I finished this but I didn’t really like it. I found the plot to be okay nothing super interesting or exciting about it. Heavy on th smut for the last half of the book. I love a good smut read but this one was just a bit odd. It felt like once the smut happened the plot disappears and the only focus is all of that type of action. The author attempts to get the main conflicts to take center stage again but they still get lost in the mix.

This is a witchy small-town romance with friends to lovers and mating bonds. It really had the set up to be a cute story, but I really couldn't get into it. The characters were meant to be almost 30 but communicated like teenagers. Also, the author continually started sentences with and/or which was frustrating. It made whole sections seem like they were starting and stopping. Just stuttering along, it was awful.

The plot would have been great for just the enemies-friends-lovers plot, but adding in the confrontation of Cassie and Seth's high school bullies just felt bloated. I think the story would have been way more interesting if it was about Cassie and Seth forgiving each other and discovering the magical world together. Instead, it just felt like a bad improv where the author kept yes anding the plot.

I did enjoy Cassie's foray into becoming a witch and discovering herself. I thought her enthusiasm and wonder were well done and fleshed her character. I also liked the dirty talk in the book. It was definitely spicy. But a lot of the actual communication between Cassie and Seth seemed like they were still in high school. The story would have worked a lot better if the characters were in their early 20s instead of late 20s.

Look, I didn't like this book. I thought it was messy and overall, it just wasn't for me.

Thanks to Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for the advanced copy. All opinions are mine.

I love anything paranormal and was so excited to start this book. Unfortunately, I DNF’d it in the first 10%. It fell extremely flat for me. I felt like it was very repetitive. The writing style wasn’t for me. And the info dumping didn’t seem necessary to me for the type of book it is. And I also couldn’t get behind the MMC calling the FMC names in the beginning of the book.

Thank you to SMP and NetGalley for the ARC!

While October is Kate’s month with her yearly “Horrorpalooza,” if the right options present themselves, I like to get in on the themed action and read some Halloween books myself! Of course, these often skew towards the fantastical and the romantic rather than, you know, all the actual horror. That being the case, I was excited when the publisher contacted me about a potential review for this book. Judging by the title and the adorable cover alone, I thought this would perfectly fit my more laid back Halloween vibes during the month of October!

This book was a bit of a strange read, in that I really enjoyed the first half of the story, but then as it moved into the second part, I found myself beginning to struggle more. But to start with the positives, the story starts out on a strong foot. This is very much a cozy fantasy story in that there is a distinct tone to the storytelling. Nothing is ever discussed in too serious of a manner and much of the dialogue is quite quippy and silly. There is a very stylistic approach to the storytelling, and it’s the kind of thing that will either work for readers right from the start or it will annoy them. For the most part, I was happy to go with it and did find much of it humorous. I made the wise decision early in the story to firmly slot the romantic interest into the “himbo/golden-retriever-esque” character archetype, which helped with my expectations throughout.

That being the case, however, I do wish the book had balanced some of the more light-hearted moments out with some seriousness. While the Seth was funny, I also wished we had some more sincere moments from him. And, as the story progressed, I increasingly began to struggle with the dialogue/character decisions we were getting as contrasted with the actual age of these characters.

We are meant to believe these two are adults well into their twenties. But too often the manner of their speech and the quality of their observations fell firmly into the teenage category. Towards the middle, the romantic conflict began to take an incredibly silly turn, with Cassie misinterpreting Seth’s actions and reactions to a truly ridiculous degree. I get that this was meant to delay their reconciliation, but it began to become silly to the point of frustrating very quickly. Her thought process (and his as well, from what we could see) fell firmly within the juvenile category and was simply not believable as coming from a mature woman.

I also understand that this is the type of cozy fantasy story where the magic system, such as it is, is very broad and undefined. Which is fine, that’s not the point of this type of story. However, Cassie also began to feel incredibly over-powered fairly early on which did take out some of the conflict in the last act of the story.

All of this said, I believe this is the beginning of a series, and I’m fairly certain we meet the next two main characters in this book, both of whom I’m definitely interested in following. So while I felt a bit let down by the end of this book, I’m definitely interested in checking out the next one. Fans of cozy fantasy romance should probably give this one a shot, though the overall quippy tone may be hit and miss for some readers.

Rating 7: A bit bogged down by the quippy tone and immature main characters, but still a fun enough read for the most part.

Link will go live on October 9 on The Library Ladies blog

This book was a witty mix of paranormal, sassy sarcasm, and a friends to enemies to lovers plot line! I can definitely see the Gilmore Girls inspo in the sassy one liners from our FMC Cassandra because they definitely took me back to the delivery of Lorelai which I throughly enjoyed. Or MMC Seth I won’t like the prologue almost made me not want to continue but I said nope I feel Iike there’s more to this bullying scenario and I’m so happy I did. Seth is truly a sweet himbo kind who’s just trying to regain the trust of his ex best friend. What they didn’t know what how magic would change their lives forever! I would consider this a slow burn but guuuuuurl when the spice scenes happen wooooooo watch out because it’s 🔥🔥!

I was able to receive an E-ARC through NetGalley. I really wanted to like this book since I love witchy plus size FMC. The dialogue between the two main characters seemed very teenish even though they were almost 30. It was extremely hard to get past the beginning of the book where he called her names in front of everyone due to her size and a few other times where she was fat shamed. I did however really like Pod her raccoon! Wish we got more of him. Overall not the best execution when fat shaming is a main plot point.

