17 of 22 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
Cotton candy romp which might rot your teeth..., June 22, 2006
This review is from: My Favorite Witch (Accidental Witch Trilogy, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)
I wanted to like this book. I really did. The main character is a witch, I'm a witch. The cover of the book screamed "pick me up and read me, I'm light, I'm fun, you'll enjoy yourself" and the blurb on the back of the book seemed to support that.
However. To be honest, I started reading this book six months ago and after about 40 pages I put it back on the bookshelf, only to pick it up yesterday and read the rest of it in one sitting. And while I did enjoy myself, this book is so full of sugary sweet storylines it will literally hurt your teeth! It's like cotton candy - gooey, stickey, sweet, fluffy and after you've eaten it you feel unfulfilled.
The bad parts: a hero who is an NHL hockey player, a witch who carries her wand everywhere and actively encourages the waving of the wand and the power being in the wand, a lot of emphasis on what said witch is wearing, a huge lead up to the actual sex scene (lots of foreplay) which didn't pay off at all and left me thinking "that's it?", a secondary story about haunted mansions and talking crows which never quite fit the rest of the story and an incredibly predictable ending. And let's not forget the [...] named "Harvey" who "weeps" at certain moments...
Oh, and did I mention the orphans in the orphanage run by nuns? Give me a break - adorable five year old twins in an orphanage would be adopted in five seconds. If we go against the grain of this book and take a step into reality, any "orphanage" today would be a group home for troubled teens.
I'm not saying don't read this book - read it, but know that it is very very sugary and in the end, fairly unsatisfying.
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9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
My Favorite Read This Year!, May 17, 2006
This review is from: My Favorite Witch (Accidental Witch Trilogy, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)
A great sequel to The Kitchen Witch. This story follows Kira after her broken engagement to a minor league baseball player who was sleeping with her sister. Kira lands a new job at a foundation supporting historic mansions and a boys' orphanage as the assistant to the new Special Events Director. The foundation needs serious cash and the founder's grandson, Jason, is the perfect person to bring people out to big-ticket fundraising events. Jason is a major league hockey star and won the title of America's Greatest Kisser on a reality TV show. His reputation as a lady's man was well deserved, but his fast lifestyle got him in trouble when his girl of the day crashed his car and put his hockey career in danger of ending. At a crossroads in his life while waiting for his knee to heal, Jason agrees to take on the position of Special Events Director for six months. Imagine his surprise when he walks in on his new assistant cursing Jocks in general and her ex-fiancee while putting a spell on the louse to get what he deserves. The story places Jason and Kira, each of whom has given up on relationships, in close quarters with a common mission. Needless to say, sparks fly.
My Favorite Witch has a little humor, a little magic, a little hockey, a little charity, a little romance and a lot of love. Both Kira and Jason are intriguing characters you are pulling for from the beginning. The boys from the orphanage and a murder of crows steal the show on more than one occassion. Jason's Gram is another great character you won't be able to get enough of. Melody, Logan, Shane, and Vickie from The Kitchen Witch make an appearance that fits perfectly with the storyline.
The author's descriptions of the fundraising events and the little details (quilts, clothing, etc.) are colorful and enchanting but not overwhelming. This is an extremely well-written novel. Overall, this is a delightful read. This book is well-worth your time and money. Enjoy.
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2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
Not MY Favorite Witch..., June 16, 2009
This review is from: My Favorite Witch (Accidental Witch Trilogy, Book 2) (Mass Market Paperback)
After flying through the previous book in this trilogy, "The Kitchen Witch," I eagerly purchased a copy of its sequel, "My Favorite Witch," to read about Melody's friend Kira Fitzgerald. I thought this one may be even more fun, as Kira, unlike the heroine of the 1st book, actually proudly confessed to being a practicing witch.
Once again, I chose this book for escapism fluff, and had such a fun time with "The Kitchen Witch" that there was no other choice but to continue the series. But I am sad to say that this book just didn't have the same magic for me.
