This story has a lot of characters, which I found to be a little bit overwhelming at first, but once I became comfortable with the characters I really started to enjoy this story! There were some heavier topics touched on, but it was able to still remain lighthearted and whimsical which was nice. I thought the pacing was good, and enjoyed how we slowly learned everyone’s secrets.
 
I really enjoyed the small town family traditions, the bakery run by women and all of the random pets that kept accumulating, but my favorite part of this book was Tessa Jane and Addie’s relationship. They had a complicated relationship with regret on one side and hurt on the other; I loved their reconciliation story and seeing them become sisters in more than just name. It was a really beautiful story of coming home, forgiveness and acceptance.
 
BIG thanks to @macmillan.audio for the ALC! I found the narration to be very enjoyable. My only complaint was that sometimes it was hard to differentiate between the POV’s and without a physical copy of the book I wasn’t able to flip back to the beginning of each chapter to quickly figure it out. A Certain Kind of Starlight is out today (7/23)! HAPPY PUB DAY!!🎉
 
Swipe for synopsis➡️

Read if you like:
🔮Magical realism
🧑‍🧑‍🧒‍🧒Family drama
🏘️Small town
🐶Animals
🧁Baking

Book Title: A Certain Kind of Starlight
Author: Heather Webber
Format: 🎧
Narrators: Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Willis
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Genre: Magic Realism, Women’s Fiction
Pub Date was: July 23. 2024
My Rating: 4.Stars
Pages: 320
I just loved this story.
I have read other Heather Webber stories and was please the same narrators were performing the characters in this story as they are both great!

In this story Aunt Bean asks her nieces Addie and Tessa Jane Fulbright to come home to Starlight, Alabama as she hasn’t been feeling well. She does go to doctors and is diagnoses with heart issues.
Aunt Bean owns the Starling Cake Company. A fun thing about the land is that it houses a meteor Crater. At night the crater gives off a special starlight Aurora.

Story is a magical character based story.
I love the character – well everyone but mean grandfather but he certainly added dram to the story.
I love the ending and did not want the story to end.

One reviewer recommends this story to any reader who needs a reminder that there is still a little magic left in the world.
Aww yes!

Want to thank NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for this GREAT audiobook.
Publishing Release Date was Tuesday July 23, 2024.

Thank you NetGalley for the advanced audiobook! A Certain Kind Of Starlight by Heather Webber is a story about family, forgiveness and love. When Addie comes back home, she can’t help but wonder why she left in the first place. She feels so welcomed and useful and she is finally able to connect with her half-sister Tessa Jane. However, in a small town where everyone knows everything about their neighbours, she learns secrets that will change the course of her life. I liked the narrators Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Williams. They also narrated Heather Webber’s last novel and I found the familiar narration quite enjoyable. Overall, a nice, enjoyable listen that I would recommend to others.

Full honesty- it took me a minute to figure out who was who at the start of this book, but who can deny a magical realism book set in a bakery? This story was warm, thoughtful, and have energy similar to The Secret Life of Bees, I really enjoyed it and can't wait to recommend it to friends as well!

Thank you to Net Galley and MacMillan Audio for granting me access to an audio ARC of this story! The narration was really well done and brought this story to life. In fact, it helped me to keep track of the long list of characters which allowed me to sink into the story!

This is the fourth Heather Webber book I've read. My sense upon finishing was that it didn't feel as smooth as her other books that I love. Two things make this perception inconsequential: I highlighted the heck out of it, and I'm rating it well above average. The bottom line is that Webber has never let me down—each of my five readings (I reread Midnight at the Blackbird Café in March; now six, with a second reading of Starlight ending July 13) has been a delight! Sometimes I've felt like I'd been on an emotional rollercoaster—every time, though, all is well that ends well.

