3.5 Stars

Wickedly Ever After is the story about a good witch and a wicked witch working together over a thousand years to see balance throughout the lands by ensuring fairy tale Happily-Ever-Afters continue. Apparently they reign in the royalty, stop wars, bring peace and allow for all kinds of social reform - until they don't. Suddenly, carefully laid plans and roles played by rote are thrown out the window and the two witches need to join forces to figure out who, what, why, where and how things went so awry in order to fix it...but can they? And SHOULD they?

There was a lot I liked about this but still things I didn't. The world was whimsical, charming, a bit dirty and often very funny. I loved a lot of the fairy tale reimaginings and subtle nods to well-known stories (i.e Cinderella, Hansel and Gretel, etc). The antagonism between Hector and Ida was fun, as was the dynamic between Tinbit and Hari, and the Happily-Ever-After blowing out of control was a good time. I kind of guessed what was going to happen along the way and hardly anything surprised me beyond a couple of lighter reveals toward the end (which seemed to pop out of nowhere for no real reason).

I think the pacing of this ended up feeling quite off - things took a long time to get going in the beginning only to race through the character development and plot resolution that it felt sort of unsatisfying by the end. Quite a few things were just told to us through the salacious gossip headlines too so it felt like we didn't actually see most of it.

I did have a good time regardless and am keen to see where this world could go - there's a lot of potential here.

After finishing this book, I have mixed feelings. Some aspects I thought were quite enjoyable while others left a bad taste in my mouth. I will start off with the things that I did not like. I felt like the two main-leads (Hector and Ida) were at worst unpleasant and at best boring. I didn't really feel any chemistry between the both of them romantically or even "as friends". Their relationships with their gnomes was at first glance sweet and compassionate. However, whenever they find out that each of their gnomes are in love with the other they not only sabotage them at multiple points, but gaslight them. Both of these aspects, made it very hard for me at times to read at times.

However, I would like to say that I was really rooting for the dragon and the princess relationship as well as the two gnomes. These four side characters were the saving grace to me in this book. I will also say that the world building was also interesting and would have liked a little bit more about how "Happily Ever After" "fell" apart.

This book was so funny! I love how so many of the Good magic spells are just romance tropes (like the Only-One-Bed Spell). Ida and Hector, the Good Witch of the North and the Wicked Witch of the West, both take care of the Happily Ever Ever magic that keeps their kingdom peaceful. But this year, things seem to go wrong with the magic. Between a reluctant prince, a progressive dragon, and an unwilling Common Princess, magic is haywire! Can Ida and Hector, with the help of their gnomes and a few other magical creatures, set the kingdom to rights?

This was such a cute and wholesome story. The charactrs were all so great and the idea of love matters more than appearance shone through a lot as well as the politics shouldn't interfere with the magic of love itself idea.

This book was nothing like I expected but it was a fun read. Between the drama of the happily ever after to the bickering between the two witches and magic gone wrong it was a good read. I love how they worked through things and how the chapters alternated perspectives.

Thank you NetGalley and source books I was so excited to read this book! I was drawn in by the cover 100% the writing was very easy to read and I love a fairy tale retelling with that being said this was a 3 star for me it was hard for me to get into but once I did I enjoyed it . I feel like the side characters were better then the main characters.

I was so excited to read this. The synopsis seemed fun and unique. Unfortunately, I stopped reading 60%
The writing and characters felt very immature and under developed. I wasn’t able to overlook the lack of plot and repetition of lines.

I had a little trouble with this book, and ultimately I think I was probably not the right audience for it. There were some things I enjoyed: this book is definitely a romantasy that doesn't take itself too seriously, although there's a surprising amount of commentary on classism and elitism for a love story. There's a nice amount of humor and the author writes with an enjoyably dry wit, and the story is pretty tongue-in-cheek with some of the references. That said, I really didn't like either of the two main characters that much and I had a really hard time caring about them and their relationship. I was much more invested in some of the other romantic entanglements, which are what kept me reading. I did have to set aside the book for a while after some events that happen about 40% into the story. I struggled a bit to re-engage once I picked it back up, partly because of my apathy towards the two main characters (and some lingering feelings about some pivotal events), but also because this is an overly long book with surprisingly uneven pacing for so many things going on. Even though I struggled with this one, I would probably read this new-to-me author again. I think you'd enjoy this book if you're already a fan of the author, and if you enjoy opposites-attract/enemies-to-lovers slow-burn romances that rely heavily on the misunderstanding/miscommunication trope. Publishes September 16, 2025. This review was based on a complimentary eARC of the story, all opinions are my own.

