Witches and female power= So good! Anyone looking for the perfect collection of witches and magic look no further. Rebellious women who ruled the world!

This is yet again another brilliant anthology about women. This time including witches. This book presents witches which were often women that were educated, unmarried, or didn't follow traditional expectations put in place by society. This book denies that if you're not following societal norms you're doing something wrong as a woman, which is true. Society expects women to be these perfect housewives when most women can do more than most men. Women have the right to worship, love, and do whatever they choose. Particular favorites include Jessica Spotwood's "Beware of Girl's with Crooked Mouths" and Tehlor Key Mejia's "Starsong."

Overall I really enjoyed this book, I felt the different settings, representations and spins on witchcraft were interesting and varied. Most of the stories were enjoyable to me, with a few that really stood out. Overall I felt like The Gherin Girls by Emery Lord was my absolute favorite out of all of them, it really pulled at my heart and felt so developed and real.

Overall I give the entire anthology 4 stars as I did truly enjoy it, but I've included ratings for all of the stories below.

Starsong - Tehlor Kay Majia
3.5 stars

Afterbirth - Andrea Cremer
4 stars

The Heart in her Hands - Tess Sharpe
4 stars

Death in the Sawtooths - Lindsay Smith
3 stars

The Truth About Queenie - Brandy Colbert
3 stars

The Moonapple Menagerie - Shveta Thakrar
5 stars

The Legend of Stone Mary - Robin Talley
3 stars

The One Who Stayed - Nova Ren Suma
2.5 stars

Divine Are the Stars - Zoraida Cordova
2.5 stars

Daughters of Baba Yaga - Brenna Yovanoff
3 stars

The Well Witch - Kate Hart
3 stars

Beware of Girls with Crooked Mouths - Jessica Spotswood
3.5 stars

Love Spell - Anna-Marie McLemore
5 stars

The Gherin Girls - Emery Lord
5 stars

Why They Watch Us Burn - Elizabeth May
3 stars

I would like to thank Netgalley and Harlequin Teen for giving me a chance to read this book prior to it's release.

Wow.

Just holy crackers wow!

These anthologies were amazing! It was so hard to put this book down.

Even harder to really decide which story is my favorite because I think they were all perfect in their own way.

I know there are going to be tons of people whom may turn their noses up at the idea of gay witch romance but you guys have no idea what you are going to be missing. These witches are wonderful characters whom are determined to chart their own course instead of allowing Lady Fate to determine it.

I really don't want to give up any spoilers to these wonderful stories since this is mainly the ARC and some things may change but really give these stories a chance to cast their spell upon you. You will not be disappointed. You will fall in love with each witch and their own tale.

Admittedly, short stories aren't my favorite and while the premise was intriguing, I wasn't hooked and had to give up about midway. Of the stories that I did read, The Heart in Her Hands was the one I liked most. Bette was an engaging character, one with whom readers might easily connect. And I do give the book points for it's inclusive cast of characters.

This collection of stories about witches and witchcraft has more to offer than the somewhat cutesy title may suggest. Instead of light fantasy romps of mischief and magic, this anthology gives us powerful allegories of persecution and inner strength. Through a diverse array of settings, styles, and characters, this book dissects what it is to be different, to be misunderstood, and, especially, to be a woman in a world that fears female power. Like any anthology, some stories are weaker than others, but stories like “The One Who Stayed” by Nova Ren Suma, “Why They Watch Us Burn” by Elizabeth May, and “The Heart in Her Hands” by Tess Sharpe really shine. Some stories provided such interesting world-building that they just begged for a full-length novel, such as "Death in the Sawtooths" by Lindsay Smith and "The Well Witch" by Kate Hart. One of the most wonderful things about this book is the sheer diversity of representation among the characters - PoC and LGBTQ characters abound in this anthology. Although at 300+ pages it did drag occasionally, this was an enjoyable anthology that I would recommend to anyone interested in reading about relatable, diverse, powerful women.

One sentence review: An anthology which captives the reader with magical characters and stories. 

I enjoy anthologies for the variety of perspectives the reader gets on a single topic. I love seeing the range of interpretation that different authors bring to the table. This anthology delivers diversity, strength, and magic on every page. 

The authors do not stray from situations faced by teenage girls from all background and walks of life. There is so much freedom to be yourself and strength in these pages that every young woman will find her voice somewhere within these pages. 

Thank you, NetGalley and Harlequin TEEN, for the opportunity to read this collection early, in exchange for an honest review.

I received this book from #netgalley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

When I first seen this book, I knew I had to have it. I love a good witch story. I know this book doesn't come out until August 2018 I believe, but I still had to get my hands on it. It did not disappoint.

There were so many good stories in the books. Several that were a little less impressive but still not bad. I love when you are able to get great stories from lots of authors together and put together a great book.

