the baking and the mystery of who the Warlock was. I also liked how all "bad witches" are referred to as Warlocks.

The only thing I have to say that is remotely negative about this book is that I am a little confused at what Anise's mother did to get kicked out of Taos. I might have missed it, and perhaps I should stop reading in bed when I am tired.

I can't wait to read the rest of this series. It was so much fun to read and the next book's synopsis sounds like it's going to be another great read.

I really enjoyed Deadly Sweet, the first book of this new series. The world was interesting, the characters were fun and there was plenty of action. I can't wait for the next book!

I have a really hard time rating anything that makes me immediately go looking for the next book (and yelling "NOOOOO!" like I just found out Darth Vader is my dad when I find out it doesn't come out for almost a year) as anything less than 5 stars. So BAM! 5 stars!

I really enjoyed Deadly Sweet. There is an element of romance but I have a hard time calling it a YA Romance. There's an element of fantasy (witches and magic and familiars) but I have a hard time calling it YA Fantasy. Actually, the main character (Anise Wise) is early college age, so I have a hard time calling it YA (but I don't think it's NA because that seems to be YA with sex scenes...) The only thing I don't have a hard time calling this book is AWESOME.

The Goodreads blurb on this book is horrible. Anise is a witch with a talent for baking enchantments in a world where witches exist but aren't terribly common or accepted. I kept thinking of witches kind of like cosplayers while reading this book. If you see someone in full cosplay randomly in public (in your school, working at the bakery at your local grocery store) they're super out of place and they definitely get the side eye. But there are places (ok, conventions mostly, but humor me) where there are LOTS of cosplayers gathered together, and then it's just par for the course. Non-cosplayers still tend to gawk a bit, take photos and things, but there is a community of like-minded people there and you're way less likely to have some jerkwad come up and start harassing you for the way you're dressed.

Except cosplayers are witches and can do magic, which may or may not be scary to people, especially when Anise feels cornered and threatened and burns down her county fair.

Basically Anise and her mom move a lot, while Anise pretends to be "normal" and tries to hide that she's a witch, and when people do find out they move to another town, and Anise starts over at the bottom of the totem pole decorating cakes at the local Grocery-Mart bakery. Oh, and gets repeatedly rejected from community college baking programs because they don't accept witches.

The blurb says Anise loves baking and potion making, but what she actually loves is baking enchantments into her pastries. (There aren't really any potions involved... but there is magic infused vanilla!) It's cute how she adds a pinch of anise to her bakes as her sort of signature. Anyway, after she accidentally burns down the county fair, Anise's great aunt Agatha finally answers an email Anise wrote her a year ago begging for an apprenticeship in her magical bakeshop (creatively called "Agatha's Bakeshop"). Little does Anise know, Agatha's Bakeshop in Taos is located on what is known as a vortex, a super magically charged area around which whole communities of witches spring up.

Suddenly Anise goes from having to hide what she is and fly under the radar as much as possible, to living in a community full of other witches. She starts making some of her first ever real friends, meets people who have known her family for generations, and learns there are all sorts of things about the witchy world she had no clue about. Including the mystery of what happened to Agatha's last apprentice, Hayley. (Seriously, they need to rewrite this blurb. She moved to Taos, not Sedona; Agatha is part of the Spellwork Syndicate, 13 matriarchs who keep the town safe and are not shady at all; Agatha's last apprentice is missing, not assassinated...)

I enjoyed the world building in this series, and appreciate how witches have particular areas of magic in which they excel, like Anise is good with kitchen witchery, Blair's family runs towards necromancy, Paula has a healing/cleansing magic that is apparently very herbal based, etc. I love Agatha's familiar, Fondant, and need to know more about her. I love Anise's Shield, Wynn, and need to know so many things about him, like where is he from? what does his contract involve? why does he sleep so much? The budding friendship between Anise and the daughters of her mom's old friends is great. OH! I need to know all the things about Anise's mom's past! What happened there? I'm really hoping these answers will be in the next book.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN I HAVE TO WAIT ALMOST A WHOLE YEAR FOR THE NEXT BOOK?!?! I need it NOW!!

This book does NOT end on a cliff hanger, and could be read as a stand alone, but it definitely left me wanting more and I can’t wait to see what develops for Anise in the second book, Sugar Spells.

Deadly Sweet by Lola Dodge is the first book in the new Spellwork Syndicate series. This one is a bit of a young adult/new adult fantasy/paranormal read mixed with a bit of mystery. The main character is a young kitchen witch who bakes spells into her goodies but after moving to a new town finds herself the target of an assassin.

This was a nice enough opener to this series introducing readers to Anise who is a witch and wants to attend pastry school but keeps getting rejected. After a witchy accident she learns of a great aunt that will take her to a more witch friendly town and teach her to bake. The only problem is this puts Anise on a hit list with many attempts on her life.

I didn’t find the mystery too particularly difficult to figure out in this one as the story went on. Also, what I kept wishing for while reading this one was a bit more into the magical side of things. I think the story focused a bit more on dessert than magic most times which left me wanting to know about the powers and witchcraft. But even with being a tad on the predictable side and not going very deep into the magical world it was still a light and fun young adult read.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.