Thank you Berkley for the gifted e-copy.

I absolutely loved The Witch of Wild Things, so I was excited to continue the series with Lightning in Her Hands. This book focuses on Teal, the second sister, and she can control the weather. Well, more like the weather feeds off of her emotions. However, when the sisters mom left, she took part of Teal's gift with her, and Teal wants it back. She also wants a date to her ex's wedding, so she decides to ask her (former?) best friend, Carter. Carter needs a favor in return - Teal to marry him so he can access the trust his grandmother is leaving him.

I really enjoyed the depth of Teal's character. Not only is she dealing with the abandonment from her mom, trying to harness her power, and trying to repair her friendship with Carter, but she is still trying to heal from an abusive relationship. Luckily, her and Carter seem to patch things up friendship-wise fairly quickly and things get steammmmmmmy (but it is a slow burn).

I'm looking forward to the next book in this series!

Cuban forced-proximity fantasy realism romance? Read more please. This read really fast for me. The first one was about the other sister Sage, and I was very excited to read about the one who's anger ignites lightning (Teal). I'm still curious about the third sister. Thank you Netgalley, publisher, and author!

Lightening in Her Hands is a terrific second book in the WIld Magic Series. We meet Teal and her sisters originally in Witch of Wild Things. And, to be honest, Teal isn’t great. We learn a lot more about Teal in book 2. We discover why she’s so selfish and pushes others away and gets into relationships, both romantic and platonic, which are emotionally and verbally abusive. Teal has a lot of trauma. She’s the middle sister, and just wants to be there for her family, but doesn’t know how. She’s ok with being unlikable, and frankly, aren’t we all a bit unlikable? But she doesn’t want to be unlovable.

One of the areas that has caused issues with her relationships in the past has been her relationship with magic. She doesn’t have full control of it, and she realizes it's because her selfish and frankly narcissistic mother stole a piece when she abandoned Teal and her sisters. Teal has a lot of anger, obviously. In order to control her magic, she needs all of her magic back, which is tricky because her mother’s gift is disappearing.

Throughout the story we watch as Teal learns to be a bit more vulnerable and works on her relationship with her sisters and her grandmothers. I love this family so much, and can’t wait for the third book just to jump back into spending time with the crazy and dysfunctional but loving Flores family.
Of course Teal has a friend, Carter who’s in a bind. He needs to marry in order to receive an inheritance. Who better to marry than his friend that he’s in love with? They had a huge falling out, but he knows he can count on her for this. What can go wrong? Of course, the marriage of convenience grows into something more as Teal and Carter allow themselves to really get to know each other and heal some wounds. Carter has a family who also has their issues, and a huge blind spot when it comes to them. He’s the golden child who can do no wrong, which is hard for Teal, who’s not welcomed into the family with open arms.

I liked Carter, but I wanted to see more from his growth arc. However, I appreciated his steadiness and devotion to her. Teal shares both her magic and her bipolar diagnosis, and Carter supports and cares for her rather than makes her feel like she has to prove herself to him constantly. Carter is patient and has always been in love with Teal (swoon) and he lets Teal just be herself. She’s bold and angry and has a lot of feelings and I just loved his steadfastness beside her. Sometimes I don’t love the friends to lovers trope because I think you miss some of the “oh, i’m getting to know you as a person” moments in a relationship. Because Carter and Teal had a falling out, they did have a second chance to get to know each other again which I liked.

All in all, I loved returning to the Flores family and getting to hang out with Teal and her sisters. I can’t wait for the third book, and Sky’s story.

i LOVE the friends to lovers and fake marriage tropes + Raquel's writing and stories so this book was an easy winner for me, I didn't have to think about it. I was caught off guard by how much it touched me! I love all of Raquel's books and I can't wait for the third book of the sisters' stories.

