Love Sugar Magic

Love Sugar Magic: a Dash of Trouble
Anna Meriano
Walden Pond/HarperCollins, 2018 310 pages
Grades 4-7
Fantasy
Love Sugar Magic series #1

Leonora's family is busy at their bakery getting ready for the town's Dia de los Muertos festival and she is feeling left out. It seems like there is more to the bustle than merely preparations and Leo suspects that secrets are afoot of which she is not privy. A spy mission seems to be in order, so Leo ditches school to find out what she is missing. Imagine her surprise to discover that her mother and sisters are really brujas-or witches-and spells are being baked into the pastries. After cornering one of her older sisters Leo has the truth confirmed and further discovers that she too possesses magical abilities, though she will not be allowed to use them until she turns fifteen, which is way too long to wait. She wants to get going now! To get her feet wet, Leo bakes pig cookies that she brings to life and magically dances around the room. Now it’s time to really put her magic to work. Leo helps herself to magical materials from the bakery and weaves a love spell for her best friend’s crush-with disastrous results.

Debut author, Meriano, pens a fun book filled with sweet treats, sisters and magic in this new series start. It is refreshing to see a book featuring Latin-American characters, who are in touch with their culture, yet fully integrated into American society in a positive way. It is also nice to see a fully functional family, even if they are brujas, who support and love each other through thick and thin. The youngest of five sisters, readers will enjoy seeing the family dynamics of Leo’s loving, yet messy, bunch and feel as if they know the characters by book's end. Leo makes some poor choices throughout the story, yet sees the error of her ways and works it all out by the conclusion. Kids love magic and this is a perfect fit for readers not quite ready for Harry Potter. They will appreciate the magical realism and imagine gaining control of their own situations through magical means. Recipes from the story are offered at end of the book, bringing in another layer and pleasing novice bakers. The Cupcake Diaries meets Bewitched, this series will find a readership. I can already think of so many kids I want to recommend it to. The next series entry, A Sprinkle of Spirits, is set to be released in February, 2019.