Way to go all the authors that were included in this book and the publishing company that picked this book up.

Collectively, I really enjoyed these stories. Using witchcraft as a way to explore feminism and female solidarity was ingenious, and I loved it. Some stories stick out more than others to me, like Andrea Cremer's Afterbirth, Brandy Colbert's The Truth About Queenie, Zoraida Cordova's Divine Are the Stars, and Kate Hart's The Well Witch.

I understand that Tristina Wright's story will not be published in the collection due to sexual harassment allegations, which is upsetting because the story was really good (to be clear, I'm not upset that the story will be removed, I am upset that Wright committed those actions in the first place).

Thank you, NetGalley, for the opportunity to read this collection!

Toil & Trouble is an anthology series that contains 12 magical stories fit for a grimoire. There's romance, spells, drama, laughter, and tears all of the necessary ingredients for a powerful potion. Each story is a decent length that usually ends with a cliffhanger, so many of these tales rightfully deserve their own stand alone books. I applaud the uniqueness and boundaries that were pushed in this genre and can't wait to read more works by the featured authors.

What an absolutely GORGEOUS collection of short stories, resplendent in their feminist roots. These are delicious diverse, often own-voices, and overall just a stunning portrayal of witches and witchcraft around the world and through time. Beware of Girls with Crooked Mouths was my favorite story - a tale of 3 sisters, who grow up knowing one will betray her siblings and kill them. Wonderful, vivid imagery and I can't recommend this enough - it deserved to be accompanied by a hot mug of tea and a cool, rainy afternoon watching steam rise from the pavement like a ghost.

I usually don't enjoy anthologies because the entries are either too long or too short for my taste. If I like the writing style I want more and if I don't I get bored and want to move on. This one read very smoothly and I enjoyed 85% of it. Some of the stories were a little disturbing but for a YA reader interested in magic, this was full of good storylines.

This is an anthology of stories about empowerment . Yes, witchcraft is a part of every story and I loved that they were all very different. Spells of hope, survival and love were cast, not just in the book but upon the reader as well. This is a quote from the story Why They Watch Us Burn by Elizabeth May which I loved "magic is not for wickedness, not for the devil, not for those with cruel hearts. It’s for hope. For survival." It is for young adults and adults as well. I was so happy to be able to review this book. I received this book from Net Galley for an honest review.

** ARC provided to me by Harlequin Teen for an honest review. **

I'm going to share my thoughts on each story as I read so please excuse the massive amounts of updates and times this shows on your feed. This book doesn't come out until late August but I've been in such a witchy mood that I had to read it ASAP. Right off the bat, guys, these stories are all so diverse and there's a bunch that are own voices. (yay!) Here are my thoughts.

1. Starsong by Tehlor Kay Mejia - 4 stars
This is a great story about a Latinx (own voices) sixteen year old trying to find her way and gain her mother's approval after making some poor life decisions and changing her ways a year ago. Trigger warning for substance and alcohol abuse related to said poor decisions. She's a bruja who is finding her way with magic, art, music, and makeup. A girl after my own heart. She is a bit of a social media star and ends up talking with a doubter, another young teenage girl who puts her faith in magic and their discussion quickly turns to Luna wondering if she's queer and flirting with her. It was frankly, adorable. There was also additional diversity in the reference to clients of Luna's who hired her to paint their polya portrait for their living room. The normalization of a poly relationship was pretty awesome to read. Overall, I really loved Luna, am rooting for her and her new life path and want so much more of her!

2. Afterbirth by Andrea Cremer- 2 stars
This is a story set in 1650 New England about a midwife being accused of witchcraft after daring to insinuate that a servent's child was the illegitimate child of the master of the house. Overall, I just didn't connect to the story or the characters but I'm not surprised. I'm not really one for historical fiction.

3. The Heart in Her Hands by Tesse Sharpe-4 stars
I really enjoyed this story on a few different levels...one all the generational witches, tea lovers, and kitchen/garden witches you could ever want which I LOVE! There are angry deities and rebellious strong women that I adored. It's a story about defying fate, the idea of soul mates being predetermined, following your love and also features a loving and heartwarming f/f love story. I really enjoyed this one!

4. Death in the Sawtooths by Lindsay Smith-3 stars
This one is probably the darkest of the stories so far. This one follows Mattie who serves Lady Xosia, the Lady of Slumber, or death. There's an entire witch/wizard order to this short story...very Slytherin vs the rest of the houses feel. Mattie is being judged for the actions of prior followers called to serve her patron and suffering judgments for their ill deeds. It's a story of judgment in a small town, overcoming stereotypes, and a bully turned friend-ish. There's some creepier TW for bullying, bloody attempted murder type deals.

