A little surface level but definitely enjoyable if you want something spoopy, romantic, and queer. With a badass bi MC and love interest (who is arguably more badass - sorry Harlowe), being open about being bi and having very different sexual/romantic entanglements despite outward appearances/reputations, who all want to enact revenge on a sleazy ex... Yeah okay, that was awesome.

But there were also some really great thoughts about nostalgia, what coming home feels like, the way we change ourselves to match changes in our lives, the importance of open communication... Not to mention some really awesome witchcraft (that I really wanted to understand better because we knew it was secret and that most witches learned a lot of the same spells but the big families had specialties... I dunno, give me some clear lore please!)

And I may have just noticed that a book two is coming out next year, so... Maybe my questions will be answered?

Fun rom-com. Absolutely loved the bisexual rep. Would definitely recommend this book to anyone looking for a fun spooky read for October

This was the sapphic, witchy rom com of my dreams.
This was such an enjoyable read. I’ve been in a bit of a slump because of school, but this book pulled me out of it with its adorable romance. It was also really funny too.

This is the first Lana Harper book I’ve read, and I was impressed with her writing style. It was very smooth and nice to read, plus her details were on point. (She made me want to visit Thistle Grove even though it’s not real haha).
I also enjoyed that this book touched on other relationships instead of just romantic ones.

Thank you to Berkeley Publishing for this advanced readers copy! This is a must read for October.
4.5 stars

It’s a cute Halloween read. Magical town with hot Baes looking for revenge. Lots of parts made be lose interest though and my eyes gloss over. The lgbt nod was nice touch though. I just didn’t ever really relate or end up liking Emily.

Rainbows and Sunshine
October 12, 2021

Sapphic, witches, magic town and a competition! I loved this fun and witchy rom com!

Emmy and Talia have great chemistry together and I adored them. Emmy teams up with Lin, her bestie and Talia to get back at their mutual ex and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

I loved the worldbuilding and the small town setting, the different ancestral homes with a specific type of magic and especially the tournament that takes place every 50 years.

It's a perfect read for this time of the year and I highly recommend it!

*ARC provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest and unbiased review

Perfectly witchy, perfectly queer, and perfectly quaint!

Hot Takes
- This was the perfect witchy vibe for someone who does not like typical spooky for Halloween! I'm not a thrills person, so this took a more whimsical, magical route and I loved that!
- All the characters were great, but the main heroines were SUCH good characters together and apart. They each had their own journey but their romance was so cute too! I also loved that this was a great example of many stories we're seeing where marginalized communities aren't just rooted in their typical traumas and instead are portrayed as regular characters dealing with the same things everyone else deals with. It's that representation!
- I love a small town vibe and the role the community plays! Lots of feelings of belonging, finding who you really are, etc.
- The magic was wayyyy more then I expected, in a good way! Not just a cute little witch situation but a full on world building magical families.

Read If You Like
- Hocus Pocus, Halloweentown, Sabrina, etc. for cute spooky vibes
- You're in the market for some legit magic talk.
- You liked the family lines of Legendborn and the whole saga behind those!

Lana Harper’s new witchy romance Payback’s a Witch follows Emmy Harlow, a young witch who abandoned her magical hometown of Thistle Grove years ago in favor of the bright lights of Chicago. Emmy left in part because a warlock broke her heart, but also because she’s tired of being looked down upon because the Harlows are the weakest and least magical of all the prominent witch families in Thistle Grove. Emmy wants to make her way in the world where her magic doesn’t define or limit her.

When the story opens, however, Emmy is reluctantly on her way back to her hometown. She has promised her father she will fulfill one last witchy duty – to serve as Arbiter at the annual spellcasting tournament. When Emmy arrives in town, she reunites with her best friend, Linden, and also becomes reacquainted with another young witch she had a crush on in high school, Talia Avramov. Emmy is appalled to hear that the same warlock who broke her heart years ago, Gareth Blackmoore, has been toying with Linden and Talia’s hearts as well. Gareth thinks he can do whatever he wants just because his family is the most powerful in the town, and the three witches decide it’s time to take him down a peg or two and that the tournament will provide the perfect opportunity for revenge.

