Hello everyone!

I hope you are all well!

I’m back with some more of the 2022 books I read and utterly adored today – catching up with reviews because ALL books deserve a space!

Today, all of the books are MAGICAL and MARVELLOUS. If you know me, you know that I LOVE a magical book!

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Yesterday Crumb and the Storm in a Teacup by Andy Sagar

Yesterday Crumb is no ordinary girl. She was born with fox ears that have cursed her to a lonely life working in the circus and her origins are a complete mystery. But she is about to escape into the adventure of a lifetime when she learns that she’s a strangeling who’s lost her magic. Taken in by Miss Dumpling, Yesterday is introduced to a magical, walking teashop filled with fantastical customers, a flying teapot turtle called Pascal and powerful spells in every teacup! A mysterious figure of darkness is working hard to ensure her new life comes crashing down – and it all starts with a deadly shard of ice in Yesterday’s heart… But there’s nothing that can’t be solved with a pot of tea, a slice of cake and a BIG dash of magic!

Yesterday Crumb is truly an adventure! I absolutely adored the magic, the characters, the twists and turns in this. This book has gone down an absolute treat in my classroom with some of my children even coming up with their own teapots and their own magical teas! I’d love to use this as a read aloud – there’s so much joy and light and fun in this story! I was proper taken by the messages about family, owning your identity and the TWIST AT THE END made my jaw drop. Not enough people talked about this when it came out… and now that there’s a sequel on the way (in March), you need to read this!

Onyeka and the Academy of the Sun by Tọlá Okogwu

Onyeka has a lot of hair­—the kind that makes strangers stop in the street and her peers whisper behind her back. At least she has Cheyenne, her best friend, who couldn’t care less what other people think. Still, Onyeka has always felt insecure about her vibrant curls…until the day Cheyenne almost drowns and Onyeka’s hair takes on a life of its own, inexplicably pulling Cheyenne from the water. At home, Onyeka’s mother tells her the shocking truth: Onyeka’s psychokinetic powers make her a Solari, one of a secret group of people with superpowers unique to Nigeria. Her mother quickly whisks her off to the Academy of the Sun, a school in Nigeria where Solari are trained. But Onyeka and her new friends at the academy soon have to put their powers to the test as they find themselves embroiled in a momentous battle between truth and lies…

Anyone who knows me knows that I love getting books into the hands of my kids that can be windows and mirrors – this has gone down an absolute storm with my kids and hearing things like “it’s so lovely to see a main character who looks like me” (a direct quote from one of my girls) makes my job of teacher and being a reader just incredible. Onyeka is a story so full of gorgeous messages about being yourself and finding your people. I loved the magic (cause obviously) and Onyeka’s very unique source of her power was a brilliant incusion. The bits with her thinking about her anchors made me proper emotional. There were lots of little moments to smile in this too. I can’t wait to read the next one now – the sequel comes out in March and I am v excited!

The Mapmakers by Tamzin Merchant

Ever since Cordelia discovered the hidden map in her father’s precious telescope, she’s been searching the streets of London by starlight and trying to uncover its secrets. She’s sure that her missing father is out there somewhere, and that if she follows his map, she’ll finally discover the truth about his disappearance. She never expects to stumble upon a secret society of Mapmakers – or to learn that magic isn’t limited to the few Maker families, but is instead is all around, if you just know where to look… But danger is lurking around every corner, and Cordelia must convince the rival Maker families to work together for once – not only to bring her father home, but to save the very essence of magic itself…

I absolutely adored the first book in this series (The Hatmakers), so I was excited to read this. This is a sequel I’ve been desperate to read since I finished the first one. The first book was amazing and I knew this one wasn’t going to disappoint either; this one made me gasp, laugh, cry and I raced through it in a matter of hours. I’d love to see more from this world of magic, friendship and hope. I loved being back with the characters, the incredible descriptions and the wonder of this world. This is a world I find myself thinking about a lot!

The Ship of Doom by M.A.Bennett

Luna thinks that an evening at her aunt’s butterfly club sounds deathly boring. But it turns out that the meeting, held in the Butterfly Room at the Greenwich Observatory, is not at all as Luna expects. The Butterfly Club is a society with an unusual secret… they use time travel to plunder the future for wonders. Together with her friends, Konstantin and Aidan, and a clockwork cuckoo, Luna boards the Time Train. The gang travel to 1912 and find themselves aboard a great ship travelling from Southampton to New York. They locate a man called Guglielmo Marconi and his new invention: the wireless radio. But as the ship heads into icy waters, they discover its name: The RMS TITANIC.
Can Luna and the boys save Marconi and his invention from the doomed ship? Can they get the radio back home to the Butterfly Club? And how will their actions change the rest of time?

In a total change of tact, this is a bit of historical fiction fused with some fantastic time travel and I THOROUGHLY enjoyed it! I wasn’t expecting to love this as much as I did, but my gosh, what a story. I hadn’t heard much about this when I picked it up, but honestly, I gobbled through its amazing characters, intriguing plot and wonderful history in a matter of hours. This is full of time travel, intrigue, bad guys, good guys and a bunch of kids whose stories I want more of! Loved reading about the Titanic! The ending SHOOK me. I can not wait for the next one!

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A massive thanks for stopping by! I hope you enjoyed these reviews!

Have you read any of these books?
What have you been reading recently?

And that’s it for now! Thanks so much for stopping by! Let me know your thoughts in the comments!

S x