I absolutely loved this novel.
Such a great story with defined characters and a great plot.
What drew me in the most was how fleshed out the characters were
The writing style was fluid and relateable.
The cover was fascinating as well.
A reviting read overall
Definitely recommend adding this to your TBR!

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

I honestly thought I reviewed this sooner. I enjoyed this book very much. I can’t wait to see what this author will come out with next.

Cook provides a fanciful tale of the chosen child. Fans of Rainbow Rowell have their next landing spot.

This was a fun read with great representation and pacing. I enjoyed the characters and the way everything turned out in the end.

I typically love YA novels but this felt far more children's to me than YA. The story is cute enough but not something that could keep either my child or myself engaged.

Unfortunately I was unable to read this one because the formatting of the PDF did not work well with a screen reader, which I use for accessibility reasons. It sounds good though, and I still hope to read it at some point!

This felt very much like a fanfiction - with the usual endless tropes, clichés, repetitiveness, lack of world building, mary/marty stu etc. In truth, you could just switch Felix for Harry and Aero for Draco and you pretty much get the idea of what you have here (if they were on summer vacation). The plot was so predictable as to be banal and it was hard to stay invested in anything.

Story: Felix's parents divorce and he finds himself at a remote village to be taken care of by his magical grandmother (who is also supposed to introduce him to magic). There he meets headstrong witch Hermi...uh Fern and her mousy companion Ron.....er...Charlie. The trio have to solve a mystery over disappearing teens that for some reason only they can do - the adults just let them do all the spells even though Felix has never done magic before, Fern is semi competent, and Charlie can't make his magic work. Cue finding a mermaid and a dragon - because yes, might as well be as uncreative as possible.

I could go on and on about how frustrating a read this book was, even if intended for a very young audience. There was no resolution on the missing children, the adults were typically weird and unable to do anything useful, and the kids are the inane Scooby Gang. The villain is so obvious as to be comical and the plot about the villain needing a relative in love in order to complete her heinous spell is borderline ridiculous. There are just too many logic holes, plot holes, worldbuilding fails, and cardboard characters. Don't even get me started about how many times someone was going to say something important when they were suddenly interrupted (x6).

I'd pass on this one. Reviewed from an advance reader copy provided by the publisher.

This was okay--there were some cultural inconsistencies (the book is set in England but doesn't use proper spellings or colloquialisms, etc.) and it read a bit younger than the target audience, which is okay but might be a letdown/confusing for readers in expectations.

Felix Silver, Teaspoons and Witches is fine if you just want an entertaining afternoon. It seems to me that the story could have been better, the characters need a little more work, as well as the setting.
A warning: if you are bothered by stories with themes related to homosexuality, I do not recommend this book, although there are no explicit scenes, beyond the occasional kiss.
I thank the author, publishers, and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book, and declare that the opinion I have expressed above is based solely on what I think of this book.

‘Felix Silver, Teaspoons & Witches’ was a really fun, easy read, with likeable characters. The plot was fairly straightforward, but engaging, which kept me reading right until the end. This book had some interesting friendships/relationships in it too!

There were a few things I found that lessened my enjoyment though. On the whole I found that the novel didn’t feel quite as polished as it potentially could have been. Grammatically I didn’t find any issues, but the story felt quite rushed to me. This meant that the characters felt underdeveloped, and as a result, less easy to connect with as I read. The romance was sweet but to me it felt a little rushed to, or even rather instantaneous after the first meeting. This made it something I couldn’t happily invest myself in.

The last thing I found was that it was difficult to tell who was narrating a chapter until a couple of paragraphs in. This made it hard to follow the story once there were multiple narrators. This could easily be helped with name of the PoV character with the title of each chapter.

The plot itself I found really interesting, and especially with the fun magic system. I loved how magic seemed to be integrated with the town it was set in. I would have loved to have seen more of the limitations of the magic, and more learning about how it works as Felix is still learning.

Overall I did enjoy reading this but I feel that there were a few things that could really improve the way the story is told and make it more impactful. I do not hate it in the slightest, and am interested to see if the final publication has been edited further. I will be getting myself a copy to see if the issues I found were just part of the early reader version. Especially as I think this story is such a fun read!

(I marked this as 3 stars but it is closer to 3.25/3.5.)

Thank you to Netgalley, the publisher and the author for gifting me this ARC (Advanced Reader Copy). I am leaving this review voluntarily. This title will be published 30th August 2022.

3,5* upped to 4
It's a book full of potential and I enjoyed it as it kept me hooked.
Some more character developement and world building would help and make it more compelling.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an electronic copy to read in exchange for an honest review.

There was so much promise in this book - but overall it was quite lacking. It was a fast read - in part because there was no world building (I couldn't even tell you what country the book was supposed to be set in). The characters were underdeveloped and it was fairly confusing when the narratives switched between Felix and Aero.

As I was reading an ARC there were also errors that hopefully will rectified before printing:
- Fern had trouble with her brakes not breaks
- I doubt fishermen eat chips/fries in the early morning
- When going to the mermaid cave Felix puts his teaspoon in his pocket then when he needs it he has to retrieve it from his backpack.