Excellent book! It's both funny and heartwarming. Our heroine can control the weather with her emotions. Imagine how hard it is to control your emotions, now imagine if every time the weather changes you get the blame? If only her mother hadn't taken so much of our heroine's power when she left.
Now our heroine is on a quest to find her mother, oh, and a date to a wedding. Meanwhile, our hero needs a wife. A fake one will do. He can't get his inheritance without one. Of course, romance blossoms. But would we want it any other way?
Wonderful story! Thank you NetGalley, and berkleypublicity@penguinrandomhouse.com

I loved the first book in this series. Unfortunately, I had a hard time connecting with this second story and that is obviously on me and not the book. I recognize that it has great potential to appeal to other readers and I encourage others to try it out! Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book.

3.5 Stars

Raquel Vasquez Gilliland is always incredible no matter what she writes, and I’ve been thoroughly enjoying her foray into adult romance. I will say upfront that I don’t think this romance is as strong as the first book in the companion series, especially in terms of the relationship at the center.

Childhood friends-to-lovers is always sweet and fun to read, but I also think it’s deceptively simple and actually really hard to pull off. When there’s an established relationship between characters that began far before the story ever started, it can be hard to catch the audience up to speed and make them authentically feel that intimate familiarity and the weight of all that shared history. And for me, I never really got to the point of buying into that with these characters. That doesn’t mean I didn’t enjoy them together or feel invested in their present-day relationship dynamic—I did. But I just think there was still space for even more emotional connection by the end.

I think part of why I feel that way is because it seems like the story isn’t sure what it wants to be. On the one hand, there’s this deeply emotional story line about Teal not being able to control her magic, and how that’s deeply rooted in the trauma from her mom’s disappearance, but on the other hand it’s also trying to be this very straightforward fake dating/fake marriage of convenience and second chance romance. And don’t get me wrong: I admire that the book doesn’t feel the need to choose between the two, but at the same time, I’m not sure that it found that perfect middle ground between the two concepts.

But putting that aside, I still appreciate this story’s willingness to explore hard-hitting topics like struggling with unhealthy coping mechanisms when managing mental health, being brave enough to not only ask other people for help but accept it when it’s offered to you, and how trauma is often a communal experience that affects people in different ways. All of that is incredibly valuable, and I appreciate how the story gives Teal space to confront those things, and especially how her journey towards healing brings her closer to her sisters and reaffirms that she is surrounded by a loving a family who supports her in everything she does, even in her mistakes.

So overall, while I did personally find the romantic relationship a bit lacking and the oscillation between trope-y romance and family drama to be a little rough around the edges, I still enjoyed this and I look forward to reading the next installment.

This book was a heartwarming read that balanced romance and fantasy, making it easy to pick up if you're interested in either genre. Definitely read book 1 to help give context to this book.

This is the second book in the Wild Magic series where we follow Teal. Teal struggles with her power and that leaks into her life. When an opportunity for a marriage of convenience with her ex-bestfriend comes up she takes to help him and to get money to hire a PI to find her mother. Chaos ensues as expected with the Flores sisters but I really enjoyed getting in Teal's head especially after her attitude in the first book.

Thank you to netgalley and the publishers for providing me with an arc for an honest review.

How fun was this one?!Andee is a pyrotechnic engineer. Ok, I’m always fascinated with firework shows and how they are created so I thought this was so cool! Anyway, she also is the daughter of an escaped from prison arms dealer who’s searching for her, his long lost daughter! Mix in a sexy CIA agent and you get this blast of a book!
Thank you #NetGalley and #berkleypub for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

The way that I would read 1 million books about these characters. This book felt so special and these characters are just genuinely the most hilarious ,destructive, and beautiful people. I think these books are a love letter to sisters and the chaos we put each other through. But really I think I loved this one even more than the first if that’s even possible.

I really liked the first book in this series, but the romance in this one was so convoluted and the logistics of their arrangement made no sense. (His grandma is withholding his inheritance until he gets married, so he marries someone his grandma hates? Okayyyyy…)

I am so happy there was a sequel to The Witch of Wild Things because I absolutely loved that book.
Lightning in Her Hands brings us back to the Flores women and Teal. I really enjoyed this book. The relationship between the sisters is touching and fun. There was plenty of humor. It also surprised me that there was quite a bit more spice in this book than the first.
The generational relationships were also quite interesting and well-written.
I am really hoping there's a third book for Sky's story.
Thanks so much to Netgalley and Berkley Publishing for the ARC!!

