Book Review - Bewitched,Bothered and Bewildered

 

Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered by Kerry Barrett

Published: 31st October 2013

Publisher: Carina UK

Available on Kindle

Order now from Amazon

 

Blurb

Part-time witch, full-time glamorous high-flyer Esme Mcleod rubs shoulders with celebrities for a living, has a sort-of-boyfriend …and just enough magic in her fingertips to solve life’s little irritations; why shouldn’t she cast a little spell to catch the busy barman’s attention, or to summon a latte to aid her all-nighters?

Called back to her small Scottish home town and meddling family, stiletto-clad Esme is way out of her comfort zone… But Esme must embrace her abilities as a witch, or watch her family lose their beloved café.

Except Esme has never claimed to be a whizz at witchcraft, and her charms are starting to go awry - she certainly never meant to cast a love spell on her ex-boyfriend Jamie! It’s time for urgent lessons in magic as well as love – it seems there’s only so much that muttering a few words over cupcake batter will fix…

 

Review

I was kindly sent the third book in the Could It Be Magic series by Kerry Barrett to review, having not read the first two I decided to start at the beginning of the story with Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered as it sounded like a series I would love.

 

Esme Mcleod is a witch who works as a family lawyer in London. She has been away from from her family up in Scotland since she was a teenager. She had a disagreement with her mother over the use of magic, which Esme is not a fan of, except for when that coffee cup just needs to come a bit nearer or the barman aren’t looking her way. Her family practise magic on a daily basis in their café, helping people whether they ask for it or not.  When her cousin Harry (Harmony) asks her to come home and her run the family business as her Aunt Suky is ill with cancer Esme has no choice but to return to the home she fled from years earlier.  Esme soon realises it’s not just Suky’s illness which is making the café business suffer and the only way she can help her family is to put her magic skills to good use.

I really liked the main character Esme; I loved the way that she defended her family from outsiders even though she didn’t completely agree with what they were up to herself. She also had a way of getting into scrapes with her magic which were quite funny, such as turning one of the villagers into a frog. My favourite scenes with Esme were when she got drunk in the pub with her old friend Chloe and tried to convince her old boyfriend to date the much younger barmaid, really funny!

This is a story filled with heart-warming characters full of family loyalty, a little romance and some quite sad parts with Suky’s storyline. The story moves at a fairly fast pace and is sprinkled with magic and humour throughout which will leave you, like me wanting to find out what happen next for Esme and her family.

Rating 4/5