Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen

Claire Waverly, a highly-sought caterer, has an instinctive flair for cooking and more – her food has magical properties. She’s a bit of a solitary recluse, living and working alone in the house where she grew up, and she is perfectly content with her lifestyle. Then her sister, Sydney, returns home to Bascom, North Carolina, after a long absence, and disrupts everything. She has a five-year-old daughter, the niece Claire did not know she had, and she needs shelter from an abusive ex-boyfriend. As the two sisters confront each other and the abuse in their own shared past, Claire is forced to drop her guard, which opens the door for new possibilities.

Sarah Addison Allen describes Garden Spells as Southern-fried magical realism with a love story at its heart. It also has an ornery apple tree that flings prophetic apples at people. If you like Alice Hoffman, you might also like Sarah Addison Allen. Now is a good time to read Garden Spells and her other novels The Sugar Queen, The Girl Who Chased the Moon, and The Peach Keeper. Her new novel Lost Lake, is set to release early in 2014.

Check out Garden Spells by Sarah Addison Allen @ the library!

The Magicians by Lev Grossman

Quentin, a high school senior, enjoys  reading a series of fantasy novels taking place in a magical land called Fillory.  He’s miserable because his life doesn’t measure up to the excitement in the books.  Then he’s invited to attend a secret, private magician’s college and learns sorcery and other life lessons.  He graduates but feels something is still missing.  Then he learns his friends have discovered that Fillory is real.  Now Quentin has a purpose and a mission.  First check out The Magicians, then continue to follow Quentin’s adventures in the sequel, The Magician King.