Tuesday, February 23, 2010

Enchanted, Inc. Series by Shanna Swendson

Katie Chandler had always heard that New York is a weird and wonderful place, but this small-town Texas gal had no idea how weird until she moved there. Everywhere she goes, she sees something worth gawking at and Katie is afraid she’s a little too normal to make a splash in the big city. Working for an ogre of a boss doesn’t help.

Then, seemingly out of the blue, Katie gets a job offer from Magic, Spells, and Illusions, Inc., a company that tricks of the trade to the magic community. For MSI, Katie’s ordinariness is an asset. Lacking any bit of magic, she can easily spot a fake spell, catch hidden clauses in competitor’s contracts, and detect magically disguised intruders. Suddenly, average Katie is very special indeed.

She quickly learns that office politics are even more complicated when your new boss is a real ogre, and you have a crush on the sexy, shy, ultra powerful head of the R&D department, who is so busy fighting an evil competitor threatening to sell black magic on the street that he seems barely to notice Katie. Now it’s up to Katie to pull off the impossible: save the world and - hopefully - live happily ever after.

This series first starting getting published in 2005, so while I'm sad to say I was a little late jumping on the bandwagon, at least when I got there all the books were already out! Swendson has put together this great little contemporary romance fantasy quartet with Katie trying to not only figure out life in the big city, but figure out life when magic is real!

Swendson writes Katie as a woman who, while being impressed by the surreal still has her feet firmly planted on the ground, which makes her a perfect character for readers to get attached to, since I'm sure so many of us would feel the same way. The romance between her and Owen is strung through all four books and is both frustrating and sweet, because as much as you want them just to get together already, the reader understands that sometimes life just doesn't work that way. I'm very happy to have all of these books to read at my leisure and they definitely make me think of my favorite rom-com movies (You've Got Mail anyone?).

Overall Feeling - Thumbs up. This series is so much fun to read from start to finish, and it's one that I'm happy to have on my shelf and recommend to my friends when they need a pick me up.

Series - 1) Enchanted, Inc. 2) Once Upon Stilettos 3) Damsel Under Stress 4) Don't Hex with Texas