Big Thanks to Netgalley, the author, and the Publisher for the advanced copy! I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own

'Wickedly Ever After' by R. Lee Fryar is a magical tale of two rival witches struggling to maintain balance and save the 'Happily Ever After', while they start having feelings for one another.

The book feels like the Shrek movies, as the author combines tropes from fairy tales to create a wondeland with an adult spin. However, that adult spin didn't fit well sometimes and felt out of place.

The twist on the classical 'Happily Ever After' was an interesting one, moreover, and it was nice to read a new view on the well known outcomes.

However, much of the action happened off page, and it was not easy to get engaged with the love stories and the lore, especially since the characters seemed to know things that the reader did not, but failed to fill us in nevertheless, keeping us in the dark for most of the story.

The writing, finally, was light and entertaining and the characters endearing.

Wickedly Ever After was so much fun to read. This book was exactly what I needed to break my reading slump. It was fun, laugh out loud funny, and had so much depth. Hector and Ida are the perfect frenemies love/ hate notes included, but the gnomes do a fair bit of show stealing. Don’t expect this to be a straight forward fairytale or romance. The tropes are there, but everything has a little twist. This is definitely not a high fantasy world builder, but if you are looking for fun and light hearted this will definitely fit the bill.

This one was lighthearted, witty, and oh so fun! I loved all the references. I will admit it was a bit odd and was not prepared for how weird the story was going to be but in a way it added to the character of the book. Can say I was not interested in the love story one bit.

Wickedly Ever After, a wicked, fun, delightful read that is full of different tropes. A realm of fairy tale characters that need their Happily Ever After fixed. It is so endearing and a cozy whimsical read.

Hector West ( the wicked witch) and Ida North ( the good witch) keep the realm balanced and all its inhabitants happy. They hold a ritual called the Happily Ever After, which is what keeps everything running smoothly. However, due to Hector's antics and mischief, Ida picks the wrong girl for the prince. Chaos ensues, and our story takes a turn for the best!
Lovely story, adorable characters, cozy warm vibes, and there's even a dragon and gnomes. You will fall in love with this book. Perfect read for fall. 🍁🍂
Thank you, Netgalley and Sourcebooks Casablanca, for this cozy eArc. All opinions are entirely my own.

<b>Wicked Ever After was an absolute delight! This was magical and entertaining and whimsical and just brilliantly executed. A perfect book for hopelessly Romantics. What happens when the Wicked Witch of West and The Good Witch of North fumbles with their thousand years old system of Happily-Ever-Afters that keeps the world happy and prosperous? Dragon Prince marries the common princess. The human Prince marries his captain. And the witches who were enemies for ages..fall in love! Doesn't it all sound so exciting and intriguing?</b>

This is so hard to explain the story line because the author was so clever and witty about presenting the traditional concept of fairy tales in unique style. Hector is the wicked Witch and he deals with death and monsters and dark side of things. Ida is the good Witch, the fairy godmother and she works with life and sweetness. Their penpal-ship is riddled with curses and veiled insults and animosity but under that, they have developed a strange friendship that none of them wants to acknowledge. Because they have took their hearts out when they took the responsibility of managing Happily Ever Afters. But this year everything is wrong. Hector’s dragon Prince doesn’t want to kidnap the Princess, the princess Ida chose by magic from common girls doesnt want to marry a Prince and the Prince himself is in love with his captain. Love magic is going crazy wrong making the witches' gnomes fall in love. At least they think so. Ida and Hector have to rectify it but it felt so wrong because things are changing.


Their adventures brought their real emotions together. They are alike in a way that they both carry a heavy but lonely responsibility. They have dedicated their lives for others but their so called hearts are not happy. Hector’s grumpy exterior hides the soft man that was exposed to Ida now. He cares and protects and builds. He didn't want to care for Ida but her fierceness and brilliance was impossible to resist. Even the witches deserve happily ever after and they cannot keep on taking away peoples choices in name of tradition. The plethora of fantastical creatures like the gnomes, ghouls, manticore, vampires and many many more were part of this story but in such a hilarious and ingenious way that I haven't ever read before. A must read of 2025.


I reviewed an early copy voluntarily

Wickedly Ever After is a “screwball fairy tale romp” about two witches trying to preserve the happy ever after. For nearly a thousand years, rivals Wicked Witch Hector West and Good Witch Ida North have preserved the Happily-Ever-After enchantment that brought peace to the realm by balancing good and evil. Their long-standing rivalry plays out through a steady exchange of letters with minor hexes and curses meant to inconvenience and challenge each other until both accidentally push things too far. Soon the love magic begins to unravel with a reluctant dragon, a rebellious princess, and a disengaged prince refusing to play their parts in the prerequisite ritual. Now Hector and Ida must work together with the help of their romantically entangled gnome assistants to repair the spell before it’s too late.