This was a fun read, I enjoyed the magical touches! It was perfect timing for a seasonal read. I read this as part of a buddy read group

I liked a good deal of Lighting in Her Hands, which gives us a peek into a dysfunctional family of witches who are struggling with a broken coven. The complicated heroine, her struggles, and the worldbuilding are all great, and the angst factor is high. But the romance has spates of only being so-so, and sometimes the heavy family drama really slows its progress. While overall, it’s not my favorite among Vasquez Gilliland’s books, this one is still a decent outing.

Former fitness instructor Teal Flores’ final memory of her mother is of her leaving Teal and her siblings at a very young age to “go on a long trip.” As an adult, Teal is still grappling with the emotional difficulties this left her with, which means she’s bad at holding established relationships and thinks herself unlovable. The fact that she’s a witch with little to no control over her powers just makes things worse. The weather around her is connected to her emotions, so if she’s sad, it pours. And she can cause lightning to strike when she’s really angry.

Teal and Carter Velasquez have been best friends since they were literally in Pampers, but they’ve been estranged since the summer before, when Carter gave Teal a life-changing kiss and she panicked and jumped into a new relationship with someone else. That man, Andre, has dumped Teal and a previous boyfriend was abusive to her emotionally. She wants to convince Carter to take her to her sister Sage’s wedding to Nate (heroine and hero of the first book in the series, Witch of the Wild Things). Carter agrees – and Teal is shocked when he proposes to her on the morning of the ceremony.

It turns out Carter has an ulterior motive. His Aubuelo, Gene, has left him a chunk of money in his will, but it’s being held in the trust of his wife, Erika. Carter won’t get the cash unless he ties the knot by the age of thirty. He offers to split the money with Teal. The marriage won’t be ‘real’ of course. And it will be purely sexless.
Teal agrees to the fake relationship, to the fake cohabitation, although it’s pretty clear things will never be purely platonic between them. Soon they’re stuck trying to figure out if what they feel is real or just lust.

There’s a decent crackle of sensuality buried at the heart of Lightning In Her Hands, but the relationship is pretty weak for the most part. I could buy Teal and Carter as childhood friends and I bought their mutual lust, but the love feels as though it’s coming almost entirely from his side. The low-obstacle, low-tension situation – all of the plot conflict being driven by Teal’s total self-loathing – also makes it difficult to get to know Carter very well. He’s basically there to be sweet and love her, which is nice but not compelling.

Teal, however, is a great heroine. I found her hobby of repeatedly turning to Reddit for advice funny, her struggles and realistic reaction to her previous abuse relatable. Rebuilding Teal as a heroine when she slept with her sister’s boyfriend six months before this book begins was always going to be heavy sledding, but the author does perfectly well with her. Teal’s conflicted feelings about her grandmother and mother, her fights with her mean ex-best friend; all of this is enthralling, and I really appreciated the bipolar representation the author gives us.

Carter is a little more elusive as a character, and he isn’t well-rounded. He has a big family, he loves and is good at his job, but I didn’t get to know him as well as I knew Teal by the end of the book, which made me like him less.

Lightning in Her Hands has great worldbuilding, solid representation, and a strongly written flawed heroine – but the romance is just middling, and would have put the book in the C range had it not been for the outstanding character work and lovely story about sisterhood that reminded me of Practical Magic. Those things pull the grade up slightly and mean I can offer a qualified recommendation.

Rating: 5/5
I received an eARC for my honest opinion.

