Mary‘s review of Spun by Sorcery (Sugar Maple Series, Book 3) by Barbara Bretton.
Chloe is always losing things-but an entire town? Just when she was about to settle down in Sugar Maple with her soul-mate Luke MacKenzie, her Fae enemy Isadora strikes, and her new hometown is gone. Even the Book of Spells, her lifeline to magick, can’t help her now. Just in the nick of time, her friend Janice roars up in Chloe’s ancient Buick with Penny the cat and her yarn stash in tow. If she is going to save her home she has to go back to Salem, where family secrets and centuries- old feuds pull her into the fight of her life.
I’ve found a new series! Love it when that happens. The third in Barbara Bretton’s Sugar Maple series, SPUN BY SORCERY is a magical trip to Salem and back as half-sorceress Chloe Hobbs tries to figure out what happened to her beloved town of Sugar Maple, which seems to have disappeared right off the map. Accompanied by love-of-her-life Luke, friend Janice, and thousand-year-old cat Penny, Chloe reluctantly travels to Salem in an effort to find what magic sent her town away and what magic can bring it back.
Along the way, she finds out that her honey, Luke, hasn’t spoken to his rather large family in several years, ever since the death of his wife and daughter. She didn’t even seem to realize he had such a big family or show any desire to meet them, which made me think she was a bit self-centered. However, I’m willing to give her the benefit of the doubt because I haven’t read the other books in this series (though I plan to!) and because they were in the middle of a crisis when they passed near Luke’s hometown. Speaking of family, she learns more about her witch-y side of the family, which helps her find the key to saving Sugar Maple and bringing it back into this world.
I enjoyed the word-play of the characters. Chloe and Luke had great chemistry and truly seemed to love each other, as evidenced by both their actions and their words. There wasn’t a whole lot in the way of romance, just a quick, very tame love scene, but that didn’t diminish their connection. Janice and Penny were great additions to the story, helping add to the tension and mystery. I liked the concept of Penny as a familiar who’s been with the family since the beginning.
When I first picked up this book, I had to laugh—I’ve been thinking about trying my hand at knitting and here was a book where the main character not only owned a knitting shop, she was completely obsessed with it (to the point where she was highly distressed by the fact that, not only had her town gone poof, her fiber and yarn “stash” had disappeared, too. Actually, she seemed more upset by that than anything. I thought it was funny but a knitter would probably get a huge kick out of it.). I’m taking it as a sign—guess I’m going to have to pick up some knitting needles and some yarn and see if I catch the knitting bug!
The only thing I didn’t like were the shifting first person perspectives, where both Chloe and Luke took turns telling their side of the story. I’m not a big fan of this type of point of view for the mere fact that I’m easily confused. Luckily, the author did label each chapter/section, which made it a little easier but, to me, if you’re going to tell a story from multiple perspectives, I really prefer you do it using third person omniscient. But, again, that’s just my preference.
Spinning in a great sense of humor and strong pinch of mystery, Barbara Bretton knits together a magical story about the power of connections, family and love. (How’s that for overuse of knitting references?) Oh, and for all you knitters out there, at the end of the book, the author includes several patterns for you to experiment with.
Rating: 4.0 out of 5.0
This book is available from Berkley. You can buy it here or here in e-format.
The series:
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