It took quite a while to keep the family (and neighbor) trees straight, which might have been an early challenge to my impression of the book. I anticipated Ree's secret (advertised in the publisher's blurb) way ahead of its reveal, but Webber surprised me in other ways (brava!). The book is full of family traditions, strong matriarchs, Southern expressions and wisdom, and helpful baking tips. I especially enjoyed Aunt Bean's “from the kitchen of” entries at the beginning of each chapter, which allowed her to share her elder-wisdom in an interesting way besides in conversation with other characters. Aunt Bean and her bakery employees, the Sugarbirds, often stole the show, but Addie and Tessa Jane were good main characters—flawed, but growing. There were other lovable supporting characters and several very effective villains. To top it off, a bunch of non-human animal characters play important parts.

If you are a Heather Webber fan—or if you're just in the mood for a character-driven, found and biological family, Southern dose of magical realism—get yourself on your library hold list pronto and/or preorder the book in your favorite format(s). I've done both.

EDITED [July 13]:

I was thrilled to read an audio ARC as well. The book is narrated by Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Willis, who also narrated the audio editions of two of my previous Webber reads (plus others). Willis was also one of the narrators of Midnight at the Blackbird Café. I like Ricardo's and Willis's work—their voices are perfect for Webber's wide range of characters, lovable or not.

The slight reservation I felt after reading the e-book ARC was gone with my second reading. I don't know for sure whether it was the repeat reading or the wonderful narration that made the difference—maybe both! In any event, I have bumped up my rating slightly.

During my second reading, something Tessa Jane says in Chapter 20 was so hilarious to me that I went back to the e-book and highlighted the section. Let me know when you (think you) get there, and we can revel together!

This unbiased review is based on ARCs supplied by the publishers—Tor Publishing Group, Forge Books (print/e-book) and Macmillan Audio from Tor Forge. Publication is expected July 23.

I love magical realism, especially when it's done in a small town in the south. I love the lore behind the Starlings and the starlight, and the sisters' story was both heartbreaking and heartwarming.

I received a gifted copy of A CERTAIN KIND OF STARLIGHT by Heather Webber from Tor Publishing and an advance audiobook edition from Macmillan Audio and Netgalley. No review was required and all opinions are my own.

A CERTAIN KIND OF STARLIGHT follows half-sisters Addie and Tessa. Twelve years ago, Addie's best friend made a deathbed confession and asked Addie to keep the secret. She left town to keep this secret, removing herself from the temptation to spill. Tessa is feeling lost in darkness after a painful breakup while feeling tremendous pressure from her mother's side of the family.

When Addie and Tessa's aunt finds herself facing serious medical complications, she asks both girls to come home and they can't help but show up for their beloved aunt. Though the sisters have always kept each other at arm's length, this is the time to come together to help their aunt with her bakery business, preserving the family and the lore around the star that once fell to earth in their family's field.

I'm always a bit hit or miss with magical realism, but I have enjoyed Heather Webber's writing in the past, so was excited to pick this book up! Overall I had a good time with the reading experience! I really enjoyed the cast of characters and the relationships, both the complications and the closeness. I also really enjoyed the lore around the specialness this family holds, the star crash, and the starlings.

I did find the story to be a bit slower than I would have preferred, but it wound up being a great multitasking audiobook listen. It is full of southern charm and cozy vibes and I would recommend it to anyone looking for that!

Another hit from Heather Webber! This one is full of lovable characters, a magical setting, and such beautiful relationships. The beginning was a little confusing with so many different characters thrown at you but they all meld together so well that it all falls into place. This was the perfect escape!

🎧🪄🐦PUB DAY AUDIOBOOK REVIEW🐦🪄🎧

⭐⭐⭐⭐

🥰Thank you so much to @forgereads and @macmillan.audio for the gifted book and audiobook #macaudio2024!

📖Title: A Certain Kind of Starlight
✍️Author: Heather Webber
📆Pub date: July 23, 2024 (TODAY)
⏳Audiobook length: 11hrs and 5 mins
🗣️Narrators: Hallie Ricardo & Stephanie Willis

🪄Fans of Heather Webber will definitely be pleased with this one! This was my 3rd book by Heather, so I know what to expect, and she always scratches the itch for the perfect magical realism book with more depth than most!