In this book you will meet Teal, who has magical powers, her power is that she can control the weather. However, Teal doesn’t know if this is a curse or a gift though, because with her moods changing, she can even hide what she is really feeling. She has a mission now that she remembers that she gave a small piece of herself to her mother years ago and now she is determined to get that piece back so she can be whole. With her ex’s wedding coming up she needs to find a date and someone that she can stand to be around, with her only and first choice is her ex-best friend Carter. Carter agrees but only if she agrees to a plan as well, but if she says yes will this plan blow up in her face?

With this being book two I loved that we got to see the characters in book one, back again but with a different sister’s story. In this book you will find a cute witchy romance but so much more. You will find that it’s not just about finding one person who understands you, but also like the first book it’s about learning to love yourself, being able to heal and have a connection with your family again. I thought the plot was well developed and the pace was just perfect for a witchy romance book. I didn’t see any moments when the pace was slowing down or dragging. I love it when books are more character driven than plot driven and for me this book was character driven, yes you will see the plot and the plot is great but to see the growth of the characters throughout the book is really what wraps up a book for me. This author has a way with her words, she writes so beautifully that you will be wishing that the book was not at the end and that you still have more chapters to read. I found all the characters in this book to be easy to connect with and I could relate with Teal.

I can’t say that I ever really liked Teal in the first book but now with her own book I can understand her better, and I can say that I really like her a lot. I loved that you won’t see a character that is all put together, but instead you will find a flawed one and one that knows this and is trying to better themselves. She knows that she is broken and not just mentally but magically as well and she is on the road to making this a better year for herself and to continue with it for the rest of her life. You will watch her wrestle with abandonment, mentally abusive ex-boyfriend, and self-harm (she runs and runs a lot), and learns that it’s okay, not to be okay. I loved her growth in this book, it wasn’t fake too, for me it was a relatable experience. I liked getting to see her efforts to mend her friendship with Carter and the steps that it took to get them to their HEA. I found that it wasn’t easy and yes, they had obstacles that they had to overcome like all relationships. I liked the fact that you got to see Carter flawed as well and seeing himself working on things, it made these pair seem like they were real people to me. I loved Carter and his banter with Teal, but you will also see a very sweet and caring side to him. I loved that he really wanted to work on things with Teal but didn’t want to push her but allowed her to get there on her own. He supported her and he was there for her when she allowed him to be. When I say that you must understand that she came from a very mentally abusive relationship and at times she would overthink things and at times I was like “not again” but then I had to understand that I knew what she was going through. I liked that he didn’t treat her badly for these things, but he was understanding and connected with her on other things.

You will find magic in this book, but as I said it’s so much more than just a cute witchy romance. The way this author writes will have you believing that everyone has magical abilities because the way that she writes it just seems natural. You will find steamy scenes, great characters, great character growth, banter, Latin culture and so much more in this book and the first one. I can’t wait to read book three.

I want to thank NetGalley and Berkley Publishing for the opportunity to review this book.

I really enjoyed Lightning in Her Hands. It’s the story of Teal, the second of the Flores sisters, who are the focus of Vasquez Gilliland’s Wild Magic series. Each sister has a unique gift and Teal’s is that she can control the weather … well, she can affect the weather and she’d like to be able to control her gift.

Teal needs a date to a wedding and Carter needs a fake wife. So, they team up to help one another. Hilarity ensues, and so does love.

I thought the magic system set admit in the real world & how it worked were super fascinating. Unfortunately this took me so many times to get into & I feel like this is a me problem but my ADHD & this book just struggled. I also wasn’t a fan of the repeated miscommunication/lack of communication, which made things worse. This wasn’t my favorite book but I’m sure lots of people will really enjoy this!

Thanks to NetGalley & Berkley Publishing for the gifted copy, which I voluntarily read & reviewed.

This one has such complex characters and small-town problems. There is also a fake engagement/marriage. The sisters have very cool powers. This was a fun magical rom com. Loved how tough these characters were and how hard they fought. So many issues with family that can be relatable with or without magic.

An entertaining and cute witchy rom-com that made me laugh and root for the characters.
Good storytelling, well plotted and witty.
Recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher for this ARC, all opinions are mine