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    Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet
    Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet
    Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet
    Audiobook9 hours

    Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet

    Written by Charlie N. Holmberg

    Narrated by Kate Rudd

    3.5/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Maire is a baker with an extraordinary gift: she can infuse her treats with emotions and abilities, which are then passed on to those who eat them. She doesn’t know why she can do this and remembers nothing of who she is or where she came from.

    When marauders raid her town, Maire is captured and sold to the eccentric Allemas, who enslaves her and demands that she produce sinister confections, including a witch’s gingerbread cottage, a living cookie boy, and size-altering cakes.

    During her captivity, Maire is visited by Fyel, a ghostly being who is reluctant to reveal his connection to her. The more often they meet, the more her memories return, and she begins to piece together who and what she really is—as well as past mistakes that yield cosmic consequences.

    From the author of The Paper Magician series comes a haunting and otherworldly tale of folly and consequence, forgiveness and redemption.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateJun 28, 2016
    ISBN9781522635314
    Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet
    Author

    Charlie N. Holmberg

    Charlie N. Holmberg is the award-winning author of the Numina series, The Fifth Doll, and many other books. Her Wall Street Journal bestselling Paper Magician series has been optioned by the Walt Disney Company. Charlie’s stand-alone novel, Followed by Frost, was nominated for a 2016 RITA Award for Best Young Adult Romance. Born in Salt Lake City, Charlie was raised a Trekkie alongside three sisters who also have boy names. She is a proud BYU alumna, plays the ukulele, owns too many pairs of glasses, and finally adopted a dog. She currently lives with her family in Utah. Visit her at www.charlienholmberg.com.

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    Reviews for Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet

    3.5/5

    150 ratings15 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Super weird but very engaging. If it wasn't Kate Rudd narrating, I doubt I would have finished it though.

      2 people found this helpful

    • 2/5
      I wish there was a way to rate the performance of the audiobook. That’s what I struggled with most. If this had been read by someone else, I may have liked it better, but as it was, I couldn’t finish and stopped listening halfway through.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 3/5
      can I just ask what in the holy forklift was that
    • 5/5
      It's certainly a weird story Especially at the beginning, but I still found it charming and even poetic in some points.
      Thanks
    • 5/5
      Oh my heart and the ending. I absolutely love this book
    • 4/5
      MAGIC BITTER, MAGIC SWEET was an entertaining fantasy novel. Maire is a baker who can infuse her baked goods with emotions and abilities. She doesn't know her past. In fact, her memory begins only a few years previous to the story when she was found and taken it by Arrice and Franc. When her town is invaded by marauders, she is captured and sold to Allemas who treats her badly and forces her to use her gift for baking to satisfy her clients. She is forced to make a house of gingerbread among other things. Maire is visited by an ethereal being named Fyel who seems to know her but who won't tell her about her past. She needs to discover it for herself. I found her discovery, once she made it, the best part of the book. Fans of fantasy will enjoy this one which talks about choices and the consequences of those choices.
    • 5/5
      This was such a joy to listen to! From the start, I couldn't wait to find out what would come next. Perfectly paced by a fantastic author and beautifully read.
    • 4/5
      Layers

      At first I wasn’t sure, but the more I read, the more I followed along trying to solve the puzzle of the story. I was not expecting to find that Allemas was who he was or that their punishment would end up being more like a reward, but that’s part of all the layers to the story that made it so good. It ended up causing me to think of it being a Frankenstein retelling and at the same time a lot of other stories and things all in one. It was a deep thinking and feeling book for me, which was part of what I loved.

      If you haven’t checked it out, you should.
    • 4/5
      Magical!

      I enjoyed every minute reading this story. The mystery, the characters, the world, it was all delightful. Many times I found myself laughing, cringing, or tearing up.
    • 3/5
      On the whole, I liked it, but it was a little weird at times. It's fairly short, too. I can't say what I missed, but I missed something.

      The bits before a new chapter starts threw me at times, because in the narrated version, it wasn't exactly clear that a new chapter began, and the text seemed completely unrelated to the story. It's a lot clearer in the printed version, cause it is in italics, so you know it's a dream sequence, or a memory, or something.