The steamy parts were overshadowed by the...wet parts? Not a fan of "messing" or the general premise of starting a book with a dear friend betraying another cruelly over their weight. Then making a person's weight part of the story line. A miss for me.

Werewolf book? Sign me up. As well as anything vampires. But unfortunately I really didn’t enjoy this book. The main character fat shames (which I get is the point of the book and character development and whatever) but it was just hard to come back from that for me.

What is up with second chance romances where you don't actually experience what they were like the first time around?! It makes it harder to care about them getting together again, because it feels like it's missing a huge chunk of backstory. That being said, this book isn't bad but it's not amazing either, somewhere in between. The witchy vibes were nice, if a bit weird at times (the microwave coming alive-ish?). Enjoyable enough.

I found the one of the author's previous book (Grumpy and Sunshine) to be a bit unbelievable but fun so I figured I was in for more of the same. Unfortunately this book didn't capture any of the charm of that one. In this one the characters come off as immature despite being 27 (a personal pet peeve of mine), and the thread of bully and body shaming really just turned me off this book. I think the prologue specially set this book up for failure, I just couldn't find the redemption and seeing how little they both have grown was frustrating.

I think this is one of those books that you know pretty quickly if it's going to be the book for you or not. So if you pick it up and aren't feeling it after a chapter or two, feel ok moving on.

I read this book because of a ARC from NetGalley, the storyline and general plot is what drew me into the story but there were some issues in between.
I found some of the information given throughout the book unnecessary, details that were not important to the main storyline that had me a little bored.
The dialogue in the book between the main character Cassie and her love interest Seth was a little bit childish. For two people who are supposed to be 27 years old they talk more like teenagers. Furthermore Cassie numerously states that she hates Seth for his bad treatment of her but when she talks to him she shows him barely any of this hate for him, if anything the exact opposite.
Some scenes were a little bit confusing and hard to follow along, like the prologue left me feeling like I didn’t fully understand what happened and I was left confused.
There were definitely some enjoyable parts, I found myself laughing at some of the subtle out of the blue jokes written into Cassie’s inner dialogue. I would have liked it if she was more sarcastic with herself and more serious when it came to Seth, it felt like there were conversations were I couldn’t focus on the plot and the seriousness because the dialogue was a little ridiculous.

This book is so freaking cute! I thought it was unique, witty, and full of charm!

I loved the paranormal vibes! Couldn’t recommend this sweet, funny, and quirky book!

This is my first book by this author and even though I enjoyed it, I thought it was a little bit juvenile for the main characters to be almost in their 30's. I like paranormal enemies-to-lovers books with banter, but this one was just not my type. I did like the racoon, the microwave and thought they were funny in some parts. It is a steamy book, but kind of childish steamy, in my opinion. Over all, I enjoyed it, and debating on reading the next when it comes out.. If you like fun, silly, paranormal, witch vibe books, then give it a try.
Thank you St. Martin's Griffin, NetGalley, and Charlotte Stein for my advanced copy.

A plus sized heroine with witchy powers, a lone werewolf, and a pet raccoon is what drew me into this story. This was the third werewolf romance story in a row that I read and the worst. There is constant fat shaming of the main character. Both characters are extremely immature and annoying. I didn't like any of the characters. I couldn't relate to any of the characters; and I, too, am a plus sized woman. There was so much that made no sense whatsoever. I wanted to like this, but I found myself constantly wanting to DNF it. I made myself finish it. If you like a bit of werewolf smut and romance, with a witchy twist, skip this one.

Another book lately that was not for me, I really need to stop with second chance/enemies to lovers, I am not fond of either so the writing and plot has to be amazing for me to care about the characters and in this case neither was good, starting with the fat shaming at the beginning and then a half explanation, very flimsy that FMC took so fast and even felt bad for him, no.
Then so much dialogue, which I normally love but found boring here, I didn’t even care about the werewolf and witch and mystery situation.

This was so much fun! The banter between Cassandra and Seth is hilarious and watching them deny what they know is inevitable was so great.

I wanted to love this book, it had some charm and the dialogue was great and full of banter and some of it even made me laugh. But the thing that held me up is the prologue and the hero's treatment of the heroine, when you begin with that kind of behavior, I'm already put off by the hero and expecting the hero to grovel and redeem himself for the whole book (which he does but also in a way that feels wholly unbelievable, and I'm not even talking about the whole werewolf thing). I wish that prologue hadn't happened, maybe they had a different kind of falling out but being best friends for so long only for the MMC to abandon the FMC and become cool and popular and friends with the bullies who tortured the heroine all through high school doesn't make for a great foundation, at least to me.

I wanted to love this book so much. Unfortunately, this just wasn't it. I didn't like the comments on the main characters weight and size. The "best friend" was horrible. I didn't even make it past 20%.

I have been looking forward to reading How to Help a Hungry Werewolf which has a fun premise, but I could not get past the writing choices. There were so many repetitious pauses and filler words/phrases that I became infuriated after a few chapters and the dialogue seemed a bit incongruous, at times fitting within scene but at other points they spoke as if they were children (not the flashbacks). I also feel misled by the comparison to What We Do in the Shadows and Gilmore Girls.

Paranormally delicious really should be the only review I leave, but... Y'all this one was SO fun! I hope we get more paranormal romances from Stein, because if this is any indication if shes writing Im reading....