Magic Chocolate Pots

Sorcery and Cecelia or the Enchanted Chocolate Pot caught my attention for two reasons. Reason one is I have a thing for really wordy titles (which is one reason why The Girl Who Circumnavigated Fairyland in a Ship of Her Own Making was such an instant winner for me).  Reason two is one of the authors is Patricia Wrede  who wrote the delightful Enchanted Forest Chronicles.  I was in the mood for something a bit on the light hearted side and this little book fit the bill perfectly.

The book is written entirely as letters between two friends, Kate, who is in London for the Season, and Cecelia who is left behind in the country with her stern aunt. The girls write back and forth about the daily going ons in each of there respective habitats, starting with innocent gossip about the locals, clothes, the horrors of being stuck with such dowdy chaperone's.  We begin to see that the girls are a mischievous duo, prone to pranks, exploring, and just getting into random bits of trouble.  Both girls however are kind hearted and deeply devoted friends.  Currently they are trying to ensure that Cecelia's brother Oliver and Kate's sister Georgina (whom they call Georgy).  It also comes to light that this story is set in an alternate world that has wizards and magic that is somewhat accepted in high society.  Think Harry Potter meets Jane Austen...actually it is quit a bit in a world like Howl's Moving Castle.  In London Kate runs into a sorceress named Miranda who has caught her in a trap that was meant for the wizard Thomas Schofield.  She escapes and mentions this in a letter to Cecelia who replies about meeting a new girl Dorothea who seems to have the unwanted ability to attract every boy in the area, including her brother Oliver. While on an outing with her new friend Cecilia catches a young noble man James Tarleton clumsily spying on the group.  When she confronts him, he makes some excuse and leaves, only to be caught by her multiple more times.  Cecelia is also concerned when she finds a charm bag between the mattresses of Oliver's bed, as her aunt if VERY against anyone practicing magic in the house.  Meanwhile back in London, many a thing goes awry and Oliver who has come to visit Georgina ends up disappearing after a scheme by devious wizards to kidnap him goes wrong.  Cecelia discovers that the bad sorceress Miranda is actually Dorothea's step-mother and that she has plans to take the girl to London and use her to get revenge on the wizard Thomas, then

essentially sucking all of the youth out of her to make herself young again (as she has been doing for close to 70 years).  In London, Thomas, the wizard in the middle of all of this helps to clarify what has been going on.  He was the apprentice of Sir Hilary Bedrick (who has turned out to be a bad sorcerer) and when it was discovered how much power Thomas had, Sir Hilary decided to try and steal it for himself.  It is the practice of wizards to put some of their power into an object to easier use it and the only object Thomas had at the time was the title Blue Chocolate Pot.  Sir Hilary stole the pot and is now using Thomas's magic to further his own goals.  After reading this Cecelia once again confronts James and finds out that he is helping his friend Thomas get the pot back.  Cecelia starts sneaking into Sir Hilary's library, getting herself into all kinds of trouble.  She also starts to study magic under a friend of James, and starts making her own charm-bags for safety.  Back in London, Thomas has asked Kate to pretend to become engaged to him, to protect him from the spell Miranda has cast over Dorthea to attract men.  He informs Kate that when it is all over she can dump him in any way it pleases her.  Kate agrees and goes so far as to meet his mother, who is a powerful sorceress in her own right.  Back in the country Cecelia manages to break the Enchanted Chocolate Pot, releasing Thomas from any hold Sir Hilary had on him, but in the mean time gets trapped along with James in a spell he is using to extract magic from her brother Oliver, a spell that will surly kill them all.  Kate and Thomas spend time trying to stop Miranda in London from accomplishing her mission of eternal youth.  Kate gets caught by Miranda, but is saved when Thomas and his mother come to the rescue, reducing Miranda to a very very very old shriveled up lady.  Cecelia, James and Oliver are saved by her aunt and her magic teacher, turns out that magic runs very strongly in the family and a terrible accident once occurred leading to a death, which is why their aunt was so reluctant to allow magic.  Once all of the bad magicans have been taken care of in a most thourghly pleasing manner, Kate and Thomas get married for real and Cecelia and James join them at the altar, everybody living mostly happily ever after.

This book actually started out as a game between the two authors Ms. Wrede and Caroline Stevermer.  The two set a very loose world and wrote to each other as the two main characters.  They kept this up for sometime, neither of them knowing what was coming next until they received the next letter.  Eventually they realized that they had a ton of letters and with a little editing a pretty decent little story.  I enjoyed this book, the writting was light hearted and fresh.  By using the letters you got to know both girls fairly well, their different personalities and the way they both went about solving the mysteries.  I loved that they kept up the gossip and clothes talk, as a girl their age in that time period would find all that very important, even amidst the danger and intrigue they were caught up in.  It go a little confusing at times, especially when you were trying to piece together how everybody was related/known/attached to everyone else.  The ending was a bit abrupt, but that was also due to the nature of the letter writting style so that can be mostly forgiven.  Overall it was fun and quick and a little bit different, I give it 7 out of 10 cups of chocolate.
What do you think of the letter writing style of the book?  How cool is it that this all started as a game?  Who wants to start a letter writing game with me?  What is your favorite alternate magic book?