Fiction, Urban Fantasy/Cozy Mystery, Paranormal
3***
Blurb: It’s hard being a good witch when your clients want bad magic.
I’m a witch. Not a powerful witch, mind, but as Grandma liked to say, it’s all in the kindness, not the power. Grandma is gone now, but her dream of having a witch shop lives with me. So, when the opportunity to run my own shop presents itself, I move across the country to take it, no questions asked. But maybe I should have. The sexy local bounty hunter shifter thinks I’m up to no good, my clients keep asking me to use forbidden dark magic, and someone’s trying to sabotage my shop. Probably the same someone who reported me to the Witch Council and left a dead body in my bathtub. Hah! Joke’s on them. As Grandma also used to say, it’s nothing a positive attitude, excellent cleaning supplies, and the complete annihilation of whoever has in it for me can’t fix. Paraphrasing. Join Hope in her quest to save her shop in the Urban Fantasy world of Good Bad Magic, featuring witches, shifters, demons, one sexy bounty hunter, and all kinds of magical creatures. Full of humor, banter, plenty of heart, and a slow-burn romance.
THOUGHTS: This was a fun, lighthearted surface story for when you do want something fantasy but don’t want dark and deep. There are lots of paranormal characters: witches, mages, shifters, and more. And a ghostly body in the main character’s bathtub.
Hope is a low-power witch who now owns a witchy potion supply shop. Her first day open and she receives a one-star review. How can she get over that?! And there are dark characters who come to the back gate wanting specific potions. Ones that she has no clue about, but seem to be what the previous owner supplied. First, she has to take care of the body, and that requires dirt from a very old cemetery. And that requires breaking into the very powerful–and handsome–shifter’s private lot. Of course, she gets caught, and the fun begins.
The characters were interesting and different, but I will admit that my favorite was Fluffy, a small white dog lent to Hope by the shifter for her protection. He figures if the dog likes her (he does), she’s okay. Hope is okay, but a little wishy-washy at times. The whole dark magic patron problems could have been solved early on if she’d just acted a little more adult. But that’s why it’s a surface story–characters that had little character but interacted well enough within the mystery. And I pretty much knew the “perps” from the beginning. But still, it was a fun read with a satisfying ending.
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