Wicked as You Wish: A Hundred Names for Magic, Book 1
Common Sense says
- Rin Chupeco
- Fantasy
- 2020
Parents say
Kids say
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The parents' guide to what's in this book.
What parents need to know
Parents need to know that Wicked as You Wish is the first fantasy book in the A Hundred Names for Magic series by the author of the Bone Witch trilogy. This story borrows characters from familiar classic tales (see if you can name them all) and throws in many modern touches like magical spells you can buy for your cellphone. A team of diverse teens (and some wily Filipino senior citizens) fight with swords, knives, staffs, a scythe, fire, and an electrified whip against ice women, ice wolves, zombies, "shades" (malicious shadows), giant toads, and rampaging ogres. Things usually don't get too gory, but a severed ogre arm keeps fighting by itself, and a man frozen in place is slowly dismembered while he watches in horror. A teen recounts his abuse in I.C.E. detention and foster care. Many teens drink at a party and pass out, but the main characters do not partake. There's straight and same-sex kissing (LGBTQ representation includes the prince and one other important character) and quite a bit of swearing, though "f--k" is uttered rarely. Tala, the main character, is not much of a leader in this story yet. She doubts herself and her abilities and eventually lets her best friend down. But there are some nice moments of characters honoring their families and seeking forgiveness for past wrongs. Descriptions of Filipino food will give readers some serious cravings.
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What's the story?
In WICKED AS YOU WISH, Tala has an interesting best friend in her small Arizona town: the exiled prince of Avalon. Alex lives next door with a large Filipino family who knows the magic that can help protect him from the Snow Queen who froze his castle and his homeland and killed his parents. Tala is learning to protect her BFF as well. Her family curse is to repel magic. Her skills come in handy after a high school basketball game and bonfire when "shades" (malicious shadows) and an ice maiden attack and high schoolers begin roaming the town as the zombie-like Deathless. Clearly, the Snow Queen knows where Alex is, and it's time to hightail it out of town. A team of warrior teens arrives to escort them to a magic-mirror portal, but it won't be that easy. They'll have to face I.C.E. agents and some rampaging ogres first.
Is it any good?
If you enjoy mysterious prophesies and lost kingdoms and wild magic and fairy tale homages, you'll find them all here, but it's way too much of a good thing in this chaotic story. Most fantasy tales with a quest of some sort offer a main character a prophecy. Here, a table full of characters get their difficult futures read. Even the most careful reader will lose track of who's marrying someone dead and who's supposed to find a sacred weapon and who needs to learn to swim. Most stories explain the brand of magic their main character will wield to save the day. In Wicked as You Wish, everyone has their own magic and their own weapons, and cellphones do crazy spells, and it's all explained in so much exposition that the storytelling suffers. And then there are all the references to Snow White and Robin Hood and the Cheshire cat and King Arthur ... the list goes on. Again, so many shout-outs need to be explained, and this slows down the story.
Author Rin Chupeco is full of amazing ideas -- that's obvious. She should have saved at least half of them for another book series. That would give her and her characters more space to tell a great story. There's much potential here, and let's hope it's fulfilled in the sequels.
Talk to your kids about ...
Families can talk about the I.C.E. agents in Wicked as You Wish. By making them the bad guys, the author is making her political views known. How often can you gauge a fantasy writer's views about current events in what you read?
If your cellphone could cast spells, what would you want it to do?
Will you read more in this series? What do you think is next for Tala and Alex?
Book details
- Author: Rin Chupeco
- Genre: Fantasy
- Topics: Magic and Fantasy, Princesses, Fairies, Mermaids, and More, Adventures, Book Characters, Fairy Tales, Friendship, High School, Misfits and Underdogs, Monsters, Ghosts, and Vampires
- Book type: Fiction
- Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
- Publication date: March 3, 2020
- Number of pages: 432
- Available on: Nook, Audiobook (unabridged), Hardback, iBooks, Kindle
- Last updated: May 1, 2020
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