{"id":94670,"date":"2026-10-21T16:55:02","date_gmt":"2026-10-21T08:55:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=94670"},"modified":"2026-10-21T16:55:02","modified_gmt":"2026-10-21T08:55:02","slug":"cooking-up-magick-book-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/?p=94670","title":{"rendered":"Cooking Up Magick Book Review"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">The first book in a new series called The Dell Chronicles, HL Bernabe\u2019s Cooking Up Magick sets out to be a cozier fantasy <u>version of The Lord of the Rings<\/u>. And in many ways, it does pull directly from J.R.R. Tolkien\u2019s world. The main character, Paisley, is a halfling who gets swept up on an adventure with a pair of dwarves, but unbeknownst to her, there\u2019s also an evil overlord that has just returned after centuries \u2013 and she\u2019s the only hope the world has to actually stop him.<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">The similarities to The Hobbit and LOTR pretty much end there though, and you don\u2019t get nearly enough detail in the first book to effectively flesh out this alternate version of Middle-earth. What you do get is a lovable main character who is surrounded by an interesting cast of characters. There\u2019s cooking, there\u2019s magic, and there\u2019s even a bit of <u>romantasy<\/u> thrown in here, but Cooking Up Magick doesn\u2019t serve up enough of any of it to fully bring its story to life.<\/p>\n<div id=\"243892\">\n<div class=\"jsx-3980863763 catalog-wrapper\"><span data-cy=\"productcard-view-trigger\"><\/p>\n<div id=\"243892\" data-cy=\"solo-product-card\" class=\"solo-product SoloProduct_solo-product__r2_WP\">\n<div class=\"card jsx-303513100 jsx-3341285356 product-card SoloProduct_product-card__JSk8u\">\n<div class=\"product-thumbnail jsx-2285132617 SoloProduct_image__vqG4e\"><img alt=\"Cooking Up Magick: The Dell Chronicles Book One\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"progressive-image jsx-1809694635 jsx-2338608387 expand\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/assets-prd.ignimgs.com\/2026\/10\/20\/81pzrdo1d0l-sl1500-1-1792540065932.jpg?width=220&amp;format=jpg&amp;auto=webp&amp;quality=80 1x, https:\/\/assets-prd.ignimgs.com\/2026\/10\/20\/81pzrdo1d0l-sl1500-1-1792540065932.jpg?width=220&amp;dpr=2&amp;format=jpg&amp;auto=webp&amp;quality=80 2x\" data-cy=\"progressive-image\"\/><\/div>\n<p><h3 class=\"title5 jsx-62124236 jsx-2827240024 name balanced\">Cooking Up Magick: The Dell Chronicles Book One<\/h3>\n<\/p>\n<p><button class=\"button-text jsx-729543028 button jsx-3027214138 jsx-3347269829 icon-button catalog-upvote SoloProduct_catalog-upvote__FWsVx centered disabled\" type=\"button\" title=\"Vote\" aria-label=\"Vote\" data-cy=\"catalog-upvote\" disabled=\"\"><span class=\"ign-icon icon-rating-like jsx-2750866048 jsx-2919720488\" role=\"presentation\" aria-hidden=\"true\" data-cy=\"icon-rating-like\" style=\"mask:url(https:\/\/kraken.ignimgs.com\/_next\/static\/media\/RatingLike.ea885513.svg?cors=1) no-repeat center center \/ contain;background:currentColor\"\/><\/p>\n<p>1<\/p>\n<p><\/button><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/div>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">Cooking Up Magick shines brightest whenever the core characters are interacting with each other. Paisley is a bubbly bright spot among the crew, capable of immense courage and compassion. She has a sort of magnetism that rubs off on her friends and which helps shine a light on each of their individual personalities. Her conversations and moments with her newfound friends (and her Half-Orc love interest) really help to ground the story\u2019s core concept of found family.<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">Naturally, these moments are often centered around the idea of cooking or magic. Paisley\u2019s driving reason for leaving her home and her family\u2019s inn is that she wants to discover new and exciting recipes to eventually bring back. Her sense of adventure is entirely tied to the idea of roaming the world and dipping her toes in the culinary culture it has to offer. But that core motivation quickly fades to the background as larger events start to unfold. There are flashes where cooking comes to the forefront of the story, but it rarely feels like food <em>actually<\/em> matters beyond an initial plot driver and a reason for the characters to come together.