Cover Image: Wicked As You Wish

Wicked As You Wish

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Member Reviews

A dozen years before...The Wonderland Wars between the kingdom of Avalon and Beira's ruler the Snow Queen ends with Avalon becomes inaccessible and incased in ice, the Snow Queen is missing, and Wonderland is wiped off the map. Alexi Tsarevich, the sole survivor of the Avalon's royal family is placed in hiding until he can come of age, fulfil the prophecy, and reclaim his kingdom.
Present day Invierno, AZ...In a town where magic doesn't work, Tala Makiling Warnock lives with her family and other magical citizens seek refuge. Tala has the ability to negate magic and disrupt spells, a dangerous ability to possess. When Alex is brought to Invierno for safe-keeping, he and Tala become friends. The arrival of the prophesized firebird puts Tala and Alex in the hands of an unlikely cast of bodyguards in order to safeguard his return Avalon.

Wicked As You Wish, a new YA fantasy series by Rin Chupeco, was one of my most anticipated reads for 2020. With firebirds, magic, prophesies, good vs evil battles what's not to love. Although the series has a lot of potential, some elements of this first novel left me feeling a bit disappointed. The world building is a mishmash of elements and characters from several fairytales and folklore legends which are combined with a rather complex magical system...hence the hundred names for magic. Although this has been done before, here it just felt a bit disconnected and left me feeling overwhelmed and confused at points. I have no love for Alex's character and Tala felt a bit underwhelming as well. What I did enjoy about this book was the diverse cast of fantastic characters who possess some unique and interesting abilities and weapons. The plot does improve and it had some really good elements as the story continued. The firebird is not what you expect and is quite the character. I also enjoyed how the chapter titles where prophetic of the misadventures ahead. What I hope to see as the story continues is some growth in Tala's character in which she becomes more compelling and her renowned abilities become more powerful and prevalent. Overall this book was enjoyable but I hope to see more as the series continues.

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Rin Chupeco takes names, places, and concepts from fairytales and legends all over the world, throws them at the wall, and while a few of them *do* stick, the result is a jumbled, nigh incoherent mess. There are too many ingredients in this book - and, while individually, they're good components, it just... does not work. At all. You can't use every food in the kitchen to make a cake and expect that it will come out tasting delicious.

Someone out there will read this and rejoice to have a Filipina heroine leading the charge, and for that alone, I'll be happy to have it on my store's shelf. But this book is not great. Rin Chupeco is much better than this.

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I really, really wish I could give this book five stars but honestly the first half was a MESS. I didn't know what I was reading, the plot and the characters and the world building just seemed to be all over the place. This book definitely had a very weak beginning, I think the only thing that kept me reading to start with was the quirky chapter titles!
I felt as though I needed to start taking notes when new characters were introduced as I couldn't keep up with the barrage of names and titles, not only of the people but also the names of their weapons and their families. I definitely felt lost throughout majority of the first half.
Thankfully, the second half of the book was better. Once a small group split off and became the main focus of the narrative it was much easier to keep track of who they all were and what was going on. The world building was still quite weak, the book seems to be mostly dialogue.
I'm definitely considering purchasing a final copy of this in order to continue with the rest of the series, it took a lot longer than needed to understand this new world created by the author but I am fascinated by it. I would recommend or dissuade anyone from reading this book, I would suggest reading a few reviews and deciding if it's worth it from there unfortunately.

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I really enjoyed all the different fairytale characters that made an appearance or were mentioned throughout the book. I felt the book started out very strongly but didn’t necessarily continue as strongly. I’m really curious about more of the prince’s backstory and have a few hunches about how the characters lives tie together. I do love the series title and am curious what will happen in future books.

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The premise of this book sounds exciting, but the execution is lacking. I honestly couldn’t get into this book and ended up DNFing it because I just found it so difficult. The beginning of the book is an absolute info dump and it doesn’t let up. I usually love books that start with a bang, but this one started with more of a simmer and stayed that way for 100 pages while continually introducing more characters and information.
I like the idea of this story; the fact that the main character is a POC and the other is LGBTQ. I like that this seems the be a story weaving fairytales together and changing them up, but it felt like I was dumped in the middle of a story and needing to play catch up while also learning all the new stuff. It was just too much for me and made it impossible for me to develop any kind of connection with the characters.

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I'm not sure what was going on with me here, but I just struggled with this one. I loved the concept. The mishmashing of different mythologies and fairytales was unique and done in a very natural and organic way. It didn't feel forced. Everything tied together beautifully. I love the fact that the characters were so diverse in terms of background, ethnicity, sexuality, and all of that, which is always refreshing to see.