I don’t want to spoil anything about the tournament but it definitely has a bit of a Harry Potter Triwizard Tournament feel to it with the three most magical families vying for supremacy. I loved the competition itself, which was action packed and a lot of fun, and of course, the witches putting their plan of revenge into motion made it all the more entertaining.

Aside from the tournament, Emmy’s journey is also quite compelling. Once she is back home and can feel the magic she abandoned so long ago coursing through her veins again, she becomes very conflicted about who she is and where she wants to be. She also finds herself very attracted to Talia and is beyond excited to realize that her feelings are reciprocated. I enjoyed watching Talia and Emmy get to know one another, especially since that relationship adds another layer of complexity to Emmy’s journey of self-discovery.

I also really enjoyed the author’s atmospheric descriptions of Thistle Grove. It’s such a magical place with the perfect autumn vibe. It was very easy to see why Emmy was torn about leaving once she was back under its spell.

If you’re looking for a fun witchy read to dive into this spooky season, I highly recommend Payback’s a Witch.

sapphic, witchy, competitive and lightly romantic, Payback's A Witch is a great read for the spooky season with imaginative worldbuilding

3/5 stars

I really wanted to love this book. Unfortunately it did fall a bit short for me though.

There were some parts that I found fun and I found the lore of the town really interesting. I did enjoy reading the book dispute some of the issues that I had and am about to lay out.

The romance was ok, but the conflicts didn’t really makes sense to me. For example, they are literally in the middle of a competition where Talia is trying to become the towns magical mayor, and yet Emmy is annoyed that Talia doesn’t want to move away as soon as the competition is over? Like, what? Talia becoming the magical mayor and the immediately moving away would have been such a bad look.

Next, for a book about witches and a magic competition, I found the magical aspects a bit underwhelming.

This book also made me realize that the John Tucker Must Die-esque revenge story works better with high school students than it does with like adults- especially when the event motivating the revenge was a break up that happened like ten years earlier.

Additionally, Emmy is part motivated throughout the book for her distaste of how the town places worth in people based on what family they are from. Emmy was further down on the hierarchy because her family was considered less powerful. However she had no problem reinforcing that hierarchy whenever she was around her cousin, who was even further down that Emmy. All her cousin ever did was express an interest in their family history, but Emmy is so mean to her for that and several times throws it in her cousin’s face that she is less important that Emmy. Also, considering that only four families in the entire town have magic and they have this much trouble with the hierarchical power structure, I can only imagine what it’s like for the vast majority of the town who have no magic.

Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley for providing me with a review copy in exchange for a honest review.

One Sentence Summary: After almost nine years away, Emmy is back in Thistle Grove to arbitrate a witchy tournament and gets roped into getting revenge on a man who broke her heart and two-timed two fellow friends and witches.

Overall
Payback’s a Witch is a witchy read, and perfect as a Halloween read. Set during October in a witchy Midwestern town, it focuses around three female witches who were all hurt by the same man, also a witch, and who now want to get their revenge by ensuring he doesn’t win the tournament that determines which family gets a magical boost. The revenge and the tournament were not as strong as I expected, but the romance was so good I could almost forgive it. This is such a fun, witchy read with great characters and a charming Halloween town. I loved the complexity of the characters and their different relationships with Thistle Grove. Even if the romance was formulaic, Emmy and Talia were such an incredible couple that it actually flowed really naturally. Overall, definitely a great October read!

Extended Thoughts
In Thistle Grove, Halloween is always in the air and magic is everywhere, though only the witches know it’s there. Every fifty years, the four founding families hold a tournament to declare a Victor whose family receives quite a magical boost.

Emmy, the descendant of one of the founders (the weakest one, actually), left Thistle Grove almost nine years before when Gareth, also a descendant of a founder, broke her heart. After her father guilted her into it, she now returns to take up the arbiter’s mantle, and a duty she never sees coming.

But it isn’t so simple. Talia and Linden, both daughters of the other two founding families, were two-timed by Gareth and they now want revenge and Emmy’s involvement, and Emmy can’t stop thinking about Talia. But, with Thistle Grove wrapping itself around her and her magic returning and her feelings for Talia growing, Emmy becomes more torn between staying and leaving after the tournament.

