I enjoyed this sapphic cozy paranormal mystery. The mystery kept me interested until the end and Sage and Ximena just made it so much better. I love Sage and Ximena; they just had the greatest chemistry. Watching them grow as they move forward after their bad past and falling in love with one another was just great.

As soon as I saw the gorgeous cover of Brewed With Love, I knew it would be one of my most anticipated books of 2025! In this book, former best friends, Sage and Ximena, are forced to work together to save the potion shop they work at (and maybe fall in love along the way). Overall, I enjoyed this book! I liked the characters, the cozy fantasy setting of the town, and I thought the romance between Sage and Ximena was adorable. However, I do feel like the writing fell short for me at times. It felt like a lot of the aspects of the mystery and the interactions between the characters were told to the reader rather than shown. That being said, mysteries are difficult to write and I think that the way this one wrapped up made sense. I also thought the ending was a bit rushed and I would have liked to see more of the aftermath of the mystery being solved and Sage and Ximena reconciling. I'm excited to see what Shelly Page does next!

i think this was a fun and quick read. I loved the spahic rep in this book and found it to be fun and quick read. I think i would call this more of cozy mystery set in a parnomal world. It def was paced a cozy mystety and i overall enoyed it. I struggeld a bit with the writing style and wish the world was flesehd out more but it was a fun read!! i would def read by this author in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley, Random House Children's, and Joy Revolution for providing me with an eARC in exchange for my honest thoughts.

Cozy, atmospheric, romantic, and all the things, Brewed with Love by Shelly Page is a phenomenal debut romantasy. I had such a fun time reading this. A bit of a mystery kept me intrigued from start to finish. Sage and Ximena's sapphic childhood friends to strangers to lovers was so good! If you like witches and werewolves and overthrowing big business pick this one up.

I loved this relatively straightforward mystery novel set in a witchy little town. Sage and Ximena had a great dynamic, and I loved seeing their young love blossom as they grew to communicate with each other despite being hurt by each other in the past. I think I wanted this to be a bit more cozy in that I wanted even more fluff and whimsy in this magical world, which was lost to the serious focus on the mystery (i.e., I felt like the mystery wasn't exactly cozy and was actually pretty high stakes and intense!), but I still enjoyed this read and am chalking up this disconnect to a marketing miss. I will be looking forward to where Shelly Page's work goes hereafter though.

As someone with a side hobby reviewing perfumes, a deep love for flowers, and an educational background in chemistry, reading this book was an absolute sensory-olfactory dream. I absolutely loved the setting, world-building, and imagery throughout this book. Shelly Page has a refreshing writing style that highlights her exquisite attention to detail and thorough research. Brewed With Love is a charming young adult contemporary romance with magical realism and a mystery subplot. This book had so many joyful, tender, visually beautiful scenes. I also picked up on many important life lessons that individuals of any age can learn from and feel seen by. This was a lovely sapphic young love story with additional themes of respecting and honoring Indigenous land and the cultures and people of that land, being emotionally intelligent and empathetic even at a young age, and the gift of having family and friends love you unconditionally so that you feel safe being your authentic self. I highly recommend buying and reading Brewed With Love!
I am already anticipating and excited about any future releases by Shelly Page.
Thank you to the publisher Joy Revolution (Random House Children's) and the Author for an eARC (Advance Reader's Copy) to enjoy this before publication!

Looking for a fun witchy sapphic romance? This one is it. I could feel the magic amongst the pages. I loved the relationship Sage had with her grandmother and Tiva. Plus we had older queer rep? Loved. Sage and Ximena had really great chemistry! It was nice to see communication happening. Plus fighting against corporate greed? A cherry on top. This was a fun breath of fresh air in between heavy reads. Highly recommend!

a good way to start off the 2025 reading year, with a cozy low stakes witchy book. the relationship and growth between Sage and Ximenia was definitely my favorite part of the story; I caught on to some of the plot twists pretty early in the story - I called Ximenia being a werewolf almost immediately -, but the mystery was still fun to read about.

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House for the e-arc!

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Children’s for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

After being ghosted by her best friend and first crush Ximena, Sage Bishop, a teen plant witch, makes it her mission to brew a heartache tonic to erase her romantic feelings. One day, someone breaks into her family’s apothecary and steals the tonic Sage has been experimenting on, using it to wipe a local girl’s memory. Sage and the apothecary’s new hire - none other than Ximena - must work together to find the culprit.

I DNF’d this at 45%. I hate giving up on ARCs, especially ones with plots as promising as this one, but I felt as if the writing was rather juvenile and the characters were thinly sketched. There isn’t much actual conflict between Sage and Ximena despite their past and Sage’s supposed heartbreak. The minor characters were so, for lack of a better term, minor that I could tell the answer to the mystery wouldn’t be satisfying. It definitely reads as an author’s first book - there’s promise but it also leaves much to be desired.

I’ve been on a sapphic witches kick when it comes to my reading and I think if I was a tween I would probably enjoy this! As it stands, I felt underwhelmed and wasn’t compelled enough to finish it.

Magic, witches and potions! Plus add in some mystery, count me in.

Brewed with Love follows the story of Sage, a seventeen year old set to take over the family’s apothecary, Bishop Brews and Ximena, Sage’s ex-best friend, as they work together to investigate who broke in the apothecary and stole the tonic Sage created.

I really enjoyed this story. It gave off cozy, sweet vibes and I love the magic and witchy vibes throughout. Following their path from ex friends, to friends, to love, plus trying to solve the mystery was a lot of fun.

The story is a YA Sapphic romance with a bit of mystery.

I enjoyed this story. It was a fun and adventurous read. I think I would have liked it with older characters better, but overall I enjoyed it.