The premise sounded delightful, but the execution left me underwhelmed. The book just felt incredibly misguided, taking the story into such an odd direction. Despite their thousand-year lifespans, Hector and Ida act more like squabbling teenagers than ancient rivals. Their stubbornness makes them frustrating rather than endearing, which is a problem in a story where there’s no true antagonist—only the protagonists tripping over their own egos.

Is it a screwball romantic comedy? Kind of with the silliness of it, but it was never really all that funny. I really thought this would be more fun, but it was just rather tedious in all honestly. The romance, too, is undercooked: there’s some tension and yearning, but not enough to carry the story. I also didn’t get the ending. It felt really abrupt and does not really provide adequate closure for any of the characters. I just wanted more out of the book.

Several supporting elements are introduced but go nowhere. The prince and his guard vanish early on, the fire elemental salamander plays no role at all, and the most compelling events between the dragon prince and princess happen off-page. Only the lovesick gay gnome assistants stand out, with their romance providing more charm than their bickering bosses. Frankly, the novel might have been stronger if told from their perspective.

Wickedly Ever After is likable enough in concept but falls short in delivery.

*Thank you Sourcebooks Casablanca for the eARC via NetGalley

This book was the funny, low stakes Romantasy novel that I didn't know I needed. Wickedly Ever After is the tale of Ida North, a Good Witch, and Hector West, a Bad Witch. The land they live in is finally at peace, but the delicate balance is achieved with a strict Happily Ever After. When a few magical pranks go wrong (because what's a little harmless curse between friends?), the Happily Ever After is at risk and thus so is all of the fairy tale land that Hector and Ida live in. Could these two, who have nursed a grudge for the better part of a thousand years, work together to help save the Happily Ever After and their realm?

This book is a delightful mishmash of different fairy tales, with some obvious and some sly mentions of different plots, characters, and tropes from well-known fairy tales. Add in some favorite romance tropes:

*Forced proximity
*Only one Bed
*Enemies to Lovers (but like, in an adorable way)
*They're on a quest to save the kingdom

Only make it between two witches who are almost 1,000 years old. The banter was fantastic, and every character was written so vividly. The sentient sensitive fern stole my heart. The sub-romance between Ida and Hector's gnomes was something that I looked forward to seeing mentions of as much as the budding feelings between Ida and Hector. This book was an absolute ball to read, and I was sorry to see it end.

Thank you to NetGalley, Sourcebooks Casablanca, and R. Lee Fryar for the eARC of this novel to review.

DNF at 43%. I love the concept of this, but it failed in almost every respect. I didn’t care for the characters, in spite of the attempt to play with the “Witches of Oz.” And the pacing was so deathly slow, I failed to become invested.

✨ ARC Review ✨
Wickedly Ever After by R. Lee Fryar
📅 Release Date: September 16, 2025
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Hands down, one of the BEST books I’ve read this year! This story had me laughing one moment, tearing up the next, and then feeling all warm and bubbly again. 🥹💖

This isn’t your typical fairy tale—it’s more like a behind-the-scenes look at what it really takes to get to “happily ever after.” And let me tell you… things go terribly wrong. The sacrifices, the heartbreaks, the twists—they completely shattered me.

I absolutely adored these characters (okay, maybe not Amber… she was kinda meh 😂). But Henry and Ida? I’d stand up against dragons, witches, giants—literally everything—for them. 🐉🪄💔

This book is magical, heartbreaking, and oh-so-unforgettable. If you love fairy tale retellings with a wicked twist, you need this one on your TBR!

This book honestly floored me. I picked it up thinking I’d just read a few chapters before bed, and suddenly it was 2am and I was still turning the pages. It’s one of those stories that grabs you quietly at first, and before you know it, you’re completely wrapped up in the characters’ lives.

What I loved most is how real everyone felt. They’re not perfect — far from it — but that’s exactly what made me care so much. I got frustrated with them, I wanted to shake them at times, but I also wanted to hug them. By the end, it felt less like I was reading about characters and more like I’d just been living alongside them.

I don’t often call a book unputdownable, but this really was for me. And even now, days later, I keep thinking about certain scenes.

If you like books that balance emotional punch with genuinely memorable characters, I can’t recommend this one enough.

I couldn’t do it unfortunately. I got about 10% in and had absolutely no interest.. it just, I didn’t feel like the main characters were likeable? This just wasn’t a book for me.