Payback’s a Witch is a delightfully witchy read perfect for the Halloween season, especially as it’s set throughout October and Halloween is thick in the air. It’s cute and fun with a healthy dash of magic, but I found it a little lacking on the revenge front, though the strong romance was almost magnetic to the point where I almost forgot about the revenge.

As a revenge story, Payback’s a Witch was surprisingly light on it despite the focus on it in the description. As a matter of fact, Gareth didn’t even seem like a major player, so the whole revenge plot just felt more like a device to get the love interests together. Unfortunately, the revenge was tied up with the tournament and the tournament itself was equally lackluster. The challenges weren’t quite as in-depth or elaborate as I expected it to be for such powerful families, but offered a nice background to the romance story. I expected a story about three witches out to destroy a man and there would be many hilarious hijinks along the way. Sadly, it felt less like revenge and more like getting two of the characters together.

But, oh my goodness, I really enjoyed the romance in this book. Normally, I’m not a big fan of it, but I really enjoyed the relationship that developed between Emmy and Talia. It was sweet, heartwarming, and beautiful. Talia, for being the daughter of a family of necromancers, is surprisingly complicated and so much more than she appears. I loved getting to know her throughout the story, and I think she’s my favorite character. I sometimes hated the way Emmy treated her, but it helped add some really great tension to their story. Their romance hit all the right notes for me, even if it was formulaic in the typical romance novel way, so the witchy aspects of the story helped me out a lot. I’ve been looking all year for my favorite sapphic romance, and I think I finally found it.

Emmy, though, kind of drove me batty. She kept flip flopping and, while it made sense, it also didn’t and kind of felt childish. I could understand the struggle she had of spending years crafting herself into what she wanted to be instead of being who she is and now being faced with unmasking herself, but I felt it dragged a little too long. She also felt a little too self-absorbed to me, spending more time rediscovering herself and Thistle Grove than actually helping Talia and Linden take their revenge, which contributed to the flimsiness of the revenge plot. Though I did love the way she was with her friends and how she worked hard to repair her relationships. So, while she did bother me, I enjoyed seeing her grow and watching her make all the right decisions.

I loved everything about Thistle Grove. Most of the witchy books I read take place on the East Coast, so I was very pleasantly surprised to learn this one is set in the Midwest. Other than frequent mentions of Chicago, it felt like any other little witchy town, but I really liked that it was firmly established as a Midwestern witchy town. Thistle Grove is so magical without being outwardly magical. As far as I could tell, only the descendants of the four founding families actually have magic, but I guess the magic permeates the air so it always feels like Halloween, making it into a huge tourist attraction. I loved that each family’s magic was different and that winning the tournament had an effect on its potency. Since Talia is Emmy’s love interest, the reader really gets to know Talia’s family’s powers, which are both fascinating and a little creepy, but so amazing. Linden’s family’s magic sounded so incredibly lovely and made my Earth-loving heart just burst.

Payback’s a Witch is a really fun witchy read. It’s strength is definitely the romance, which I really loved even though I usually hate romance in books. I wish there had been more of a revenge story and more to the tournament, but it was really nice to get to know the families and Thistle Grove, so I’m looking forward to the next book in the series. Overall, Payback’s a Witch was a lot of fun with characters that blended really well together and absolutely does not lack in Halloween spirit.

Thank you to Berkley and NetGalley for a review copy. All opinions expressed are my own.

Lana Harper’s Payback’s A Witch is the perfect book for those looking for an atmospheric Autumn romance. It follows Emmy Harlow, the heir to one the four founding witch families of Thistle Grove, as she returns to her hometown 9 years after getting her heart broken by a Blackmoore, the most powerful of the witch families. Emmy had vowed to never return, but once every 50 years the founding families compete in a magical competition, and it is the Harlow’s duty to run the game. So Emmy returns one last time to fulfil her duties as a Harlow, and not disappoint her family. Upon her return, however, Emmy starts to question everything in her life. Things get even more interesting when Emmy’s best friend Linden asks for her help: to get revenge on the Blackmoore boy who broke her heart years ago, as he had just cheated on Linden with Talia, heir to the Avramov family. The three women team up to humiliate him at the tournament, and as Emmy and Talia get closer, there is an undeniable spark between them.