These are just a few things that stood out and made me cringe.

Felix Silver, Teaspoons, and Witches is a great story of family and friends coming together to defeat evil. Unfortunately, there was almost no world building, we were plunked down in a magical world with no knowledge of how it works and what the magical parameters are. It’s a solid 3.5 stars for what is there, but there was so much potential to expand and make it a 5 star read that was missed out on.

LACKING IN WORLD BUILDING, CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT AND PLOT PROGRESSION

I think it's safe to say that this one just didn't do it for me. There was only one thing, that I enjoyed - and that was Aggie, Felix' spry grandmother. Other than that, this just felt like a waste of time.

👎 What I Disliked 👎

Aero: Okay, this might be a weird one... But the romantic interest, Aero? Every time I saw that name on a page, all I could see was chocolate 😅

Pacing: The pacing was all over the place, but especially the first half of the book was an issue for me. It felt super rushed, too much was thrown into the mix to quickly - fantasy elements, mystery and a HOARD of characters. Way too many, way too fast. Editing would have been good.

Setting: While it is explicitly written, that this story takes place in England, I was forever thinking that it shouldn't have been. For once, it did nothing for the story whatsoever. Secondly, the author has chosen to write everything in American English, opting for American spelling, American idioms and expression. Often it also seemed that the author (though I believe I've read somewhere that he's half British) knows very little about British/English culture. A brit would never say, that they were a senior in highschool, Mr. Cook.

World Building: To begin with I was on board with the fantasy elements of the world, that Cook tried to built. Magic performed with silver spoons instead of wands? Absolutely! Personal familiars that take the form of cure animals? Sign me up! But quickly I soured on the whole thing. There were just too many unanswered questions. So much that was left unsaid and then ultimately didn't make any sense at all. It hindered my enjoyment considerably.

Characters: While Aggie was a real pleasure, I didn't feel the same about any other character. Aero became a bit of a joke to me - a clichéd love interest dressed in a candy wrapper. Felix didn't really step up and show his colours at any point. But perhaps the biggest mistake were all the many, many side characters that are just there. They have no lives of their own, no stories of their own and serve no purpose except to give the semblance of a personal life for Felix. I really wanted more background, more personality and more development for all the characters.

Felix Silver goes to live with his grandmother Aggie, while his parents are going through a divorce. Aggie teaches Felix all about how to control and use the magic he holds within himself. Felix makes new friends in Dorset Harbor and is welcomed into the magic community. However, weird things are happening around town. History seems to be repeating itself as teenagers are starting to go missing. Why are teenagers going missing? Can Felix and his friends solve the mystery?

I really enjoyed the details Harry Cook included about Dorset Harbor. I could picture myself there with the characters. I also enjoyed the romance parts between Felix and Aero. However, I felt the characters could have been a little more developed. The book starts from Felix’s point of view and then at some point begins to switch back and forth between Felix and Aero. It is sometimes unclear for several sentences which character’s point of view we are reading from. I would definitely add the name before each part so that the reader knows which character’s point of view each chapter is written. I strongly feel like this was written more like a middle-grade book instead of a young adult novel. I think if the characters were 14 instead of 17, the book would be much more understandable and relatable. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and would rate it 3.5 stars. I am rounding up to 4 stars in hopes that the final version is more thoroughly edited, and the point of view labels are added. I’m also hoping it is changed to a middle-grade book.

I highly recommend this book to anyone that loves fantasy books about magic, especially if you like LGBTQ representation.

Oof this was a classic case of great premise, horrible execution. I don't even know what to point out - the way the magic system wasn't explained and was just randomly used whenever it felt convenient, the fact that there were So.Many.HarryPotter.References. No way you're in publishing and that ignorant at this point. Especially with a queer main character. Then there was the insta-love that..just. No. Call it lust if you want but gimme some substance beyond the characters just having two convos that are ALWAYS interrupted, no matter what - I mean, yes, this is a beloved plot element but maybe don't use it in every single conversation when your two characters know nothing about each other. Also. Why the random POV switch without any indication when the voices sound exactly the same and the reader has to figure out who is talking because you don't distinguish them enough? No. Nope. Not to mention that the secondary characters were flatter than a crepe, especially since they only mattered when Felix needed someone to lift him up, pimp him out or help him solve the "mystery". The only redeemable thing about this was Felix's grandmother.

This was a fun ride! The story and characters were great! Highly recommend! I can’t wait to buy a finished copy when it’s released!

This book had so many problems, primarily the author's obsession with clichés. If there was a cliché about witches and witchcraft, Cook found it and included it in the book. Felix, the main character, read way too young for his supposed 17 years. Even after he stated his age I wanted to debate him and say, "no sir, you're 12." I do not prefer instalove but on some occasions I can buy it. Not this one. The magic system, even though he included all the witchy clichés, he left pretty much unexplained only to add new aspects whenever the plot needed a little help. It didn't help. I figured out the plot and the "twist" way before these characters did. I do not recommend this book.

The romance was cute and I loved the biphobia call out but I honestly feel like this didn’t deliver beyond that.