Spellbound?

So, this is almost embarrassing.

I read a book last night.

Like, I got into bed, started a book, finished a book about ninety minutes later (I hope it was an hour and a half, and not two hours - I'm not totally sure), then went to bed. Way too late. Was I entranced? Perhaps by the herbal spells that feature prominently in the book?

The book was Garden Spells, by Sarah Addison Allen. It's been on my to-read list forever, so long I had forgotten why I had added it (probably one of those "other people who viewed this title also viewed..." listings), but Widener didn't have it, and I never remembered to go to the BPL and get it. But I was wandering around the other day, after picking up Swamplandia! and remembered & found it.

It's a not-very-long novel about a family that seem to be some kind of witches, that live in the South, garden, and have a magical apple tree. There's also, of course, romance, sisters, endearingly batty old ladies, a bad guy, a precocious child and...hmm, I think this story is called Practical Magic, no? But however formulaic and predictable it might have been, it was engaging and I tore through it. It was a perfect bed-read, I was sated and sleepy at the end - I just wish I had split it into two or three sessions!

The way the book was written, and the cover blurbs or something, made me think this is part of a series, maybe about the town, if not the same two sisters who are the protagonists in Garden Spells... I think it was the way that different families around town were given different characteristics, it's just asking to have spin-off after spin-off. Or you could mosey through the main family's family tree (literally, too, their apple tree is a character itself) generation by generation of strong-willed women who eventually find the right man. Or maybe not a series, but a lot of similar books? Certainly the author had a TON of books spread over a couple shelves in Copley.

I believe my original notes on the to-read listing were that this sounded like a beach book, and I was right, more or less - beach, bed, lazy day wherever. Not great literature, but if there are more out there, it might be worth sometimes having one on hand for when I don't really want to think, but just want a nice story about nice people.