<\/p>\n<div class=\"display-title jsx-684634384 jsx-2659527929 quote-container\" data-cy=\"quoteBox\">&#8220;As she learns about her new powers, so do we, and it\u2019s some of the best Paisley character building we get in the entire story<span class=\"stack jsx-2959124702 jsx-326843967\"><span>\u201c<\/span><\/span><\/div>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">As someone who is always happy to geek out about cooking, I expected the author to showcase more of that in Paisley&#8217;s character. It\u2019s clear that she likes it, sure, but the writing seems to spend too much time telling us that and not enough time showing it. Going into this book, I had hoped to see Delicious in Dungeon-levels of enthusiasm for cooking and found myself a bit disappointed that it wasn\u2019t what I got.<\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">So while Paisley\u2019s personality doesn\u2019t necessarily shine through her cooking, we do get a better feeling for it through her magical ability. She doesn\u2019t discover her powers until the story progresses a bit, but once they start to manifest, they show up in ways you\u2019d expect from a compassionate chef. She\u2019s able to draw power from her love of her companions and spread that to the world around her. With this power, she\u2019s able to heal, protect, and even connect on a deeper level with her friends. But once she gains her magic, cooking pretty much takes a backseat for the story, and sure, seeing as she\u2019s the first new sorcerer in this world in a really long time, it definitely makes sense for this to take over the story. As she learns about her new powers, so do we, and it\u2019s some of the best Paisley character building we get in the entire story.<\/p>\n<p><span data-cy=\"poll-view-trigger\"><\/p>\n<section class=\"box-wrapper jsx-2673806401\"\/><\/span><\/p>\n<p data-cy=\"paragraph\" class=\"paragraph jsx-2269604527\">Beyond the core characters, much of the book is driven by Verzod, the evil sorcerer. He\u2019s the one who\u2019s inciting war in an otherwise peaceful land, and acts as the obvious antagonist to Paisley (and everyone else). Despite getting multiple chapters from his perspective, it\u2019s hard to draw any other conclusions about him beyond his just being the pure embodiment of evil. The only character depth we\u2019re really able to glean is his soft spot for his lost talking cat, Whipclaw. But since said cat spends most of the book with Paisley, we don\u2019t really get to explore that side of him. I would have much preferred to have left him as a mysterious outside entity that gets revealed in later books, but there\u2019s still plenty of room to flesh out his motives later on. As is, his existence serves its purpose as the inciting action of the story.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<center><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ign.com\/articles\/cooking-up-magick-book-review\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Read Full Article At Source <\/a><br \/>\n<center\/><br \/>\n<center><script>\n  atOptions = {\n    'key' : 'ab8cc34fbebd96e6c135978b4baca540',\n    'format' : 'iframe',\n    'height' : 90,\n    'width' : 728,\n    'params' : {}\n  };\n<\/script><br \/>\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highrevenueformat.com\/ab8cc34fbebd96e6c135978b4baca540\/invoke.js\"><\/script><\/center><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The first book in a new series called The Dell Chronicles, HL Bernabe\u2019s Cooking Up Magick sets out to be a cozier fantasy version of&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":94671,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[1813,5897,31991,28],"class_list":["post-94670","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech-gadgets-reviews","tag-book","tag-cooking","tag-magick","tag-review","wpcat-32-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94670","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=94670"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/94670\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/94671"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=94670"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=94670"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=94670"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}