🐦I loved the sister/family drama in this one and of course the delicious baking tips! I love when books outside the mystery/thriller genre have twists 🌪️ and there was one in this one that really got me!

📖Read if you enjoy:

🏘️Small town charm
🪄Magical realism
👭Sister drama
🥞Baking/recipes in books

☕If you haven't read her 2023 release AT THE COFFEE SHOP OF CURIOSITIES YET, you absolutely must 🥰

🪄Her books always feel like a Hallmark Movie in book form and I'll keep reading them as long as she writes them!

🎧Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Willis absolutely nailed the narration and the differences in their voices made it easy to always know which character was speaking! Highly recommend the audio version!

No one brings a story about small-town magic to life quite like Heather Webber. If you’re a fan of magical realism and charming stories about strong and resilient women, then her books are for you.

A Certain Kind of Starlight is filled with family secrets, complex relationships, and endearing characters. Cozy and sweet with a hint of magic it really is a perfect read.

Both narrators, Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Willis, did an amazing job of bringing these characters and their southern charm to life.

This audiobook was an all-around delight! I loved all the baking tips at the start of each chapter. I spent a wonderful day listening to this cozy magical book and baking some of my favorite star galaxy sugar cookies. For now on, I will be calling them my starlight sugar cookies!

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are my own.

There is absolutely nothing better than picking up a book that feel so incredibly cozy and warm, UNLESS it's also realizing that book feels familiar and when you look up the author, she also wrote another book which gave you the same exact cozy warm feelings and she becomes your new favorite cozy author!

Heather Webber has a way of telling stories which make home feel like a warm cloud; where the main characters are looking for acceptance or a form of home or family and we, the readers, join them on their journey. I love the magical realism of not truly knowing which parts are magic and which are just family ties. I think I was a little frustrated with Addie for being so hell bent on "keeping her secrets" which only did more harm than good. Self sacrifice is rarely the best course of action.

We clearly know who the "bad guy" is, and we have a host of really great people. We have a family owned bake shop and some fairly emotional moments along the way. Though I've only read two books by Heather Webber, I will be going out and finding more, very soon! These books are so charming and enjoyable. There is a softness around the edges which makes them light and easy. They also have enough depth and substance to keep you engaged until the final pages and, boy, are those final pages usually powerful.

This was a sweet and wholesome book. I love the way Heather Webber writes her characters, I always feel connected and like I just had a warm hug.

Twelve years ago, as her best friend lay dying after giving birth, she told an earth-shattering secret to Addie Fullbright, and made her promise not to tell anyone. The only way Addie knew she could keep the secret was to flee her hometown of Starlight, Alabama. But when her beloved aunt, the woman who helped raise her, gets a shocking diagnosis and asks her to come back to Starlight to help run the family bakery, Addie knows it’s finally time to go home again Tessa Jane Wingrove-Fullbright feels like a failure. She’s always been able to see the lighter side of life but lately darkness has descended. Her world is suddenly in shambles after a painful breakup, her favorite aunt’s unexpected health troubles, and because crushing expectations from the Wingrove side of her family are forcing her to keep secrets and make painful choices. When she’s called back to Starlight to help her aunt, she’s barely holding herself together and fears she’ll never find her way back to who she used to be. It starts off rocky since Addie and Tessa have never been close. But with the help of Aunt Bean and the Sugarbirds, Addie and Tessa Jane come to see that magic can be found in trusting yourself, that falling apart is simply a chance to rise up again, stronger than ever, and that the heart usually knows the best path through the darkness.