As I'm sure you already know, this tells the story of Kira, who is a Special Events Planner in Newport, RI. She works for Bessie Pickering of the Pickering Foundation, a non-profit group that supports the St. Anthony's Home for Boys. They need money, so Bessie hires her hockey player grandson to be Director (!) of Special Events, and Kira as his assistant. Kira is barely recovering from finding her fiance and sister in bed together, and Jason has had his athletic life all but ruined by a careless woman. Sound interesting? So did I. And then I started reading.
Problem One (for me): The lead character of Kira just wasn't as much fun as Melody. The opening scene, in which she is caught mid-spell, is great, but after that it just becomes corny, moderately steamy one-liners between Kira and the male lead, injured pro hockey player Jason Goddard. Especially as given her choice of strange, retro outfits and the fact that the book goes out of its way to explain that she has multiple piercings (not to mention her propensity to carry around an actual wand) I expected her to be a little more flamboyant (i.e. interesting). Instead, I found her character (surprisingly) a little flat and boring. She didn't really do or say anything memorable in the slightest.
Problem Two: I did not find Jason as attractive, sexy or charming as single-dad Logan of "TKW." I guess a "wolf-like" glare CAN be sexy. After all, I am a big fan of paranormal romance novels. Here though, I don't know, it just was...weird. Not sexy at all. All I can think of when I read that is his face elongating like in "An American Werewolf in London." He glares at a lot of people, a lot of the time. And then (to tease her) he starts referring to Kira as "MIZZZ Fitzgerald," often several times in a conversation. If a real person actually kept doing that, it would become very annoying, very quickly.
Problem Three: The plot just didn't mesh for me. There was just a little too much going on, even for a fluff romance. I mean, Jason is a hockey player who is injured and was on a reality show...He is now a Director of Special Events for a non-profit business?? They then sit and rattle off ideas for Special Events...I'm sorry, but the truth is that I just don't care about the details of invites and party-planning, which to me, took up waaay too much space in this book. In "The Kitchen Witch," we were informed with just enough info about the biz to believably get by, and that was great. No extended jargon or in-depth conversations about the step-by-step production of a show. This book? Here is a paraphrased example of MANY conversations in the novel: "We could get balloons." "But where would we buy them?" "We could get them at the Dollar Store." "But we should personalize them." "That's an excellent idea, Mizzz Fitzgerald. Where can we do that for cheap?" "I know this great place. How about we put our names on them?" "Great, Mizzz Fitzgerald! How about we put our names and our addresses on them?" "Great! How about we put our names and addresses and our dogs'zodiac sign on them?" "Great!! Hey, we should get business cards. How about..." And on and on. And none of this having anything to do with the plot. If you happen to be interested in this sort of thing, this is your book. If you're like me, and just want something to happen, then you feel my pain. I was not in the least surprised to learn that the author has been a Special Events Coordinator, and because she knew a lot about Planning, she wrote a lot about Planning. No offense at ALL to Ms. Blair, who is a wonderful writer and apparently was great as an Events Planner! I just did not care much (personally) for the Special Events 101 course.
So yeah, it took me a LONG time to get through this. Now this being said, I did enjoy the not-so ordinary office setting of old mansions in New England. I especially liked the business with the crows, and how Kira noted that crows often foretell change.
If you're new to this trilogy of books, then you should know that, like "The Kitchen Witch", this is not a novel with lots of magic and mayhem at every turn. The magic is almost nonexistent, unless you count the magic of romance, destiny, seduction and everyday life. And I do. :-)
Because I enjoyed the 1st book so much, I am not giving up on Annette Blair. "The Kitchen Witch" proved to me that she is a talented and fun writer. I will, one day, get around to finishing out the trilogy with "The Scot, the Witch and the Wardrobe" (which I'm sure will be great, since I don't think there's any Event Planning) and maybe even "Sex and the Psychic Witch." But right now, the only remedy is to read something scary and dark...with no fluff!
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