This one was so good! It definitely expanded upon the universe introduced in book 1. I loved getting to meet all the families. 4.5 stars rounded up.

DNF @ 41%

I was very excited for this book because I really liked The Hatmakers but alas, it doesn't seem to have the same charm that the first book had. I attempted it twice and failed to finish it both times.

The Mapmakers spends a lot of time expanding the world of Hatmakers and introducing a new cast of characters, which is great and might work for some, but I preferred the more contained, small town story that the first book in this series had.

I would still recommend this series to anybody that enjoys middle grade fantasy as it is magical and fun, and I still stand by my opinion that book one would make a wonderful movie.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

I received this book for free from netgalley for an honest review.

Really well thought-out book with amazing characters and excellent setting. Love the cover

WOW! This book is beyond amazing! It is magical, full of heart, hopeful, full of adventure. moving, enchanting, and so much more! Whenever I picked up "The Mapmakers", I went on a magical journey and simply could not put this book down!

This is the second book in Tamzin Merchant's "Hatmakers" series, and, oh my goodness, I simply adore this series so much! Ms. Merchant's writing style is vivid, visceral, detailed, magical, and I could envision each and every moment while reading. Her passion for the story she is telling is so clear, and the world she has created is so full of wonder. She has seamlessly blended history, fantasy, and so, so much heart to create a story that shows anything is possible if you put your heart into it. Also, Paola Escobar's illustrations are incredible, beautiful, whimsical, and magical!

Cordelia Hatmaker and her friends are so kind, brave, caring, and smart. Cordelia has a map that can only be read by starlight, and she believes that this map will lead her to find her father, who many others believe to have died at sea. However, Cordelia believes that her father is alive, and will do anything to find him. I do not want to say too much about the plot due to spoilers, but, I will simply say, this book is truly remarkable. While looking for her father, Cordelia soon finds out that magic itself is in danger. Along with her friends, Cordelia begins to unravel clues and secrets, and discovers even more about magic, herself, her family, and others along the way. Will Cordelia and her friends, both new and older, be able to stop evil from destroying all of the magic? Will all of the different families be able to put aside past differences and come together to help and protect each other and the good magic all around them? You will simply have to read to find out!

(Possible Spoilers!)
Oh my goodness, this book truly kept me on the edge of my seat. Seeing all of the different families come together to save those they care about most was truly beautiful and so, so magical!

I highly recommend this book! I hope there will be many more books in this amazing series!

Thank you so much to NetGalley and W.W. Norton & Company-Norton Young Readers for the ARC of this book, it is simply incredible! All opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Mystical and fun. My kids enjoyed it as well as myself. Great storytelling, and awesome kid characters. If you like magical books, try this one. Thanks NetGalley for the ARC

Thanks to NetGalley for the advanced reader copy.

This is a solid Middle Grade Fantasy/Historical novel that definitely benefits from reading in series order. It ticks many of the boxes for a fun series, packed with action, magic, and engaging characters.

We return to the magical England Tamzin Merchant introduced us to in book one, "The Hatmakers". Cordelia Hatmaker lives with her family of magical hat makers, the Hatmakers, and there are rival families, the Glovemakers, the Bootmakers, the Cloakmakers, and the now disreputable Canemakers. Each family has a Royal charter, and after a falling out years earlier, refuse to even talk to another member of a magical family.

Cordelia's father was reported missing by his colleague Witloof at book one's outset, and we find out at this book's open that Cordelia has been slipping out after dark to look for clues regarding her father's disappearance; she's still the only one of her family who is convinced he is not dead. She needs to find him to reverse the family's dwindling fortunes, and though caught by Sam, the orphan the Hatmakers took in in the last book, Cordelia is reluctant to share the purpose of her nightly hunts.

Cordelia ends up stumbling on a major secret her father has kept from the rest of his family: he's a member of the Secret Society of Mapmakers. The Mapmakers create and maintain maps, often to magical locations, and it's vital that now that Cordelia is also one of them, according to the Mapmakers' librarian Peregrine, she must maintain the Society's secrets. At the same time, Witloof has escaped the King, and he is on the hunt for specific magical locations. Cordelia finally acknowledges she'll have to bring Sam into the secrets, and Goose, too, and all of them will have to find a way to bring all the Makers back together if they are to defeat Witloof.

This book was fun! Cordelia is energetic, and super determined. Though I wish she had opened up to Sam earlier, Cordelia is seemingly tireless at trying to find her father, despite her family's disbelief. I loved how she, Sam and Goose finally got people to begin working together, though it did take things getting pretty bad for all Makers for that to happen.

The story wraps up nicely, though I would love it if Merchant returned to this world, as Cordelia is a fun character, and I liked this alternate take on English history.

Thank you to Netgalley and to W.W. Norton & Company for this ARC in exchange for my review.

The sequel to The Hatmakers, The Mapmakers picks up with our protagonist, Cordelia, as she continues on her magical quest of mystery and friendship.

This was a very fun sequel to The Hatmakers! Cordelia has improved a lot since the first book! This novel has magic, adventures, and a dash of humor! The writing is very beautiful with vivid world-building! This is a perfect read for fans of Ophelia!

After saving England from war, Cordelia Hatmaker is back for another adventure. Determined to find out what happened to her father, Cordelia becomes entangled in a secret society of Mapmakers. To thwart the threat to the essence of magic itself, Cordelia and her friends must convince the rival maker families to work together.

