Back of Book: 

After spending most of high school as the quiet girl, Ellie Kobata is ready to take some risks and have a life-changing summer, starting with her Anti-Wallflower List—thirteen items she’s going to check off one by one. She’s looking forward to riding rollercoasters, making her art Instagram public (maybe), and going on an epic road-trip with her best friend Lia.

But when number four on Ellie’s list goes horribly wrong—revenge on Jack Yasuda—she’s certain her summer has gone from charmed to cursed. Instead of a road trip with Lia, Ellie finds herself stuck in a car with Jack driving to a magical convention. But as Ellie and Jack travel down the coast of California, number thirteen on her list—fall in love—may be happening without her realizing it.

In The Charmed List, Julie Abe sweeps readers away to a secret magical world, complete with cupcakes and tea with added sparks of joy, and an enchanted cottage where you can dance under the stars. 

Book Number: One 

Genre: Young Adult | Fantasy | Contemporary | Romance | LGBTQIA+ 

Review: 🌟🌟🌟

A road trip summer romance tinged with magic the whole way through featuring tropes such as childhood best friends to lovers and forced proximity. 

Ellie Kobata is ready to break out of her shell and stop being antisocial. In the hopes of bettering herself, Ellie makes an Anti-Wallflower List to complete with her best friend on their summer road trip that they are ecstatic to go on. That is, until Ellie accidently reveals to Lia that her family is part of the magic community. This gets her and her ex-best friend/neighbor, Jack, in deep trouble. As a punishment, their parents force Ellie and Jack to drive down to the convention center while Lia stays behind and learns the ways of magic. Now, the two must work through their troubled past or risk having the most uncomfortable road trip in the history of ever. 

Not gonna lie, this book reminded me of so many other books, which I think was its main problem. It really wasn't all that original and the beef between Ellie and Jack was so petty it made me want to tear my eyes out at points. These two obviously care for each other deeply, so I found it so frustrating that they acted as though it was the end of the world that they had to go on a fun road trip with one another. 

Let's back up though. This story starts out pretty slow with Ellie and Lia prepping for their road trip and enjoying the beginning of their summer vacation. Ellie tries to get an early start on her Anti-Wallflower list and Jack gets in the way of all of her goals, such as riding a rollercoaster and kissing a cute boy that was flirting with her. In an act of pettiness, Ellie and Lia decide to take revenge on Jack and the two end up messing up their entire lives in the process. Mega oof. This then leads to Jack and Ellie forced in close proximity for the rest of the book as they embark on the road trip instead.

The road trip wasn't the most engaging at the start, but it was nice to see the two begin to realize that they are actually the same people they knew as kids. This leads to them eventually starting to act amicable towards one another, which slowly leads to flirty banter and some sweet situations in which the two start to fill in the gaps of their decade apart. 

This story really focuses on remedying one's past mistakes, taking charge of one's own future, and not missing out on the things that are right in front of you. Though I was often annoyed by Jack and Ellie's behavior, these lessons are all valuable and things that many high schoolers (and adults alike) still need to learn to take to heart. 

I was honestly a much bigger fan of Ellie and Jack's younger siblings, Remy and Cam. This gives me hope for book two in the series, because it follows Remy and Cam's love story. These two are so young in this book that I'm really curious to see how they mature and all the obstacles that they encounter in their relationship. Hopefully, their story isn't as petty as their elder siblings' tale. 

Overall, "The Charmed List" did end up being a disappointment to me, mainly because it's a pretty basic story, the magic system isn't overly unique, and the tension between Ellie and Jack mostly existed due to petty events in their youth that literally have little to do with the two of them specifically. This book wasn't bad necessarily, just nothing I haven't seen done before. If one is looking for a sweet summery road trip romance with some great tension between the two main characters, this could be a good one to give a try. I am looking forward to reading "Our Cursed Love" soon and checking out Remy and Cam's story and how it differs from their older siblings' romance. 

Back of Book: 

Six days to remember.

Love or lose him forever.