5. The Truth About Queenie by Brandy Colbert- 5 stars
Okay, so I'm a sucker for the unrequited love storyline but oh man, Queenie and Webb have my heart. We have an all black cast of characters and Queenie who is a witch denying her powers because she believes they went wrong in her youth and hurt a friend. I just loved and connected with so much of this story and I would absolutely read a full-blown novel centered around Queenie. I adore her.

6. The Moonapple Menagerie by Shveta Thakrar- 2 stars
This is a story about friendship, learning to push past doubt, and trusting in yourself and those who care for you. It was a sweet story about teenage shapeshifters who take on a churel (demon) who wants to insert themselves into their play...or maybe just teach them some life lessons. It's a sweet story less about magic and more about friendship.

7. The Legend of Stone Mary by Robin Talley- 2 stars
I'm not sure why I couldn't connect with this story. It's about a small town girl named Wendy who has always been warned away from the woods where a statue of her great great (a bunch of times over) grandmother's statue remains to remind the town of the witch who was killed there. It's a story, at its heart, about not repeating the mistakes of the past but the magical/witchy vibes were slim to none. There was a f/f relationship that had potential but even that wasn't fleshed out for me.

8. The One Who Stayed by Nova Ren Suma- 5 stars
Oh my goodness, that was the most tension and dread in a story that I've read in a long long time. Reading that and knowing what Mirah was about to encounter was heartbreaking. I read the entire story with teary eyes and a hurting heart but the short story was still absolutely beautiful. At its core, it's feminist, empowering, and about women coming together to support other women, to help them at their darkest hour. Such a very powerful story. Trigger warnings for sexual assault, rape, and assault.

9. Divine are the Stars by Zoraida Cordova-4 stars
This was such a beautiful magical realism story and that's saying something because I rarely connect with magical realism. I loved this story about Marimar and her cousin Chuy going back to see their dying grandmother. It's a beautifuly/ugly look at family, greed, and love. I absolutely adored it, and the fact that it is an own voices Latinx story makes it even more amazing.

10. Daughters of Baba Yaya by Brenna Yovanoff- 4 stars
Okay, maybe it's because I'm coming up on Easter and us Greek's are dying all our eggs red in preparation but I'm totally connecting with the Orthodox Russian in this story. This story is gritty, dark, and dangerous and I'm about it. It's about girls who are done sitting back and listening to bullies, about girls who are finding their agency, their power. No longer will they let boys call them sluts, or whispers and taunts be unpunished. Serious The Craft vibes and I live for it. Consider yourself warned- some girls smile just to show you their teeth.

11. The Well Witch by Kate Hart-2 stars
Historic stories don't do much for me but a girl living alone in the rugged Texas outback all alone with her mom passed away and her father gone for 3 years who can call water to her and build an oasis around her--I could get down with it. Then 3 men on the run wind up at her place, taking up residence in her barn and I was waiting for something "worse" to result from the story and while it didn't I still wasn't a fan of the way the story panned out. There was a strong woman of color who was self-sufficient and then turned victim in the lamest of ways. I couldn't get behind that but the beginning was pretty promising.

12. Beware of Girls with Crooked Mouths by Jessica Spotswood- 5 stars
Wow! Okay, total Three Dark Crowns vibes here as we deal with three sisters who know that their family curse means one of them will go crazy and murder the others (plus we have a poisoner in the midst). I loved the sisters. I felt for Jo who has to make a difficult decision to spare her sister's lives. This is a story about family, fate, and love and how doing what you think is right can turn out so so wrong. I loved the vibe of this story, which felt very Victorian but also featured normalized bisexuality and a f/f marriage arranged by parents for the purposes of social status gain. YES to all of it.


13. Love Spell by Anna-Marie McLemore- 5 stars
This was such a beautiful beautiful story about a bruja who is living with her tia in an attempt to learn her craft. She also still attends Catholic mass and gets communion and struggles to mix her magic and her faith and be accepted by those around her. Her magic comes in the form of healing broken hearts and helping those who have lost love move on. She starts to fall for an acolyte and feels such despair because holy men can fall for witches, can lust for them, but will never marry them or be with them publically. She struggles to maintain her faith and her crush/first-love while balancing the knowledge that he can never be hers. It was heartbreaking and beautiful, hopeful and real. It doesn't hurt at all that this is an own voices Latinx story with a trans male love interest. Honestly, just such a lovely story!

14. The Gherin Girls by Emery Lord- 5 stars
Another in the collection that is so hauntingly written. This is a beautiful tale of sisters, the bond they share and their unconditional love they have for one another. As the oldest of four girls, oh my heart broke and rose with this story. At its core, it's about abuse (though hinted at and never described) and how abusers seek to isolate you from those who love and want to protect you. As somebody who has seen their sister in unhealthy/abusive and healthy/loving relationships, I related to this on so many levels. Of course, it's got magic, but the love of a sibling that will always hook me. One sister identifies as a lesbian though it's hinted at that she may be pan/bi like their eldest sibling. Another diverse and amazing read in this collection and one that had me tearing up more than a little bit. Love these strong amazing sisters.

