Review: When We Were Magic

When We Were Magic by Sarah Gailey
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

How much would you be willing to give up to help your dearest friend? Would you give up your dreams? Your color vision? Your memories? Your tears?

I've had a growing love for Sarah Gailey's writing ever since I read Magic for Liars and some of their short fiction. (Though I wasn't much of a fan of their hippo novellas, I must admit.) When I read their Magic for Liars I immediately felt it had a kinship with Alice Hoffman's look at sisters and magic. Not derivative mind you, but as skilled as Practical Magic was in looking at the sharp and soft edges sisters have for one another, and about the vagaries of life that pull us apart and draw us together again. In When We Were Magic, her first young adult novel, Gailey only deepens my appreciation for her vision of friends, family, lovers, and how we are greater than our worst mistakes and can be loved for exactly who we are, not in spite of who we are.

Alexis and her friends Roya, Maryam, Iris, Paulie, and Marcelina are magic. By which I mean they can do magic. (More on how they actually ARE magic below.) The six young women (one might be nonbinary, she's still kind of deciding) stick together when prom night goes very wrong for Alexis and a boy named Josh dies when he was alone in his bedroom with an ambivalent Alexis who asked him to be there with her. At the time, Alexis was upset, confused, hurting, maybe horny, and did I mention upset, all because Roya went to the prom and after-party with Tall Matt. When Alexis heads off to Josh's room during the after-party, her world goes sideways and Josh is, um... never the same. Rather than facing it alone, Alexis has her five best friends (including Roya) to help her in a dire situation.

The real magic of this story is in the strong friendships. And the fact that this group of young women can make room for more friends, and room for their loving families. I love the fact that Gailey is not afraid of magical disasters and sees them as a proving ground for who is really in your corner. And that their protagonist Alexis finds that there are always people in her corner, whether she feels she deserves them or not. Alexis, like many a young person, is figuring herself out. She's made mistakes, and they do define, or at least, re-define her. But rather than breaking her down, they make her stronger and wiser. Gailey shows the reader that with honesty, support, and love, you find you can thrive in spite of your worst mistakes.

This is a wonderful book that I have recommended to my female and nonbinary friends- young and older adults alike.

I received a courtesy copy of this novel from SimonPulse in exchange for an honest review.

Want to buy a copy of When We Were Magic from your local independent bookstore? Click HERE.

For reasons I do not fathom, there is no audiobook of this novel as yet.

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