This was such a fun read! While the plot was pretty predictable, it was still a delight to read and see how everything was going to unfold, even though I had already guessed the ending and plot twists. I liked the way the plot moved forward, and found the pacing to be just right. This is not a particularly fast paced book, but the setting and atmosphere made the slow/medium pace entirely the right choice. Speaking of atmosphere, that was without a doubt the best part of this book! Thistle Grove is a magical town full of witches, and while the “normies” don’t know for sure that there are witches in their town, they fully buy into the witchy lore. As a result, their entire tourism is based on a year-round Halloween aesthetic. Basically, Thistle Grove is my dream town and I would like to move there immediately! It was such a charming atmosphere, which made it the perfect book to read in the fall. Otherwise, the characters in this one were lots of fun, although the side characters were not the most memorable. I really loved the romance between Emmy and Talia! I almost always dislike the relationship conflict that happens towards the end of every romance novel, but I found this one actually made sense for the plot and characters, and was very well done. The tension between Emmy and Talia was so strong, and I loved the “will they, won’t they” nature of their relationship.

Overall, Payback’s A Witch won’t be a story that sticks with me for a long time, but it was an enjoyable read and definitely got me into the Halloween Spirit! I would definitely recommend this one to anyone looking for a light romance with a witchy twist to read during the Fall season.

Payback’s a Witch is a romantic fantasy with delightful worldbuilding of the ethereal quality. The novel follows Emmy as she returns home and comes to terms with who she is and where she comes from. Emmy is an intriguing, multi-layered character, who at times is quite frustrating, but she remains relatable throughout. 

The writing style is the primary focal point of this novel. The book is chock-full of clever lines and insightful remarks about the world that the author has created. The prose is heavily laden with worldbuilding and imagery. The book uses flowery, at times old-fashioned syntax, but it’s nicely paired with modern expressions, such as “nasty woman” and talks of being “chaotically neutral”. Unfortunately, Emmy’s witty internal observations and beautifully implemented flashbacks do come at the expense of pacing, and the read is quite slow and heavy with description. This book is definitely for those who read for language and setting.

Because of the focus on language, the worldbuilding is phenomenal. I would say that it even rivals that of Harry Potter, with the way that magic works and the little idiosyncrasies that are explained throughout the book. There’s an intricate complexity to the magic described that shows the author put a lot of time and effort into constructing this fantastical world. The book is rife with magical history, for the town and the founding families.

Magic is in the air, along with a hint of sexual tension. The romantic chemistry between Emmy and Talia is cute, but it takes a backseat to everything else that’s going on in the book. I would almost say that this is a fantasy novel with a romance subplot. While the romance plotline does follow your typical romance story arc, it’s overshadowed both in quality and in amount of time spent on the main plotline, which reminded me a lot of the Triwizard tournament in Harry Potter (in a good way!)

I recommend this book to those who want a descriptive, modern story of witchcraft with phenomenal worldbuilding.

John Tucker Must Die, but make it witches.

This was a delightful book. I loved the setting in the magical town. Witches, a competition and a group of vengeful ladies getting even with the man who did them all dirty. The magic system was simple which worked well in this type of story. I would have liked a little more worldbuilding but overall this was a great read.

This is a perfect sapphic fall romance. It’s atmospheric, a little bit angsty, and wickedly hilarious.

Emmy Harlow’s been away from her hometown of Thistle Grove for nine years, and just about the only thing that could drag her back was a pleading letter from her father asking her to uphold the family tradition in the Gauntlet, a magical competition held every fifty years between the heirs of the four witch families that founded the town – well, except for the Harlows, who just arbitrate it. But that’s par for the course for Emmy, who wasn’t a very powerful witch even before she left town and lost all her powers. She’s only there to do her familial duty so she can get back to her real life in Chicago, hopefully without running into the guy who broke her heart, Gareth, too much. But a chance encounter at a bar reintroduces her to Talia, one of the other heirs.. and rekindles a high school crush. But it’s only when she discover that Gareth’s hurt both Talia and Emmy’s best friend Linden as well that she develops a new purpose for being there: preventing Gareth’s family from winning the Gauntlet again. Plus, it’ll mean spending more time with the very charming Talia….

“But being around Talia felt so vivid, so radiant and jewel toned. It made everyone else I’d ever been with seem to pale, to fade into unremarkable pastels.”