My problem was that the story and writing just felt like it was meant for a much younger audience. This is slotted under YA but it didn't feel like YA at all, it felt more like middle grade. Some of the characters just felt like paper cut outs and I didn't feel connected to anyone at all.

For me, characters are the most important part of the story, followed by plot and writing style. Although I liked the IDEA of these characters and the IDEA of this plot, but I just felt like it missed the mark for me personally.

This book was provided by netgalley and Sourcebooks Fire for an honest review

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Pretty disappointed in how this turned out. Big twists were predictable, lots of loose ends, characters don't really show growth, it was all over the place plot wise, and world building was meh.

I kept reading because I wanted to know how it ended.

Wicked As You Wish follows Tala as her and her family try to hide their magic (the fact that they can cancel magic, rather) as well as protect the Prince of a kingdom that has been cursed as well as frozen so that no one can enter or leave. The government partners with an evil Queen and chaos ensues, thus leaving Tala, her family, and the Prince on the run. They somehow end up in the frozen kingdom, fight off monsters, and break the curse.

This sounds amazing, honestly. And I enjoyed the idea behind it. But the beginning was full of info dumps that took away that enjoyment, as well as was riddled with random, strange occurrences (such a ogres and an army of brainwashed kids and a government that has turned on them and magic mirror portals??) that felt like they had no purpose other than to provide shock factor. Of course, later on in the book it made sense, but the beginning is a mess.

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I absolutely love Rin Chupeco's THE BONE WITCH trilogy, so I was excited to dig into WICKED AS YOU WISH.
It totally did not disappoint.

WICKED AS YOU WISH has the feel of epic fantasy with a contemporary twist, thanks to the world-building that she does in this story. (I'm REALLY hoping there are maps in the print version because I had a hard time placing where some of the countries are located in this alternate history of the world.) The setting for the story is modern-day, but thanks to this alternate timeline, the US is the Royal States of America, California has been annexed, and fairy tale lands are real places (think Neverland, Avalon, Wonderland) along with a contingent of fairy tale princesses (Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, Red Hood, etc) who have real backstories.

In this story, Alex, the last prince of Avalon, has been in hiding while they await the arrival of a firebird before his 18th birthday - its arrival will hopefully signal that he will, at last, be able to free his country of the icy grave it's been buried under.

Magic is real, and made accessible through technology. Tala is half Filipino, half Scottish, and her "magic" (from her mother's side) is that she can repel magic. She lives in Arizona next door to a houseful of other Filipino aunties and uncles, all who are fierce warriors/guards of their own right (fighting with fans edged with sharp blades, among other things.)

Chupeco has woven in a lot of modern-day issues - ICE and borders, prejudice against minorities and LGBTQ, the fight for technology and resources in order to maintain power. She also has a diverse cast of characters that are well developed and interesting - fierce, quirky, and strong-willed.

In fact, of all the characters, Tala is the LEAST informed about what's going on, both with the task they must undertake, her family history - even her own control of her own powers is still a work in progress.

Oh, and the battles! There are a wide variety of enemies to battle, from ogres to ice wolves and ice maidens to a Swamp king and the Ice Queen's army of ...undead? Posessed? (I was never really clear what their status was once she possessed them other than "gone".)

And to that end...there is a LOT going on in the story.

The feeling of epic fantasy comes, I think, from the sheer amount of information related to the world-building going on in the story. There is a lot of it - magic, cultures, history, and it's all thrown at you in some pretty big info dumps. (this is where maps and character lists would be helpful, to show where everyone comes from.) This isn't a story to race through - while this was a marathon read for me, it did involve a bit of backtracking from time to time to re-read a section to sort out history, in particular.

I admit, there were a few spots where the pace picked up and I lost the thread a little bit. There are still a few elements in play that I'm confused about at the end - this was a tale with a LOT going on. There is also a lot of magical terms to keep straight (as the book says - there are as many words in Tagalog for "magic" as the Inuit have for "snow") as there are locations of these nether lands and a lot of side characters.


Did I mention that I read this in a day - I simply couldn't put it down - and I can't wait to see what comes next for Tala, Alex, and the rest of the crew. (Although wait, I must...)


Thanks to Goodreads for providing me with an advanced reader copy.

