Someone has to say it and it might as well be me: Seriously Wicked is seriously adorable. This is a light YA urban fantasy, suitable for tweens and up (actually it’s pretty G-rated, but I’m guessing it will be most interesting to tweens and younger teens as opposed to younger kids).

There was plenty to amuse and delight me as an adult reader, starting with the book’s opening:

I was mucking out the dragon’s garage when the witch’s text popped up on my phone.

BRING ME A BIRD.

“Ugh,” I said to Moonfire. “Here we go again.”

This witch goes on to text further instructions:

HANG SNAKESKINS OUT TO DRY
FEED AND WALK WEREWOLF PUP
MUCK OUT DRAGON’S QUARTERS
DEFROST SHEEP
DON’T BE SNARKY
THESE ARE THE CHORES BY WHICH ONE MUST UNDERSTAND TRUE WITCHERY
NOW BRING ME A BIRD

This is cute, and for me it fell on the “just right” end of the cute spectrum, and not the “So cute that I want to barf” end. If you find the preceding instructions to be more on the barf end of things, then this is not your book (although you might like Connolly’s wonderful Ironskin series, which is rich in fantasy with not a whiff of cuteness about it).

Camellia is a high school student who is being raised by a witch, Sarmine. Camellia is adamant that Sarmine is not really her mother, and that Camellia is not and never will be a witch. Camellia insists on going to public school (she gets excellent grades so that Sarmine will never be called to a conference) and she does whatever Sarmine wants her to do (because otherwise she’s punished with various nasty magical spells). But Camellia refuses to actually learn any magic despite Sarmine’s constant efforts to persuade or bully her into using at least an elementary self-defense spell.

When Sarmine decides to summon a demon to help her take over the town, Camellia is forced to really step things up. Now she has to deal with a mean girl at school, a slipping grade in algebra, a sad dragon, a phoenix that is about to explode, and the fact that the boy she has a crush on has been possessed by a demon and is kissing all the girls at school. Watching her juggle everything is stressful but watching her come into her own is deeply satisfying and fun.

One thing I liked about this book is the nuanced way it deals with supporting characters. Sarmine is abusive, but she’s not one-dimensional. Her desire to have a relationship with her daughter, her grief over her lost husband, and her belief that she has to protect Camellia by making her tough turn her from a caricature into an understandable, though still pretty awful, person. I also liked Camellia’s best friend, Jenah, who refuses to be pushed away by Camellia when she realizes that something is wrong.

This book doesn’t have a full-on angsty love triangle but Camellia does have an unwanted admirer in the incredibly awkward Kelvin, who tutors her in algebra and supplies her with goat blood (his mom runs a farm, and fear not, the blood is in very small, non-lethal quantities). Kelvin may or may not be on the autism spectrum. He masks his social anxieties by pretending to be a robot, but I never get the sense that the author is mocking Kelvin. I loved that Camellia tries to appreciate him, insists that he is not creepy, and is always honest with him about her feelings, even switching to robot voice herself once to help him understand the she likes him, but doesn’t love him: “Love is strange and nonmechanical. Does not compute.”

As for the boy Camellia does like, Devon, he’s a dreamy, shy, musician poet who is fairly non-fazed by the fact that the first time they meet her butt is literally on fire due to a burning feather in her pocket. Devon is much more sketched-in as a character than Camellia, but it’s easy to see why she likes him, and it’s also easy to see why the demon is able to tempt him. Devon and Camellia bond early on over their love for animals and that compassion and kindness for others keeps Camellia and Devon connected even though they don’t know each other very well and even though the demon gives Devon the sense of confidence that Devon has always craved. The romance is age- and plot-appropriate: it never claims to end in an HEA. It might turn out to be one, or it could be a Happy for Now.

The only thing I didn’t like about the book was the fate of Sparkle, the high school’s Mean Girl. I felt that it came out of nowhere and was unnecessarily cruel. Given the fact that Camellia and Sparkle were friends as younger kids, I would have liked to have seen a reconciliation – it would have been more in keeping with Camellia relates to the other characters at the end of the book. The reason this book is a B+ instead of an A is that the Sparkle arc sat wrong with me – it was a jarring note of ugliness in an otherwise lovely story.

Overall, this story is told with a wonderful amount of warmth and humor. Camellia is tough and resourceful and in the course of the story she grows more confident about herself and more flexible in how she thinks about other people. Her ability to carve out a happy ending for everyone at the end of the story is truly triumphant. I recommend this as an easy, fun, feel-good book – perfect for something to relax to during finals week, or when you have a cold or are under intense stress. The dragon alone makes it worth reading, as does the werewolf puppy who is only human during the full moon (at which time he’s a three-year-old boy). Above all, I totally adored Camellia, who has flaws (I could relate all too well with her tendency to be jealous of people who seem to know exactly who they are) but who is clever and always tries to do the right thing. This is a satisfying stand-alone but I’m still looking forward to the sequel, Seriously Shifted, which is coming out in November. Can’t wait!