"If nothing changed, there'd be no such things as butterflies." This was a sweet surprise! I mostly read adult fiction nowadays, but I've missed books like this! What surprised me is that THE CANDYMAKERS took itself surprisingly seriously - it sold itself as a mystery, and it was a mystery, and an especially good one at that! It starts out as a fun, sweet candy-making adventure, but it doesn't end on that note. It's never until it's over: THE CANDYMAKERS doesn't stop revealing secrets until the very last page. Somehow both unexpectedly funny and unexpectedly touching, THE CANDYMAKERS never turns treacly and the fun never fizzles out - it has plenty of meaningful stories to tell. There is something so nostalgic about reading something I would have enjoyed as a child. Some things never change: I will always love elaborate candy factories and child detectives, and this was the sweetest, funniest, smartest combination of both.

"If nothing changed, there'd be no such things as butterflies." This was a sweet surprise! I mostly read adult fiction nowadays, but I've missed books like this! What surprised me is that THE CANDYMAKERS took itself surprisingly seriously - it sold itself as a mystery, and it was a mystery, and an especially good one at that! It starts out as a fun, sweet candy-making adventure, but it doesn't end on that note. It's never until it's over: THE CANDYMAKERS doesn't stop revealing secrets until the very last page. Somehow both unexpectedly funny and unexpectedly touching, THE CANDYMAKERS never turns treacly and the fun never fizzles out - it has plenty of meaningful stories to tell. There is something so nostalgic about reading something I would have enjoyed as a child. Some things never change: I will always love elaborate candy factories and child detectives, and this was the sweetest, funniest, smartest combination of both.

The Candymakers is definitely a sweet surprise! The story takes place in the Life is Sweet candy factory where the candy-making contest was taking place. Daisy, Philips, Logan, and Miles are the four protagonists of the story. This book is unique compared to others because it gives the same story in four different perspectives. I appreciate that Wendy Mass presented the story in that format because it gives readers a sense of what is going on without giving only one biased perspective and it helps you understand each character better. The four are oblivious to the secrets each person held. Peculiarly, the secrets they had ended up to be what kept them apart, but they used it to protect the factory and to reconcile. By the end, everyone learns something about each other and became close friends.

I'm glad that no one was hurt, but I wonder if that'll stay the same in the long run, with all of the space debris + uncontrolled substances in our atmosphere at the moment. I really hope that the debris doesn't hit the International Space Station, and that we do get to explore space a bit more! It would be a shame to be grounded, after all of the hard work in the 'sixties and seventies.

Dazzling and brilliantly executed, The School for Good and Evil manages to be both heartwarming and seriously sweet. It's a middle-grade novel written by Soman Chainani, and it utilizes fairy-tale tropes to excellent effect –– it had me giggling for a while, because this is exactly the type of light-hearted, snappy humor that always makes me laugh. Sophie and Agatha, the two protagonists, represent why teenage girls shouldn't be taken lightly––they are characters that grow on you, and they are characters that grow with you. Like Shrek and other fairy-tale adaptations, The School for Good and Evil stays true to its roots. It's true that female villains are often the most delightfully wicked of all, and I especially liked how earnest Sophie's very turbulent, atypically teenage emotions were exploited––it was very real, and her motives were explained in a way that made sense. I think I would consider this a "light read," because it was coming-of-age and just very adorable, but––there was a lot of surprisingly hidden depth, lurking under the surface. Digging up the history and the world-building was enlightening, and the writing delves into answering some philosophical questions: What is the true nature of friendship? What even is "good and evil," exactly? What choices really matter in the long-run? We don't live in a world with castles and brambly forests and fairy-tale heroines, but that's the point––we can apply the lessons and questions from The School for Good and Evil and use it in our own worlds, in our own surroundings, in our own situations. I will tell you this: by far, the most important lesson that the School for Good and Evil strived to teach is that your nature is self-determined. We are not inherently good or evil, and we do not have to be what people expect us to be. We are more than capable of breaking out of our molds, and blazing our own paths into the future––in the real world, we can't travel back in time, but there is always (always!) room for change inside our souls.

Dazzling and brilliantly executed, The School for Good and Evil manages to be both heartwarming and seriously sweet. It's a middle-grade novel written by Soman Chainani, and it utilizes fairy-tale tropes to excellent effect –– it had me giggling for a while, because this is exactly the type of light-hearted, snappy humor that always makes me laugh. Sophie and Agatha, the two protagonists, represent why teenage girls shouldn't be taken lightly––they are characters that grow on you, and they are characters that grow with you. Like Shrek and other fairy-tale adaptations, The School for Good and Evil stays true to its roots. It's true that female villains are often the most delightfully wicked of all, and I especially liked how earnest Sophie's very turbulent, atypically teenage emotions were exploited––it was very real, and her motives were explained in a way that made sense. I think I would consider this a "light read," because it was coming-of-age and just very adorable, but––there was a lot of surprisingly hidden depth, lurking under the surface. Digging up the history and the world-building was enlightening, and the writing delves into answering some philosophical questions: What is the true nature of friendship? What even is "good and evil," exactly? What choices really matter in the long-run? We don't live in a world with castles and brambly forests and fairy-tale heroines, but that's the point––we can apply the lessons and questions from The School for Good and Evil and use it in our own worlds, in our own surroundings, in our own situations. I will tell you this: by far, the most important lesson that the School for Good and Evil strived to teach is that your nature is self-determined. We are not inherently good or evil, and we do not have to be what people expect us to be. We are more than capable of breaking out of our molds, and blazing our own paths into the future––in the real world, we can't travel back in time, but there is always (always!) room for change inside our souls.

COOL!!!