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Unfortunately, this was a "did not finish" for me.
From the start of the book, it reads like a weird information dump. There is no buildup for the characters or the world in which they live. The readers are just thrown into messy worldbuilding with characters that feel bland and one dimensional. I loved the idea behind the magical realism of this story, but it was really all over the place. It felt impossible to retain any kind of information.
If there's anything I took away from the short moment with this book is the Filipino representation that is so often not present in young adult books.

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I loved this book!! Rin Chupeco has done a wonderful job of interlacing many different fairy tales and stories that I grew up with into a new world based on their magics. I thoroughly enjoyed this read and already cannot wait for anither!

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I had heard a lot from this author and decided to give him a chance and I was not disappointed at all, this book was fantastic.
There are many characters that are bad and I love, I love that there is a lot of darkness and evil.
It's very difficult to pick a favorite character, because they're all great and special.
Enjoy this book from start to finish, especially the end.
Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to read this ARC.

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I have mixed feelings. This is such an interesting precise. However, sometimes the execution falls a bit flat. Just using the term, "frog" put me off a little bit. It didn't feel ominous or fear inducing.

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This was such an interesting blend of modern/contemporary life with fantasy! Tala was a fascinating main character, and though I did struggle to keep the fantastical side straight in my head in the beginning, the joy of following her story was more than enough to keep me engaged.

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Rin has a way of writing poetically in my opinion. The way she brings on cultures in this was beautifully done. I also admire the diversity of the characters. This book was a 5 star rating, heck most of Rins books ive read have been 5 star ratings. It’s something about the way she writes these scenes that have me picturering everything vividly.

There were times I really wanted to see a scene pulled out of the book and drawn! I literally can go on, but I won’t let’s talk about the characters.

This book has a bunch of bad ass warriors that you can’t help but become attached to. We have Zoe, Ken, Loki, Cole, West, Alex and best yet Tala! They all have to get the prince to safety the prince being Alex, without the Ice Queen getting to him. Thoughout the book, I was laughing at the interactions of these characters. They felt like friends and comrades, while there was points in the story where I wanted to throttle Alex (the prince) because he acted like a FROG! He was so mean to them and acted entitled and ungrateful! At first I really thought he was this humble prince who would be a hero in the end but nope. He redeemed himself slightly in my eyes in the end.

Tala for sure was one of my favorite characters, though I felt mixed feeling because she didn’t own her badassness! She felt very insecure to me and I’ll tell you why! BECAUSE NO ONE WOULD TELL HER WHAT THE HECK WAS GOING ON! She was literally set to be a key player and yet no one told her anything. She had to piece it all together on her own and i felt her frustration like girl get yourself some new friend! There was a bit of a love interest and it didn’t really focus on that which I didn’t mind. I think Tala had bigger things to worry about. Her dad though, he’s a different story!

Ken, Loki, and West really kept me reading on! They seem like the end game, friend goals, friends I wish I had! Zoe and Cole, the tension the pure wanting that was there!! They can deny all they want but I think they are perfect!

Over all, I really enjoyed this book. That last part, Rin had me chocked!! Like what do you mean!! I’m excited to see more of these characters and see if Tala excepts her destiny or will she run from it!!

Thank you to fairyloot and NetGally for the copies of these beautiful ARC’s!

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**Review will be posted on my blog on 2/29/20 , closer to publication date**

Thank you to Sourcebook Fire and NetGalley for giving me a chance to read this eARC.

Let me just say, I have a love for Rin Chupeco books. I remember not being able to read The Bone Witch because it was too slow and yet it ended up being one of my favorite series. 😱

So here we have Wicked As You Wish. Think magic, technology, an alternate Earth where the land of fairy tales exists in our modern day world. It reminded me of the show Once Upon A Time!

Tala is half filipino, half scottish and her power? She negates magic, she can break spells, which is super useful when you are around evil magic users. The last heir of the magical kingdom of Avalon, Alex, is in hiding and his protectors are her parents who used to be warriors when Avalon was a thriving place. But with the Snow Queen after him, now Tala, her family, the new Bandersnatch warriors are on the run to get to Avalon and free it from it’s frozen prison. Will they succeed?

What I Liked:

*There is an intricate world being described in this book. It will confuse a lot of people because it did confuse me. Just know that it is our modern day world, but the fairy tale kingdoms of Neverland, Wonderland and Avalon exist as well. It’s real. As for the magic system, non-magic users covet spelltech, basically using magic and technology together, ex. a cell phone which can create spells! But there is older magic or powers that are passed down through bloodline as well. Tala’s power is to break up spells and hers is passed down through her mother.

