Review - Snap Magic - It's more than hocus pocus

Little Witches ~ Angela and sister Nadia Sunde
at Snap Magic's Launch

Tweenhood is a terrifically testing time. One I remember of intense scrutiny when everything about you; the way you look, the way you dress and the friends you avoid suddenly becomes big deal. You find yourself navigating that mystical ground twixt ‘little kid’ and ‘fully fledged adolescent’, feeling as though your every move is being examined under some humongous magnifying glass for humiliating broadcast. It’s a time to loosen grip on your childhood beliefs while at the same time search for new vessels of magic in which to float your maturing soul. Complicated concepts at any age, but utterly bewildering at age twelve. Yet Lily Padd, star of Angela Sunde’s inaugural Pond Magic, is about to set sail in another tale of pre-puberty angst to prove to us all that tweenhood really is ‘a snap’.

Snap Magic snaps, crackles and fizzes from the moment Lily plunges into the girls’ toilets to escape the painful inflictions of Rick Bastek, a lad with limited like-appeal and tarnished intelligence. Aside from the awful daily avoidance of being ‘snapped’ by Rick, Lily is also at odds with an embarrassing secret of her own which threatens the childhood confidence she shares with her long time bestie, Maureen.

Things slide further down the gurgler when the two girls realise their whispered bathroom exchanges have been overheard by Ellen Middleton, the meanest, prettiest girl in school, who’s so feminine she makes you want ‘to puke’; you know the type.

Lily is distraught beyond words. Ellen threatens to divulge every lurid detail about Lily to the whole school which could easily ruin any hope of snagging a friendship with the staggeringly charming new boy, Storm. 

Maureen is convinced witchcraft is to blame again after she notices long black hairs sprouting from her best friend’s face. She might well be right when Lily’s bewitching neighbour, Mrs Swan becomes involved. It isn’t until the eve of the school’s Halloween Dance that Lily realises that if magic can cause such colossal chaos, perhaps it can overcome it too. 

Snap Magic is a book young girls and boys will instantly warm to. Angela Sunde has magicked a spellbinding story that showers readers with more sparkling moments of silliness than there are hairs on a yeti’s chin, which by the end of the story, are many.

Lily is a lovably verve-loaded girl with a wry sense of humour whose desire for obscure normality is at conflict with her knowledge of things of a more Wiccan nature. Sunde has crafted a cast of non-obnoxious characters easy to read and laugh along with, my favourite being Maureen; pumpkin-haired, brazen tempered, self-assured and faithful as a puppy.

With gossamer fine references to Cinderella floating throughout, Snap Magic reinvents the twist in twisted fairy tales with frequently funny injections of parody. Nothing escapes Sunde’s wickedly wacky observation of our humble suburban lives: snap and store party plans, frozen bras and spectral pumpkin soup; it’s all there to be snapped up, now.

Snap Magic is the perfect bookshelf companion to Pond Magic yet reading it first will in no way diminish the magic of either.

Terrific for tweens, lovers of pumpkin soup and budding little witches everywhere.

Red Pedal Press October 2014 You can locate Snap Magic here.

Follow Angela as she zaps around on her Blog Tour broomstick. Check out the dates and places by clicking on the Snap Banner.

Want to talk to a real witch? I chat with Angela about Snap Magic and casting spells over at Boomerang Books Blog. (OK, so she’s not really a witch but boy can she cackle and looks super fetching in witches’ britches.)