This audiobook was so much fun. I always enjoy this author's books, and this one was no exception. The book was full of the mysticism, wise words, helpful hints, family, and southern hospitality that I have come to love and expect from her novels. I adored Aunt Bean, Tessa and Addie, and I loved how in-between chapters, Aunt Bean gave helpful hints for baking. The starlings, who let them know every time something was wrong, and then the final scene of the book that left me in tears - all of it made for a magical experience that I think you will love as much as I did.

As with pretty much ALL of Heather Webber’s books, this one was terrific!
Blending real life, family ties, healthy friendships, small town living, and a tiny bit of magic…

Aunt Bean (Verbena Fulbright) is not feeling well. As she’s usually full of spunk and energy, this makes her entire family worried…so when she makes phone calls asking her nieces to ‘come home’ to help, well, they drop everything to go home to Alabama.

Bean has a bakery business, and its future lies on the precipice…

Additionally, the girls grandfather has big plans of his own, and if he gets his way, they’ll be totally out of the picture…

But, we are in a SMALL TOWN, where there are eyes and ears everywhere…and maybe just a little magic in the way of stars, starlight, starlings, diamonds, lightening flashes, family…and love…

Webber has a way of weaving together a picture (story) where you fall in love with all of the characters…even when you don’t like them, or don’t want to!

And the small town charm in each of them gives me hope…that maybe one day the world CAN be a better place.

Loved Addie and Tessa Ann. Loved Aunt Bean.

Loved how Addie cannot keep a secret to save her life, but when her bff from HS tells her one, one that will change HER life forever…Addie keeps it! Even though it hurts her through and through. Even though she believes her life will never be the same. And, because of this, Addie moves far away from her small home town, with no plans to ever return. But life sometimes has a way of changing your mind…and heart.

All the stars for me, because, as usual…this one from Ms. Webber brought out ALL THE FEELS! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️💫💫💫💫💫💫

So excited to be able to receive this one as an ARC, as this author has NEVER let me down!!!

Thanks to #NetGalley and #MacmillanAudio for an ARC of the audiobook which releases tomorrow, 7/23/24! (In exchange for an honest review)

#ACertainKindOfStarlight by #HeatherWebber and narrated wonderfully by #HallieRicardo and #StephanieWillis.

Feel free to like, follow and friend me on: Goodreads,
IG @ #BookReviews_with_emsr or
My Facebook Book Club: Book Reviews With Elaine.

Thanks so much for reading! And if you ‘liked’ my review, please share with your friends!! 📚⭐️

Some magical realism books are up my alley, some are not. This one was worth the read. The different type of relationships between characters were greatly explored. The small-town vibe and how every got into everyone else’s business was fun. I love stories with strong female characters and relationships. Also, there were so many secrets that were slowly revealed. The narrator was great and added a lot to the story. I loved the baking tips at the beginning of each chapter. I loved that there was some romance in the story, but it wasn’t the main focus and storyline. The writing was good, and I look forward to Webbers next book.

A Certain Kind of Starlight is another fantastic southern tale from Heather Webber. Each summer I look forward to her latest book, and while I typically prefer the physical book format, which 3 generations in our family have been known to share, I had the pleasure of listening to this on audio. The narrators do a fantastic job transporting the reader to Starlight, Alabama. Brought together by their beloved aunt, Addie and Tessa Jane manage to work through their own pasts, while navigating their own evolving futures. A story of family, resilience, and secrets, this is another magical, warm hearted book by Heather Webber. Thank you to Macmillan Audio and NetGalley for this advanced audio book, all opinions are my own.

I love Heather Webber’s books with a touch of southern cozy and magical realism.

✨Genre: Magical realism
🖤 Steamy rating: Mild
⚡️ Profanity: Mild

Two estranged half sisters, Addie and Tessa Jane, are summoned to their home town of Starlight, Alabama by their Aunt. Addie left Starlight 12 years ago after experiencing the death of her best friend and other heartbreak. Tessa Jane moved with her mother after the death of her father. As the two reconnect with their aunt and the people they left in their past, buried secrets come to light causing excitement in their magical community.