      The narrator has a lisp, which I found a little irritating at times, but she narrated well, so I stuck with the audio book.
    • 4/5
      This story was a but slower than the Paper Magician series, and yet I had to finish it to find out the relationship between these characters. It was interesting and not what I thought it would be, but still a pretty decent. Not my favorite and placed under the Paper Magician, but I don't think it moves quick enough for teens.
    • 5/5
      I loved all the references to fairy tales in this story, but I loved more the way the story unfolds and how it all makes sense at the end. Ms. Holmberg's conception of angels - of what they do and don't do - is so interesting. And the ideas of forgetting and remembering and of creation are all so thought provoking. Nicely crafted and complete story with all the loose ends wrapping up neatly at the conclusion. Loved it!
    • 2/5
      The book started out OK but by the time it got to the end, and I had to push myself to finish it, I thought it was soppy and silly. At the beginning of the book, combination of baking and magic was intriguing but that seemed to be abandoned as a major theme as the story went along. The author styarted to build a different world but the pieces didn't all fit together and by the end of the book, there were loose ends galore. Instead of being a heroine, the primary female protagonist turned out to be an angelic type creature who did a bad thing because she wanted a "child" with her lover. She cried a lot at the end. And the book then had a "happy ending". I doubt I will ever read anything by this author again.
    • 2/5
      Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet is the latest book by Charlie N. Holmberg. Mairie is a baker in Carmine. She has no memory of her past. Mairie was found by Franc and Arrice. They took in Mairie and helped her. It has been four and a half years since they found her. Then one day Mairie is out and notices a strange glow. It is a type of being glowing before her but is not whole (cannot touch him). He seems to know Mairie, but she (of course) does not know who he is. He tells her to run. Their village is being attacked by marauders (they ransack, kill, and kidnap people). Mairie (runs in the wrong direction) hides in a cupboard inside her bakery. The men quickly find her and take her along with Cleric Tuck (who Mairie was interested in). The marauders make them walk for days until they put the people in cages. They are selling them as slaves. Mairie is bought quickly by Allemas after examining her (he seems to know her). Allemas takes Mairie to his cottage where he locks her up (and forgets about the basic needs of humans—food, water, etc.). Allemas soon returns with baking supplies. Mairie has a special gift. She can make people feel things with her baking. Mairie is not sure what Allemas wants at first. Then when Allemas discovers that there is more to Mairie and her talents, he sets out to exploit them. This turns out to be a journey for Mairie. She looks out for the apparition and sees it again (after she finds half a beautiful crystal). The apparition knows Mairie, but he cannot tell her anything. Mairie has to discover her past for herself. She ends up going full circle in her discovery to find out what happened to her, how Allemas knows her, and her relationship to the unusual apparition that goes by Fyel. Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet was a sleeper novel. It is slow paced, strange (just plain odd), and confusing. I have to admit that it never did completely make sense and the ending did not help (maybe it is just me). I give Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet 2.5 out of 5 stars (good idea, but did not like the final product). I prefer Charlie N. Holmberg’s first books. They had something special, magical in them that this novel was lacking. The writing is good (which helps). Ms. Holmberg makes scenes come alive with her words (which is why she got the 2.5 stars). The book does have a good message if you make it to the end. I am not sure if I will be reading any more books by this author. They would have to sound really good for me to try them. I’m sorry but Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet was just not for me.I received a complimentary copy of Magic Bitter, Magic Sweet from NetGalley in exchange for an honest evaluation of the novel. The opinions and comments expressed above are strictly my own.
    • 3/5
      The good: As always, Charlie Holmberg has a fantastic imagination. This was like Grimm's Fairy Tales crossed with the Genesis creation story, and for the most part, it worked really well. There are pleasant little allusions to Hansel & Gretel, or to the Gingerbread Man, but these never overtake the main storyline. That storyline begins like something straight out of The Sugar Queen or Like Water for Chocolate, with a girl named Maire who can instill baked goods with emotions that influence the people who eat them to feel certain ways. (I think there was also an unfortunate Sarah Michelle Gellar movie with a similar plot.) But that sweet, simple, magical-realist beginning takes a quick turn into the less familiar, as Maire's town is overrun by bandits and she's sold into slavery. Her new master: His wiry, curling hair is the color of unearthed carrots and protrudes from either side of his head as though trying to escape his ears. His skin is unlike any I've seen before -- pale and chalky, almost blue in hue ... His bright chartreuse eyes, different in size, hover under thick brows.In other words, this guy: descriptionUnfortunately, there are no tea parties or white rabbits in the book whatsoever. And although the main reveal of the story is fairly predictable (there are only so many answers to who/what Maire really is), there are still a couple of surprising plot twists.The bad:The first-person perspective is always difficult to pull off, and I'm not sure it was entirely successful here. There are portions where Maire is a little unconvincing in her descriptions: My mind is like a pan of cake torn apart by eager hands, leaving only the outer crust. Really, Maire? That doesn't even make sense ... although, now that I think about it, maybe that's the point.Anyway, this was a fun read. Ultimately, I think I prefer The Paper Magician trilogy, because it's a more interesting world, but this was still a great way to while away a few hours. Note that I received a free copy of this ebook from the publisher in exchange for my honest review.