This was such a great continuation of Cordelia Hatmaker’s story! It’s full of the same magic and wonder of the first book and introduces us to a few new characters.

I love the whimsy in this series. The history of the Makers is explored further and I really love the idea of being able to imbue objects with different qualities based on the material they are made from!

I can’t wait to read these to my daughter when she is older!

Thank you to NetGalley, Tamzin Merchant, and W.W. Norton & Company/Norton Young Readers for the e-arc of The Mapmakers in exchange for an honest review.

I don't know why but this series just isn't for me. I recently read book 1 in preparation for this book and while I didn't hate it, I didn't really like it either. It was cute but I just am not connected to it. I restarted the first book twice because I thought I was missing something at first. There's a ton of info and backstories and history between everyone already and I felt the same way with this one. There's a ton of characters and just so much going on the whole time. I am not having a good time and had to force myself to keep going. I'm so sorry this didn't work for me. I was really excited for it. Thank you netgalley, publishers, and the author for an earc.

Cordelia is at her misadventures again! In this second installment she discovers a secret society that she becomes a part of that is basically tasked with stopping some evil doings and trying to get the makers back together.

I thought this was a great sequel to the first book. It drew on the world elements that I really liked from the first book and did a great job of expanding on it in believable ways. There was a thread or two or mystery throughout the whole book that kept me involved and curious as to what would happen. We even had a few satisfying twists. My favorite thing about this world is the magic system that is just unique and fresh and this book continued to deliver!

This is such a wonderful story and I cannot wait to read Tamzin's future books.

It is hard to know what to write about the book because I don't want to let any spoilers slip. I will say that this book brings us back into the world of Makers, there is still a serious threat, and Cordelia seems to be the only person who ever sees the threat.

I teared up a couple of time while reading this book. I absolutely loved the ending; Jelly! (you will understand this when you read it).

If you loved The Hatmakers as much as I did, you need to pick up the sequel The Mapmakers by Tamzin Merchant a fabulous middle grade series. Following the capture of Lord Whitloof, our beloved Cordelia Hatmaker and her friends Goose Bootmaker and Sam Lightfinger are terrified to discover that he has escaped the gallows leaving a trail of destruction in his wake that threatens to rid the world of all of its magical wonders. Cordelia discovers through a series of clues left by her Father using the Starlight Map from the first book, that he was part of a secret society of Mapmakers who help to find and preserve magic all around the world. The location of the Mapmakers hideaway provides a perfect nod to the history of publishing in London. With magic being destroyed, Cordelia and her friends hatch a plan to try to bring peace between the makers that they can harness their collective powers as the only way to save their magic and defeat Lord Whitloof once and for all. This is much easier said than done with years spent being sworn enemies. Cordelia continues to hold out hope that she will find her Father, though no one else seems to believe that it is possible but her. Join Cordelia, her friends, family, and all the fun makers they meet along the way as they help solve the mysteries of magic and help the makers start to see that by working together they can help defeat a common enemy. I look forward to reading more books by this author in the future. Thank you to NetGalley and W. W. Norton & Company for the advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

The Mapmakers is the second book in the Hatmaker series. I feel these books should be read in order to really add to the depth of the story and really because they are enjoyable middle grade books. The Makers are families full of magic but Witloof it out to destroy all magic. Can Cordelia and her friends save magic and get the enemy Maker to work together?

Overall this was a fun book to read. From beginning to end this story had something going on like there wasn't time to waste. The idea of the makers is different, each family has their own specialty. I liked how they were all brought together, working together for the better.

I am eager to get a copy for our kids to read knowing they will enjoy this story.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Once again this is the second book in a series and I did not read the first! The first is called The Hatmakers, and I had enough "backstory" in this one to get up to speed. This is a fantastic little fantasy novel that really reminded me a lot of my own favorite book series, the Fly by Night books by Frances Hardinge. (Weird to call them a series but there are only two. Possibly more eventually??) I love Cordelia, the main character of this book, and it's an excellent middle grade.

NetGalley ARC Educator 550974

Part two of Cordelia's story. More action, the same quirky characters as well as some new ones. Cordelia is still searching for her father. She stumbles upon a secret group of mapmakers. I hate that the story has ended but the memories will stay with the reader.

Another whimsical adventure in the world of Cordelia Hatmaker!

Since Cordelia saved England in the last book, she figures now she has time to finally find her father. But while she's trying to puzzle out what the map he sent her means she finds a hidden society of Mapmakers. And it turns out that the Maker families she was raised to believe are the only ones with magic aren't actually alone. There's magic all around if you know how to find it. However, dangers lurk and she needs to get all the Makers to work together to save the world.

First off, this series is set in such a delightful and whimsical world. I really enjoy the magic system and how it seems to be based on the kinds of things you imagine as a child. Cordelia, Sam, and Goose are fun characters and I think they're very relatable but still interesting to read about as you discover more as you read the story. This adventure had all the high stakes of the first book, which I enjoyed, but it still felt safe enough to just read for fun. There were definitely some frustrating decisions and twists and turns of the story, but they all made sense if you took into account who the characters are, so I can't really be mad about them.

Overall, if you enjoy interesting magic systems and middle grade fantasy, I think you'll like this series. You definitely need to start with the first one to understand the world, but it's easy to hop back into with this book. I really hope we'll see more stories in set in the London of the Makers in the future.