☆☆☆¾
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In this (delightfully screwball) fairy tale romp, even the most wicked deserve their happily-ever-after.
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What drew me to the book:
It sounded fun!
How long it’s been on my TBR:
Since June of this year!
My expectations:
An enjoyable Fantasy adventure with a side of romance.
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My thoughts whilst reading:
I have to admit it had been a while since I’d read the synopsis & so I went in expecting the characters to be young but I was pleasantly surprised to find that they were immortal but older, they have Arthritis & Gout, they had grey hairs & bad backs, it was such an enjoyable change from the brand of immortality where the characters are forever 21 & never age again, especially as it’s the older years we’re seeing from the main characters. The next thing I was thoroughly impressed by was the world, it was fun mix of Medieval & Modern, I guess you could say it is what has been dubbed Medieval Y2K, from the tabloids to the Pixarati I loved it, especially as there were many different types of beings including Gnomes who were side characters, Dragons & mentions of Imps & other such beings, it was such a nice change in pace from the typical 4 same species being recycled.
I have to admit some of the notes that I took were (accurate) predictions of what would end up happening so I won’t include those in this review but it left the book feeling like it was somewhat predictable. Other than that I had a lot of fun whilst I was reading it from the relationship between the characters who seemed to be mirrors of each other - making them perfect as so many small things tied them to each other - to the wide variety of different beings who made an appearance to all the different settings the book took place in.
How long it took me to read:
6 Hours across 3 days.
Overall:
Overall Wickedly ever after was such an enjoyable read, I had fun reading it & would love to see it turned into a film or perhaps a TV show! I think the thing I loved most about the book was the world with its fun & modern twist, it’s what I would love to see more of from Fantasy books with its funny tabloid headlines to the crystal balls which worked like TV’s, I completely loved it & thought it was a shame that we didn’t get to see more of this fun world. I will say that the book felt as if it had a massive plot hole which it never addressed, I thought it would be part of the obvious conclusion to the story, after all we start the book with very specific terms of what is to happen next & yet despite Hector, one of the main characters, being there it never so much as crosses his mind that this could be why everything has gone so wrong which ended up annoying me a little but it wasn’t the worst. I will also say as much as some plots felt obvious I felt that it didn’t feel like it had a clear path for where the book was going with our main characters, Ida & Hector, towards the end, normally there’s some foreshadowing or a kind of feel as to where the book is going or even a feeling of excitement as everything builds up which I didn’t quite get. My last complaint about the book is also somewhat a compliment, throughout the story we switch between Hector & Ida’s points of view which works well & gives a really good insight into the characters & their relationship but I found it also weakened the book a little as it meant we didn’t get to see a lot of characters like the Prince, his Knight, the Princess & the Dragon when I feel that seeing more of their characters & developments could have really enhanced the story & given it a little more oomph!
I do actually have two more minor nitpicks I want to mention before ending this section, the first is that at one point, both Ida & Hector have something revealed by the other via a barbed guess of a retort & both their retorts are revealed to be true & yet the book never explores these truths of the characters despite how interesting & easy it could have been - all it would have required was the two talking about it to either each other or their trusted Gnomes, simple, but instead it’s ignored & just never talked about again. The second is that I felt the actual final scene of the book felt a little weak, it set up for a decent epilogue but instead I felt it ended on a slightly abrupt note when it could have been extended just a tad later than it did, there was even a really obvious ending which I think would have worked much better for the book, alas, it is what it is but I have to admit, all my complaints are relatively minor & I really enjoyed the rest of the book, it was full of little unexpected surprises for me & gave me a lot of what I want to see more of in Fantasy books so the issues are easy to look over for everything else the book has to offer.
Miscellaneous:
I loved the world because it was reminiscent of Duloc & Far Far Away from Shrek with a touch of the Happily N’ever after movies. It was fun & what I’d absolutely LOVE to see more of in Fantasy books!
Did it meet my expectations:
In some places yes, in others it absolutely exceeded them!
My thoughts on the cover before & after reading:
Before reading it I quite liked it & I do think it suits the book although I do think the outlines representing Ida & Hector could be changed to better suit them as characters, including more details & making them more than just silhouettes.
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Favourite character:
This is a tough one, I loved both Hector & Ida although I think I enjoyed Hector a tad more.
Favourite scene:
I don’t think I had one.
Favourite relationship:
Easily Ida & Hector’s though I do have to mention that I was rooting for Tinbit & Hari too!
Favourite quote:
“can’t I have you? Just once.”
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Why I rounded the review down*:
It was a really fun read but it had room for improvement.
Do I regret reading it:
Not in the slightest!
Will I be reading the sequel:
According to Goodreads it is the first in the series so absolutely yes!
Will I be investing in a physical copy:
Perhaps when the paperback comes out.
Do I recommend it:
Yes, especially if you’re in the mood for something fun!
*(for rating systems such as Goodreads)
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Thank you so much to Netgalley for the ARC.