N/A The Only Way Back by Tristina Wright- N/A
I'm skipping this story as it will not be in the finished version after sexual assault allegations were brought against the author. I'm so happy that Harlequin has taken to heart this incident and removed the author and her story from the finished version of this book.

15. Why They Watch Us Burn by Elizabeth May-5 stars
I have tears in my eyes as I write this last review. What a stunning, diverse, amazing, beautiful, feminist, empowering af story this was. This was the perfect ending to this collection. This story has TW for rape/sexual assault though not described it's heavily implied and understood. This story centers around Night and the 12 other women taken into the woods to repent for leading men to sin. It's a haunting and all too true analogy for how we treat survivors of sexual assault and rape and oh my goodness, the sisterhood, the love in this story is overwhelmingly beautiful. There's a trans character and a f/f relationship in this one as well as messages of hope, support, and strength. Such a stunning story!

This collection is the absolute definition of feminist, empowering, witchy, and haunting. I loved every single second of it, even those 2 star reads because as a whole I walked away knowing this is a book I will recommend, will come back to, and will think about for a long long time. What a beautifully crafted collection this is.

This collection overall was pleasant to read. It definitely gave me some ideas on how to approach magic differently in my own writings. Some of the stories were a bit boring, and a few alluded to some disturbing themes related to the dark side of humanity, which while somewhat interesting, were definitely not what I was expecting in this collection. But I suppose they are needed to add a balance to the good and bad sides of life and people. Overall, would recommend this book if someone wants some witches and magic reading in their life.

*I was sent an e arc from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. *. I was really excited for this one, but it was kind of a let down. I thought the stories would have a more magical base to them. A few of the stories I really enjoyed such as The Truth About Queenie by Brandy Colbert. I really enjoyed some stories, which really disliking a few. Overall 3 stars.

I could not WAIT to dive into this 15 story anthology alllll about witches and witchy stuff. I'm usually on the fence regarding short stories because I don't always feel content with such a short glimpse into these worlds. Overall, I was pretty pleased with how most of these stories came together and I felt satisfied for the most part. I also loved all of the different representation throughout the book - it's very diverse and that was much appreciated. Some of the stories were a little tough to get through. I did have to take quite a few breaks because the middle of the book had a lot of stories that started to blend together for me. However, the beginning and end of this book are definitely strong and delightful. I would recommend to those who enjoy short stories, witchcraft, and a lot of diverse perspectives.

"She has that look on her face. That "I'm going to solve this with food or fury" face."
This book is a little jewel, 15 short stories about women and witchcraft. In the past or the present, here or there, it explores different kinds of witchcraft, different cultures, and characters. I loved it all. All the 15 stories. Of course, some more than others. But overall, each of them has wisdom and beauty in it!
Each main character lives a struggle, but also has magic in their life. They learn and grow through the stories and so do we.
I recommend this book to all women, witches or not, who wants to dive into their power within!

Full review on the blog!

All about the W's: Witches and Women

If you enjoy stories revolving around strong, weak, and inspired women, you will likely take to this series of short stories. If you enjoy a little magic and magical realism, you will enjoy the short stories.
If you enjoy stories that include a bit of romance for the straight and gay crowd, you will absolutely dig this book. I think this story has a little bit of everything for women readers with a little magic in them.

With so many short stories involved, I find it can be a bit difficult to follow the characters and their various names and story lines. But I was pleasantly surprised to experience this issue very little through out the book. In addition, I really enjoyed most of the stories presented. It started a bit slow in my opinion, the middle and the end, containing some of the best stories. But there wasn't a story that I didn't enjoy. There was a little of something for each woman out there. And many of the struggles were incredibly relatable. Each and every author did quite well in their story creation.

I waited a while to be approved by NetGalley to review this book and it was well worth the wait.

Title: Toil & Trouble 15 Tales of Women and Witchcraft
Author: Tess Sharpe
My Rating: 2 Stars

What it's about: As the title implies, 15 Young Adult short stories featuring women and witchcraft.

What I liked: I liked the witchcraft and the diversity throughout these stories. I love the cover art.

What I disliked: Pretty much all of these stories bored me to tears. I just couldn’t get into them and on the rare occasion that I was interested in one of them, it ended way too soon, as short stories often do.

Overview: I was so pumped about this book, it was everything I’m interested in, but it just fell very flat for me. In the end I’m only giving it a 2 star rating, because while I finished it, it was a struggle. I had to keep pushing myself to continue.