Book Overview
Description
May the best witch win in this sapphic enemies-to-lovers romcom, where rival witches hex for the affections of the new boy in school… but are vexed by their interest in each other.
Welcome to Thornhaven, a quaint coastal town where witches hide in plain sight.
Lily Allerton is descended from Thornhaven’s most illustrious magical family. When her tarot cards tell her that acquiring a boyfriend is essential for a successful senior year, she decides to do whatever it takes to bag the cute new boy at school—including overcoming her total lack of interest in him. Determined to make her parents proud, appear “normal” (the fact that she’s never liked a boy is a closely guarded secret), and stay on top of the popular-kid food chain, future valedictorian Lily makes sure that nothing stands in the way of her goals.
But Chrysanthemum Quinn might.
When Chrys moved to town three years ago, she had high hopes that she’d no longer be the outcast with weird powers—hopes that Lily quickly dashed by ostracizing her from the other witches at school. She was too poor, too grunge, and too sarcastic for Lily’s tastes, with a major resting witch face. Nothing like a proper Thornhaven witch. Since then, she and Lily have despised each other and competed relentlessly. Chrys is going to beat Lily for valedictorian—and if Lily wants the new boy, then Chrys is going to win him first.
But when Lily’s and Chrys’s attempts to hex each other create a curse that threatens the town, they’ll have to put aside their animosity to stop it… and reckon with some deeply buried emotions. Because breaking the curse will take more than magic—it’ll take acknowledging that it’s not the boy either of them wants. This fresh, playful, witchy romcom from USA Today Bestselling author Tori Anne Martin ( This Spells Disaster ) is sure to appeal to fans of sapphic charmers like I Kissed Shara Wheeler and She Gets the Girl.
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Highlights & Quotes
(10)“But mine’s a normal flower name. She could have been Rose, or Violet, or Daisy.” Besides, there was nothing flowerlike about Chrysanthemum herself … unless, possibly, Lily considered blooms of the poisonous variety. Monkshood. Foxglove. Datura. Those names would have been more fitting for someone as bitter and spiteful as Chrysanthemum.
Lily didn’t think there was anything wrong with her, exactly, but the lack of a romantic life made her different, and everyone knew being different made life harder.
feel this
he carried himself the way most boys did—with total confidence, as though they knew they’d won the gender lottery and were playing the game of life on easy mode
Strange that Luke would be the reason for it. As much as Lily liked his company in a friend kind of way, there was something irritating about her battle with Chrysanthemum escalating over a boy. It felt very anti-feminist.
Life was always simpler when you could pretend other people, especially those who had hurt you, didn’t exist. If you pretended hard enough, then no one could ever hurt you again. You could see right through everyone around you, like they were ghosts. Their words and actions became an inconsequential shimmer in the passing breeze.
Undoubtedly part of that was developing an understanding of why Lily craved validation, but Chrys knew now that it was also much simpler—Lily was a geek. Learning new things made her happy. Just like it did Chrys.
Chrys felt less panicky this time, but still unsure. As an introvert, she didn’t mind being alone (helpful when one didn’t have many friends), but there was a difference between being alone and feeling abandoned, and Lily clearly leaned toward the latter.
She must have stopped breathing for a moment, her entire body too devoted to processing this information to remember how to sustain life. Then Lily gasped, and oxygen flooded her lungs. She was going to scream. Absolutely lose her shit.
third degree
never heard that before
Did I succeed? Well, I think I conveyed my personal experience through Lily, but there is no one way to identify as asexual, just as there’s no one way to identify as anything. Everyone’s experience is unique, and asexuality exists on a spectrum and in many forms
really liked the ace representation