I've been waiting for this book for so long, I've been seeing Shelly at LA events all through last year - and the book was amazing! The mystery plot was woven in really well with the MC's character development as well as her reconnection with her ex bestie, and every plot twist was executed perfectly!

-- ty to the author, the publisher and Netgalley for an advanced copy!

4.5. this was so fun and i loved Sage and Ximena so much.

separately: the author thanks her dog in the acknowledgements which didn’t affect my rating but does make me more likely to read whatever she puts out next!

This cozy, sapphic fantasy mystery is perfect for a day inside reading.

Sage Bishop helps run her family apothecary with her grandmother and their new hire- Sage's ex-best friend and ex-crush, Ximena. When a potion is stolen on Ximena's first shift that ends up wiping the memories of a local teen, everyone is a suspect. Sage begins her own investigation to prevent her apothecary from being shut down, but it turns out the theft is not the only mystery surrounding their Hemwood home. Can Ximena be trusted? And can Sage prevent her heart being broken a second time?

"Brewed with Love" features a sweet romance and cozy mystery. With endearing characters, this book makes a great addition to fantasy readers' shelves. Would recommend.

This is a really fun and cute romance. I thought the mystery element was well utilized as a device to get the characters together and while it was interesting and I enjoyed seeing more of the town through the investigation, it was also a bit predictable. That said the magic system and characters were so well written it was so interesting seeing how the towns history and magic effected the dynamics between the characters. The romance was sweet and fun and felt very age and situationally appropriate. Overall this is a great romance and my only complaint would be wanting the mystery to be a bit more complex.

I really enjoyed this author's writing. I haven't read anything by them before, but I really got into the story and the pacing of it. The characters were well developed and lovable.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley and am voluntarily posting a review. All opinions are my own.
I’ve enjoyed all the books I’ve read from Joy Revolution so far, so I was optimistic going into Brewed with Love, even if, as a contemporary fantasy, it was less likely to work for me. And sadly, while there were things I enjoyed, this book ended up letting me down.
One of the issues I often have with contemporary fantasy is the world building, but I actually didn’t mind that aspect here. The detail into the different types of witches and the types of magical practices was a lot of fun, and the little interstitial brew recipes add a both texture to the magic system and a dash of humor in places.
The major characters, while not super captivating, are also decent. Sage is set to take over her family’s apothecary Bishop Brews one day, and she’s working to invent a tonic to cure heartbreak that will also contribute to the apothecary’s legacy. Ximena, meanwhile, is a new hire at Bishop Brews, as well as being Sage’s former friend who ghosted her. The proximity, plus them working together to solve a mystery, was a great basis for them to reconnect and for romance to grow. They were generally easy to like and root for throughout.
But I think where the book let me down was how “cozy” it was. It’s simultaneously the advertised cozy romantasy, plus it’s also a cozy mystery, my ultimate literary nemesis. While this was hinted at in the blurb, I wasn’t truly convinced that the stakes were all that high. In theory, I guess they are, because of Sage’s connection to Bishop Brews and it’s being threatened, but between that and the clues being rather obvious, it just didn’t feel very compelling, especially when the romance, while not the most exciting, was still much more interesting than this.
While this book was a bit of a mixed bag, I’m not surprised at this result, given my hyper-specific tastes. But that means I’m not the right reader for this book. However, if you tend to enjoy all things cozy, from mystery to (contemporary) fantasy, and you also are looking for a witchy romance, I recommend checking this out to see if it works better for you.

Brewed with Love is a lovely cozy fantasy with the perfect amount of romance! This is a cute, fun, and mysterious book.

The writing was easy to read, descriptive, and fit the story perfectly. I loved the characters so much, especially Sage and Ximena! I think their development throughout the book was very realistic. It was lovely to read. The plot was interesting and executed very well! I liked the mystery aspect and enjoyed predicting how things would go!

Overall, Brewed with Love is a fun and intriguing read! Thank you Netgalley and publishers for the ARC! All thoughts and opinions are my own!

Three things I love: sapphics, witchy books and cozy vibes. This book had them all! I absolutely can't wait to read more from this author. Thanks to NetGalley and Joy Revolution for the advance copy!

I really liked the overall concept of the story, but I felt like the history of the town and how exactly the magic works was a bit underdeveloped. Especially when you add werewolves into the mix without giving much background or information as to how and where they exist and why the town is so afraid of them. Therefore I would have liked more information geared around Ximena and her family, given we don’t ever get her point of view and have to rely on the information Sage gives us, which isn’t a lot, probably because she herself doesn’t know a lot. I also think Ximena’s whole transformation and storyline was a bit too similar to Jacob from Twilight if I am being honest. The pacing was difficult to go along with at times, sometimes things were incredibly slow, and other times there were too many suspects and subplots going on that if felt too rushed. Another pet peeve I had was having to wait until chapter 21 just for them to kiss… The slowburn was just too slow in my opinion so I would have loved for them to realize their feelings sooner, but that is just a personal preference.

I admired Sage alot for her dedication to her roots and keeping her family business afloat. I definitely got the message that small businesses are very important to the community and oftentimes big corporations have ill intentions and are often super greedy without taking the people and community into consideration. Ximena took longer for me to like because she spent so much time hiding her real feelings and keeping secrets from Sage, but I am glad they were able to compromise and make it work in the end. Ximena and Sage did have good banter and chemistry for a YA romance. I would absolutely love to read a spinoff of Mercer and Poppy, as I really grew to love them, especially towards the end. The side characters were good, a bit surface level, but still worked well with the main characters. I do wonder why all of the adults seemed absolutely clueless during this whole investigation…Overall, I enjoyed the plot, small town magic element, and praise for small business, but I think the story and characters could have benefited from more depth, complexity, and romance intertwined.