*Speaking of fairy tales, I like how portals are the rabbit hole, or magic mirrors. There are the magical items like the sword in the stone and a firebird. But I love when fairy tales and the modern world collide, I’m a sucker for it. 😍 And this book is like…chaos with a light-hearted feel to it?

*Modern day issues arise in this book – the author talks about ICE and people being detained at the border, like our current problems in the USA today.

*Diversity is everywhere in this book. I love that the elite guards from Avalon were these old filipino women – YES, I felt like my grandmother could have been a Katiputan guard. She could wield a machete like no other. And besides racial diversity, we have LGBTIA+ representation as well.

*There is action and battles with ogres, ice wolves, toads, ice maidens and possessed cold zombies (is the Night King from GoT the Snow Queen’s man or what? 😅😂). It’s a wild journey to Avalon, folks!

*Tala as a character seems as neutral as her curse/power/agimat. She’s still learning to control her power, she’s the newbie when it comes to portals, ice maidens and Avalon itself. So basically she’s us, the reader who doesn’t know much. Haha. I hope we see her power grow. She’s the main character but I think she faded when the Bandersnatch crew came along. I love the Bandersnatch crew, they are all so different and have their own strengths and weaknesses. I also see some potential love matches brewing…(I hope!).

Things That Made Me Go Hmm:

*This story at times is all over the place. I had to put it down to finish an arc that I had a closer publication date and I’m glad I put it down because my brain had some time to simmer with the information about I gathered in the first few chapters. There was a lot of info dump at times. For me, I didn’t mind that because I needed to understand all the workings of this magical world. There is a lot to learn. But once I picked up the book again, I finished it in a day because I was entertained.

*Like I said it’s a wild journey from Arizona to Avalon because there are SO many characters, places and magic terms to remember. I enjoyed it, but I think a lot of people will be put off with all of it thrown at them at one time. I think the world building will confuse many readers.

*Please give me some romance between Zoe and Cole? And what’s going to happen with Tala and Ryker? Can anything come from that? 🙁

Final Thoughts:

This book was chaotic but for me in a good way. I felt like it woke me up, which was what I needed because there are a few books on my night stand I’m trying to get through and they have been putting me to sleep. 🤣 This one slapped me in the face and was like come on, pay attention and let’s take a ride! It’s not perfect by any means, it can be confusing.

It’s not a story for everyone, but seriously, I enjoyed this story a lot and the ending made me go… 😱. I think this book would make a great tv show because it is so visual! Anyway, I’m definitely looking forward to the sequel because I need answers.

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Unfortunately I just had a really hard time connecting to this book. I couldn't get a hang of the world and found that all the world building just felt like a giant info dump. I had a really hard time connecting with the plot and the characters as most of the time I was just trying to figure out what was going on.

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The plot sounded really interesting - a contemporary fantasy about a deposed teen monarch, and the magic-negating Filipina heroine and diverse group of teens who help him reclaim his throne and country. The concept was a new take on a familiar plot, good groundwork was laid for the second book, and all the characters are interesting.

But to get to the action, the reader has to battle through a LOT of worldbuilding. There's a confusing mix of alt-history America, fictional/fairytale countries and characters, and historical-based countries and characters. As a Filipino-American, I love the use of Filipino culture, but it gets lost when trying to keep track of the histories and characters. I do want to acknowledge that this was Chupeco's first book (and it got shelved for being "unmarketable"), so it's not as polished as her published work, but editing should have took a stronger hand in corralling the worldbuilding when the manuscript was brought back out. Rather than use so much Euro-centric fantasy, I would have loved to see more Filipino, or even more broad Asian-based mythology. I would have also cut at least one of the countries, or encourage the US to be framed as a fictional modern country to get around revising so much real history to make the story work.

We need diverse books, and it hurts to not be able to say more positive things about what could be a phenomenal book, but there were just too many concepts a reader has to absorb before they can get to the story.

2.5/5 stars

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This is a book for the hardcore fantasy readers, which is not me. It will have its readers but I found the characters and world too big a hurdle to understand to enjoy the story itself.

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This had so much potential. It also had underdeveloped ancillary characters and a convoluted story line that read as more muddled than interesting.

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I had a hard time with the beginning of this book, the work building was very confusing and at times I felt like information was just being thrown at me and then left there. But as the book continued I really became invested in the characters and their history. Run Chupeco definitely brings her characters to life with her writing. There are so many great action moments that are broken up with a lot of humour. But also I love the strong family bond in the story as well. Can’t wait to see what comes next!!

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