A review by thelibraryofalexandra
Kissed by Magic by Erica Ridley

3.0

Erica Ridley’s 'Let It Snow' is honestly such a cute little holiday read, and I read it after Christmas last year.

I read this in under an hour! It is a super quick and easy read, and super cute and adorable. Essentially, you follow the story of Lance Desmond, a soldier of fortune, who owes some people some money (because I’m pretty sure he spent 200,000 grand on a pirate ship), so he decides to go to the cursed Castle Cavanaugh, in order to find the Golden Bloom of Eternal Youth, the most sought-after treasure, to get the money and hand it over to Ivan Radko, the dude after Lance.

And thus, the quest begins! The ‘cursed’ aspect of Castle Cavanguagh is pretty refreshing so I won’t go into too much detail, but I think the blurb gives you a pretty good indication of the premise of the curse. I have to admit that I was slightly confused concerning the universe of the book. In the beginning, I thought possibly it was set in an Ancient Greece-like world, because of the descriptions of men wearing swords and the drachma used. But then the characters were talking about their smartphones and wifi networks and my brain imploded. However, one thing that you have to know from the outset, because I had to re-read paragraphs as a result of this, magic is known and practised. Witches and warlocks have evolved! They are using e-readers instead of carrying around tomes holding spells and chants. I laughed more than I should have. I’m just going to insert here one of my favourite lines from the book:

“Your grandma once raised an army of mummies from the dead in order to overthrow a terrorist military regime” (p. 20)

How fantastic is that?

In terms of the characters, and I’ve said this quite a lot in this review, Lance and Marigold are cute. This is not a deep and meaningful read and the character development is limited; but at its core, it’s a fun and light-hearted read, and I laughed more times that I could count. I give it 3.5/5 stars only because I wish there was more explanation surrounding the context of the narrative and the universe it was taking place in. Ridley writes such refreshing and exhilarating content, with the idea of the world so incredible, that it seems like such a waste to not extrapolate on it a bit.

My only regret is that Lance really should have twerked. It’s what the story needed.

rating: 3.5/5

*review originally posted on my blog! https://writerpending.wordpress.com/2018/01/16/romancelandia-review-let-it-snow-by-erica-ridley/