Book Review: Payback's a Witch by Lana Harper

Payback's a Witch by Lana Harper
Length: 336 Pages
Genres: LGBTQ, Paranormal Romance, Fantasy
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars

A special thanks to NetGalley and Berkley for an ARC of this book!

Trigger Warnings for Cheating

"A swell of raw magic flooded into the car, until the air around me nearly shimmered with potential, bright and buzzy and headier than a champagne cocktail. As if Thistle Grove's own magical heart was pulsing eagerly toward me, welcoming me back. No hard feelings about my long absence, apparently.
Made one of us, I guess."

I was so, so pleased when I was reached out to to give a review of this amazing, wonderful, perfect book, and I cannot thank the publishers more for allowing me too! Payback's a Witch is everything I dreamed it would be (and more).

Set in the magical town of Thistle Grove, we follow Emmy Harlow as she returns home to take her family's ancestral place as Arbiter during the Gauntlet, a spellcasting tournament in which the other three witching families compete. Emmy hasn't returned in four years, and left in the first place all because of her ex Gareth, scion of the stuck-up Blackmoore family, who own almost every bit of Thistle Grove and everyone in it. They are the most powerful of all the families, and haven't lost a tournament in years and are expected to win again like clockwork. Only Gareth screwed with the wrong witches.

Upon returning, Emmy learns it's not only her heart that he's broke -- he also hurt her bestfriend, Linden Thorne, and the darkly beautiful Talia Avramov's. Together, they devise a devilishly sweet scheme: work together during the games to bring down Gareth -- and the Blackmoores -- once and for all. The only thing Emmy doesn't expect is to fall head over heels for Talia.

I adored everything about this book, from the history of the families, which wove in some Arthurian myth along with the Russian Baba Yaga, to the charmingly witchy town, to the romance between Emmy and Talia, which was equal parts sweet and sexy. The writing was gorgeous, so incredibly evocative I could actually picture the haunted woods, to the dusty little shop (cleverly named "Tomes and Omens") to the verdant Honeycake orchards. Payback's a Witch is the perfect romance for #SpookySzn, and let's be real, for every season after!