The Harlows are the weakest of the four families, and her meager magic was always a disappointment for Emmy. So after the humiliation of her breakup with Gareth, it wasn’t a big deal for her to give up her magic and go live outside Thistle Grove. She’s built herself a magic-less life in Chicago – well, except that she works as a product sourcer for a faux “witchy” subscription box. While she believed she was perfectly happy there, once she gets back in Thistle Grove, she realizes what she’s been missing. Tea with her mother, picnics with her best friend Linden, flirting with the gorgeous Talia… But she still feels like she can’t escape what being a Harlow means in Thistle Grove – less than. Talia can’t understand how Emmy lives without her magic, and has no desire to leave Thistle Grove. So whatever this attraction is between them, Emmy thinks they can have a bit of fun but it won’t go anyway. After all, she’s leaving as soon as the competition is over, and Talia knows that. Right?

“The night air gusted against my face, smelling like an absolute of fall; woodsmoke and dying leaves and the faintest bracing hint of future snow. And right below that was the scent of Thistle Grove magic that I’ve never come across anywhere else. Spicy and earthy, as if the lingering ghost of all the incense burned by three hundred years of witches had never quite blown away. A perpetual Halloween smell, the kind that gave you the good-creepy sort of tingles.”


This book is serious fall vibes. There’s apple orchards, fields of sunflowers, pumpkins… not to mention a costume ball and a party in a haunted forest. The prose is just gorgeous and evocative, and if Thistle Grove was real I’d definitely be one of the hordes of tourists descending on it in October. Even Talia has a bit of that dark magic vibe going on, since the Avramovs are basically a family of necromancers, though actual hexes and dark magic aren’t something they’d stoop to. The plot and world building are pretty fun, too, with each family having a distinct form of magic, demonstrated throughout their daily lives and in the various Gauntlet challenges. The dialogue is a bit hard to quote due to all the swearing, but it’s absolutely hilarious and made me laugh out loud several times.

Overall, the perfect book for grabbing a PSL and an apple turnover and settling down in a comfy chair!

I received an advance review copy of this book from NetGalley. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Five Reasons to Read This Book

One. It’s a fun take on a John Tucker Must Die retelling. It takes the bare bones of the story and transplants it into a whole new setting. And makes it sapphic. So, in addition to being a fantasy and a romance, it has, occasionally, these kind of vindictively comedic elements.

Two. This ties into the first point, but there’s something so satisfying about seeing a cishet guy get his comeuppance for acting like a complete tool. Call it schadenfreude, but don’t we all love it? Sometimes all you want from a book is to see the good guys get what they ought, and the bad guys (or, in this case, dickhead guys) being very satisfactorily taken down. But not only that, when he is, the main characters promptly forget about him. There’s some kind of catharsis to this book—about unhooking yourself from someone who’s had such power over you for so long.

Three. We mentioned it was sapphic above, but it’s the kind of sapphic that you really feel (if that makes sense). That is, the way Emmy acts with Talia, the flirting, the way she simply describes Talia, all of that jumps off the page. You can, to be somewhat cliched, feel the heat between them. You’re not simply told that they’re attracted to each other, but after each of their interactions you find yourself whispering under your breath “god, that’s gay!”.

Four. You know those Halloween films, the old familiar ones, that you come back to over and over again. Sometimes they’re set in a little spooky town, one that surrounding folk believe is just a town that’s very keen on all things spooky, but in actual fact, those spooky persons are real. That’s what this book feels like. Set in a witchy town, founded by four families of witches, that people flock to for its witchy delights, real or touristy, it evokes those kind of film, to us. You could so easily see this book being turned into one as well, in time.

Five. On top of being a fantasy romance, this book is very much about family bonds. As we noted, the town is founded by four families and each of those families has their own distinct character. But what they all share is a loyalty, to the town and to their own. They’re tightknit, and they have each other’s backs. They don’t always get along, of course—who does?—but at the end of the day, they’re each of them truly a family.

Queer. Witty. Funny. Witchy. Sapphic love.

This book had everything I needed to start this spooky season off right! I loved all the characters and their interactions with each other and the whole community of Thistle Grove (stars hollow vibes for sure). But, beyond being a fun Halloweentown/Twitches-esque story that you're going to want to read to set the mood for fall, it has a great larger lesson: It is OKAY to still be finding yourself and figuring stuff out.