I love Heather Webber’s writing, because it feels like snuggling up in a warm blanket. Her characters are a delight. Told from rotating perspectives of Addie and Tessa Jane, they overcome heartache, find their voices, and look for the best in people. I also liked the second chance romance and enemies do lovers happening alongside the family drama. Lastly, the kindness the characters showed animals made this book complete.

Triggers: Death of a parent and domestic violence

Thank you @macmillan.audio for the early copy of A Certain Kind of Starlight. I adored it.

#macaudio2024

I listened to the audio version of this book narrated by Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Willis. While the narration was fine, this book just wasn't for me. I really struggled keeping my attention on it while listening, which is highly unusual for me. I don't do well with lots of characters, so that may have been part of it.

There are lots of family issues in the story, lots of secrets and some romance thrown in. There's a little fantasy, too, so if you're in to that this book might be for you.

Thanks to Macmillan Audio for the copy. All thoughts are my own.

I wish that Goodreads had a half star rating because I would give this a solid 4.5 stars. Heather Webber never disappoints and her latest book, while not a departure from her previous books (her current ones) is a feel good book about what family means with her signature magical realism. She is one of my go-to authors when the chips are down and with life lately being as difficult as it is, it was exactly what I needed. Addie left her home town of Starlight, Alabama when her best friend told her a life altering secret. She needed to put distance between herself and the people she loved, especially since she couldn't reveal the secret. Now, however, her beloved aunt is very ill and she asks Addie to come home to help run her cafe. It coincides with a break up in a relationship which also makes Addie question her priorities. Starlight is a special place, which is where the magical realism enters the mix. There is also Tessa, her "sister" (read the book to find out the reason for the quotes) and Addie's complicated relationship with her mother.
This book fits the "formula" of Heather Webber's books, which for me right now is a good thing. There is always family. Someone always comes back from somewhere. There is always magical realism. There are always deeper themes. For me it was almost perfect, though it was a little quickly packaged at the end and I think perhaps, Ms. Webber could have taken a little more time to resolve things. Nonetheless, it was an enjoyable read.
This was an audiobook which worked well. The author had a good Southern accent which works well for this book and her reading was engaging.
Thanks to NetGalley and to Macmillan Audio for giving me the opportunity to read this advance copy of the book in exchange for my honest opinion.

This Alabama story is magical realism with a spoonful of sugar.

Years ago, a meteor fell from the sky causing a deep crater in Starlight, Alabama. On certain nights, the townsfolk walk the now created Starlight Path to see the beautiful aurora glowing from within it. Some believe that one's fate can even be determined in the lights.
Addie Fullbright is finally returning home after finding out her Aunt Verbena has a terminal illness. Aunt Bean needs Addie's help running the bakery. It's been twelve years and Addie is still burdened by the secret she carries, told to her by her best friend, Rie, on her death bed.
Tessa Jane Fullbright feels like she can't do anything right. There's so much tension and high expectations from her Grandfather and Mom. She's just been through a painful break up and now she is dealing with the sobering news from her Aunt Bean and the reappearance of her sister, Addie.
The two must now work together to reconcile past hurts, rise stronger above their obstacles, and salvage the true magic in the bakery.

I really thought this book was meant for me. I usually gravitate toward the southern trope since I've lived in the south my whole life. This one was disappointing. The concept was decent and original with the illuminating crater, but for the life of me, I really couldn't follow the plot or relationships entirely. I understand the gist. This writing just lacked development. It was a completely cheesy Hallmark plot line with total caricatures of southern characters. Hallie Ricardo and Stephanie Willis were fantastic narrators. I fully believe they did the very best in making the most of the script they were given. The one who read from the perspective of Addie sounds EXACTLY like Carrie Underwood. It was impressive. I fully believe there is an audience for this one. It's just not me.

Thank you NetGalley, Heather Webber, and Macmillan Audio for the chance to read this audio ARC in exchange for my honest review.