After spending time immersed in cozy fantasy at New York Comic-Con, I’m back to writing book reviews. Next up on my backlog for review is Sea of Charms by Sarah Beth Durst. This is the third book in The Spellshop series and I just reviewed the second book, The Enchanted Greenhouse, last week.
You can find my reviews of the previous books and purchase links below:
And for a disclaimer – I received Sea of Charms courtesy of Net Galley and the publisher in exchange for an honest review.
Here is the blurb:
Marin had always belonged on the great blue sea. When the man she thought was the love of her life schemed to ruin her parents’ business, she did what her heart knew best: she fled to the sea.
Now working as a supply runner on her own boat, Marin sails from island to island, delivering a varied array of goods: letters, flour, stories, and even the occasional enchanted statue. It’s a lonely life, but it’s hers. Besides, she’s got the company of Perri the sea serpent and Ree the sailor shrub. They’re the best crew she could ask for.
On one of her routine trips to the capital of the Crescent Islands Empire, Alyssium, Marin finds the city on fire and a revolution underway—so she offers transportation to Dax, a composer friend who refuses to leave behind his instruments. What starts as a rescue evolves into a deal: Marin will keep Dax on as a (temporary) member of her crew if he becomes her pretend boyfriend at the End-of-Harvest Festival back home.
Against her better judgment, Marin finds herself intrigued by his stubbornness, his passion for stories, his charming smile—and realizes that perhaps she isn’t saving him. Maybe it’s the other way around.
Sea of Charms is a cozy fantasy romance about finding your crew, your family, and moreover, finding yourself.
This book felt different that the earlier ones in this series because it took our characters to multiple islands across the Crescent Islands Empire. While the other books in the series work well as stand-alone novels, this one ties in to the events of those earlier books and would be best read after the other two. Marin is a side character in The Enchanted Greenhouse, so it shouldn’t be a surprise that we see where her adventures overlap with the events of that book.
The timeline in Sea of Charms takes us back to roughly the start of the revolution in the capital city, Alyssium. This book also takes place over a longer time frame than the earlier ones, but with a broader world to explore, that made sense to me. For part of the book Marin sails without any human companions, so the romance aspect of this story takes time to develop as it requires Dax to be around Marin enough for their relationship to develop.
I loved how Marin tried to be a loner and refused to take on a crew or passengers, only to bend her rules as circumstances changed. She was unable to refuse people in a desperate situation and I think she empathized with their desire to flee their homes as she herself had done when she went to sea, even if the reasons were different. Dax was also a wonderful character who starts out naive and sheltered, but he yearns to see the world. His role as a talented composer and musician put him in a different social class than most of the other characters we see in this book, but opposites attract and made him the perfect partner for Marin. Dax is obviously enamored with her throughout the book, but it takes time for Marin to heal from her past experience and to learn that she can fall in love again. Like the earlier books, the romance is sweet and stays simple.
Once again, a talking plant was probably the most endearing character in this book. We first met Ree the wax myrtle in The Enchanted Greenhouse, but in this book we see him learn how to sail. Like Dax, Ree is also naive but eager, and his joy in becoming a sailor helps to soften Marin’s heart.
The places that Marin and crew visit in this book were one of my favorite parts of the book. We get to see Alyssium during the revolution, as well as Marin’s family home with an abundance of winged cats. Together the crew braves a dragon and a magical storm, and even encounters unicorns. Overall this was a delightful and inventive story that tied together some of the pieces of earlier books, while remaining focused on its own central plot.
The next book in the series will be The Magical Cheese Emporium and is expected to be published January 19, 2027.
Have you read any of Sarah Beth Durst’s books other than this series? Which would you recommend? Let me know in the comments.
You can find more of my book reviews here.