My favorite line from our MC is:
"I'm the problem. I've done all this work to get where I am and now... it's like I'm flailing. Like I'm not sure about anything anymore. About who I am, what I want for myself, even where I want to be. "

Though, the main character sometimes really annoyed me, I loved her character ARC and the fact she's a mid-20s women who is still trying to find her footing and who she is/wants to be. That is SO relatable to me and I think millennials everywhere. In times like this, in a society like this, finding what truly makes us happy and who we want to be versus what society tells us will make us happy and who we should be can be vastly different and trying to decipher between the two can be hard.

I would definitely recommend this to people looking for a light, fun, but relatable read to start off this spooky season!

Thank you to Netgalley for an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

4.5/5

This book was so much fun!! Witches, magical games, and the small town vibe ugh I am a fan. Every time I picked this book back up it put a smile on my face. I cannot wait for the next installment.

Emmy Harlowe is a witch. Her self-imposed exile from her hometown of Thistle Grove has left her magicless, but Emmy left home for good reasons: to forge her own path, and definitely NOT because she was running away from her ex who crushed her heart. But when a spellcasting tournament brings her back to arbitrate the games, Emmy finds out her ex has not only crushed her heart a decade ago, but he was most recently two timing her best friend, Linden, and Talia Avramov. Both Talia and Linden want revenge and they ask Emmy if she's in.

The mix of witchy magic, Emmy's bookish tendencies and the atmosphere of the competition made this such a delight to read. Then there's the chemistry between Talia and Emmy, I loved it so damn much. I was rooting for these two ever since their scene together! They were just so cute. I also loved how vulnerable Emmy gets with Linden and her family. There's trauma in her relationships from how she left and it won't be solved by a "I'm here now". I really loved seeing Emmy strengthen these relationships and realize how much she missed Thistle Grove.

Then there's the magic! I loved the different families and the secret of the Harlowe magic. It was so cool and I want to know more. Someone send me a sequel!

Rep: bisexual female MC, bisexual female love interest, queer female side character (briefly mentioned).

CWs: Alcohol consumption, infidelity, sexual content (moderate), toxic relationship (past relationship), possession by spirits.

Payback's a Witch is such a fun story and perfect for getting into the Halloween spirit. As I understand it, Lana Harper writes young adult novels under another name - I haven't read any of those, but after reading this one, I'll be checking those out while I wait for book 2 in this series. The story is entertaining, interesting, and thoroughly engaging, and I liked all of that, but what really impressed me was the author's attention to detail. Everything, from the small-town setting to the well-rounded characters to the magic - it all just comes to life. Yes, I realize it's fantasy, but Harper makes it feel real. I felt like I was there, listening to these conversations and watching this competition, waiting for Gareth Blackmoore to get his comeuppance. Then we have the romance between Emmy and Talia, and these two have such good chemistry. Plus they're likable, both separately and together. We get the story from Emmy since it's first-person POV, but all of the characters feel just as developed as Emmy. I'll stop there so I don't give away the book's secrets, but this is definitely a recommended read for the season.

This was an absolutely fun read. It follows the main character as she returns to her hometown to fulfill her duties as the Scion of the Harlow family. However, unlike typical books, she is not participating in the competition but is the arbitrator for the other three families. Which I have to say is a fun new take on those kinds of stories since normally they follow one of the competitors. But this does not lack drama for the main character. She had moved away from her hometown, and its magic to escape the past she had with an ex. She’s now back in town and needs to repair old relationships (family, friends, etc) AND she has a beautiful new love interest that is one of the other scions competing (plus her ex!).
It was honestly a very cute read, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Furthermore, I was amazed to discover that the other is also responsible for a few YA books I have read and enjoyed. Above all else, this author writes wonderful female dynamics and characters. WHICH given that this is a sapphic romance just makes it all the more perfect!

This was an excellent book to kick off spooky/autumnal season. It read like a warm and comforting cup of apple cider (with a bit of a bourbon kick!) and I loved it. Thistle Grove felt so fully realized to me as the book's setting and everything was just so cozy and fun. I can't wait to read the next book set in this world!