Remy Kobata has always wished she was destined to be with her best friend, Cam Yasuda. All the way from being neighbors from birth to mixing up magical prank potions together to their “just friends” homecoming date during their senior year in high school, nothing’s a secret between Remy and Cam—except for how much she is in love with him.

Remy is trying to work up the courage to confess her feelings during their winter break trip to Japan, when she gets selected for a mystical tea leaves reading and it reveals that they’re not meant to be together. After they stumble upon a secret magical apothecary in the back alleys of Tokyo, Remy and Cam are offered an ancient soulmate elixir, created before all love potions were banned by the magical government. They each have their reasons for wanting to take it, but what could go wrong with finding your soulmate a little earlier?

Except, after they drink up, their senior year trip flips into the worst vacation ever: Cam has forgotten who Remy is. If she can't help Cam remember her by midnight New Year’s Eve, they’ll both be cursed to forget each other. To unravel their past and rewrite the future, Remy and Cam must travel through Tokyo to rediscover Cam’s memories and make new ones—and maybe even fall in love all over again. 

Book Number: Two (Last Book) 

Genre: Young Adult | Fantasy | Contemporary | Romance 

Review: 🌟🌟

Remy Cobata and Cam Yasuda, younger siblings of Ellie and Jack from "The Charmed List" are here to shine in their own friends to lovers romance. 

Remy Cobata has been in love with her best friend, Cam Yasuda, for as long as she can remember. She fears that confessing her feelings will make things weird between them, so she keeps her feelings close to her chest. Remy and Cam are going on a final trip to Japan before they go to college on opposite sides of the ocean. Remy decides that she is finally going to tell Cam that she loves him, but the universe seems pretty set on keeping them apart. When they encounter a magical fortune's teller that tells Remy that she doesn't have a soulmate, Remy loses all hope. That is, until she comes across a potion shop that offers her an illegal love potion to make Cam fall in love with her. Things backfire when Cam completely forgets Remy. Now the two of them have six days to get Cam's memory back or lose the chance of every being in love for good. 

This book was as gimmicky and surface level as the first one. I like Cam and Remy more as characters than Jack and Ellie, but the plot of this one frustrated me so dang much. The fact that neither of them is brave enough to confess their feelings after being in love with each other for years and years had me in a bit of a rage. The fact that they both believe that magic will solve things with little effort was also a major L on their parts. 

I did think it was fun to explore Tokyo with the two of them. Having this book be set in Japan added a bit of flair to this book that was otherwise pretty flavorless. These two also had to contemplate their futures apart, because Cam planned to go to college in the United States and Remy planned to go to college in Japan. Being in Japan had them contend with their fates and contemplate the consequences of a long-distance relationship. 

This book was cute enough, but I didn't really feel the romance. In "The Charmed List" it was obvious that Remy and Cam care for one another deeply and they were only in middle school (I think) back then. However, I fear their relationship didn't really grow in this one. I'm not saying that they wouldn't make a good couple, but we got to see literally zero time with them actually together in this novel. In my opinion, that's kind of a bummer in a book marketed as a romance book. Also, if these two were such good friends, they should have been able to communicate about literally anything that had some depth to it. They are great at surface level conversations but failed when it came to anything serious. 

I get that this is a sequel to a book that already had magic incorporated into it, but I fear that the magic didn't sparkle at all. It seemed a bit out of place in this book and made for a bit of an awkward reading experience. It added a bit of whimsy that this book desperately needed, but that was about it. 

Overall, "Our Cursed Love" definitely let me down. I figure I'd enjoy it more than "The Charmed List" because I liked Remy's bookish vibes and Cam's addiction to science and puzzles; nerd romances are usually quite fun. However, I just found the plot of this one to be super frustrating and not very original. I fear that Julie Abe and I may not have the best of relations, which is a bummer, because I think many of her other books sound really good. There is a chance I'll still give some of them a try, but I will definitely approach them with caution. Who knows, maybe her middle grade books will be better because the romance element is usually less at play in children's books.