Add Some Magic to Your Summer Reading with This Great Novel of Magical Realism

by Susan Roberts

In the face of hardship, two women learn how to rise up again under the bright side of the stars Starlight, Alabama, appears to be a small town full of magic and friends and loving families but there is also a mean and sinister man who wants to own the town and take away the magic for his own benefit. What will win the ultimate contest - love and magic or greed.

Amazon affiliate links are used on this site. A free book was provided for an honest review.

July 2024; Forge Books; 978-1250867292
audio, ebook, print (320 pages); magical realism

Aunt Bean has requested that her two nieces come home to help her at her bakery.  Addie comes home from Birmingham and plans to stay for a few weeks.  She left home 12 years earlier after her best friend shared a secret with her that would be devastating for some people to find out.  She knew that she had a problem keeping secrets so felt that it was best for her to leave the town she loved.  Tessa-Jane has had a rough couple of months since her fiancé left her at the altar.  She's the granddaughter of the greediest person in town and people hold that against her when she's in town.  Even though Addie and Tessa-Jane are half-sisters, they've never been close and there is a lot of unrest between them when they come home to help their aunt at the bakery.  But there is magic in Starlight, Alabama - magic that helps people make decisions and always look at the positive side of life.  Will this magic bring Addie and Tessa-Jane a way to treat each other like the sisters they are?  And will they find happiness and contentment and decide to stay in Starlight?

Magical realism is a genre of books that I don't normally read but Heather Webber wrote a book that makes the magic seem real and comforting.  It would be great to travel to this town and let the magic help you feel good about your life and decisions.  I enjoyed the two main characters and especially like Aunt Bean - she was always optimistic despite health problems and always tried to help everyone she knew.  I also enjoyed the ladies who worked at the bakery (and had for years) who referred to themselves as the Sugarbirds.  Addie and Tessa-Jane both grow throughout the book and learn that when you fall down in life, you can be stronger than ever when you get up again.

My only complaint about A Certain Kind of Starlight is that there are too many characters and too many subplots.  I'd have liked the story to concentrate on Bean, Addie, and Tessa-Jane and skip some of the subplots about people in town.

Overall, it was a great book and one that I really enjoyed.  It would be a good book to read at the beach.  It's an easy read and something that is easy to put down and pick up again.

 

Buy A Certain Kind of Starlight at Amazon

Susan Roberts grew up in Michigan but loves the laid-back life at her home in the Piedmont area of North Carolina where she is two hours from the beach to the east and the mountains in the west.  She reads almost anything but her favorite genres are Southern Fiction and Historical Fiction.   

 

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