The Sugar Queen

May 5, 2008
Allen’s second bewitching offering (after Garden Spells
) is a candy jar of magical characters and mystical adventures set in an ordinary North Carolina town. At 27, Josey Cirrini is “plain and just this side of plump” and trying to make up for her legendary childhood temper tantrums by caring for her aging, widowed mother Margaret. Her closet features neatly stacked junk food packages and romance novels, and her life chugs along. But as the book opens, Della Lee Baker, waitress at the local greasy spoon, shows up in Josey’s closet, having propped a ladder against the house and climbed silently in overnight. She’s hiding from someone or something, and has no intention of leaving anytime soon. Instead, the very direct Della Lee sends Josey on a series and missions and misadventures that encourage our low self-esteem heroine to step outside her box and away from her snack-filled closet. As in Allen’s previous work, there’s an element of the supernatural (self-help books that literally follow one around; tears that sprout mysterious tropical flowers), and again it works. Words such as sweet
, charming
and delightful
are weak accolades for such a pleasurable book.

Ariadne Meyers uses just the right touches of various Southern accents to suggest the North Carolina setting of this novel. At first, Meyers's youthful-sounding voice seems odd for the portrayal of 27-year-old Josey. But as the story progresses, it becomes the perfect choice to depict a young woman who is learning to individuate from her cruel, manipulative mother. Meyers also provides a chilling rendition of the mother. As Josey decides to live her dream, she is accompanied by two spirited female characters who are also trying to overcome their limiting pasts. Meyers's youthful timbre fits particularly well with the elements of magical realism that add to the story and lighten its tone. S.W. (c) AudioFile 2008, Portland, Maine

September 1, 2008
Allen follows her New York Times best-selling debut, Garden Spells, with this story of love, redemption, and choosing happiness. Narrator Karen White (Luncheon of the Boating Party) gets the Southern idiosyncrasies and gentility down pat, and while she effectively creates unique male characters, she has a greater range of personality from which to choose with the quirky female protagonists. This work of magical realism will keep listeners hungry for more. [Also available from Random House Audio as a retail ed. abridged CD (ISBN LJ 5/1/08.Ed.]Jodi L. Israel, MLS, Salt Lake City

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