Author: Lee Edward Födi

Publisher: Harper Collins

Narrator: Stacy Rustin

Release Date: November 30/21

Audio/Page Length: 8 hrs 40 min 368pages

Reviewer: Laurie

Thank you to Edelweiss+ and the publisher Harper Collins for a digital ARC of this title to read. I also listened to the audiobook of this title from Harper Collins

I am using a new review format. You can find a few more details about 5-4-3-2-1 here.

5 – Sentence Summary

Cara Moone attends Dragonsong Academy for Magic and desperately wants to be a wizard. Instead, she’s a spell sweeper (a.k.a. as a MOP -a Magical Occurrence Purger) who cleans up the magic residue left behind after someone else has cast a spell. A mysterious black goo starts appearing in various places, but only Cara sees it, and no one believes her when she says it is destroying the magical field. To make matters worse, when the Academy finally realizes something is wrong, they put Cara’s nemesis Harlee Wu (known to the entire student body as The Chosen One) in charge. Cara and Harlee must learn to work together to help save the magical world, even if Cara thinks Harlee may be the one behind the disruptions.

For further details, please refer to this GoodReads Link. 

4 – Opinions

Fans of fantasy will enjoy the play of troupes in Spell Sweeper and while seeing the gentle poking of fun – this is a story that is much more than that. It is the story of how we all can be heroes of our own story no matter our circumstances. Cara is a character that many will relate to – she makes more mistakes than most, but at the heart of everything, she is trying to forge her own path, and Mr. Födi does this magically (pardon the pun). This is a sophisticated story and well written with its vocabulary, well-developed characters with a sense of humour (insert hashtag funny) and plot twists. Personally, I loved the chapter titles with their humour and a wee bit of sarcasm that set up the chapters for readers. 

I had the good fortune to read and listen to Spell Sweeper, and narrator Stacy Rustin does a magnificent job. Capturing the personality of Cara would not be an easy task, but Ms. Rustin pulls it off with her pacing, the tone she sets and her inflections when Cara is interacting with the other characters, in particular, Harlee Wu. Ms. Rustin also has distinct voices for all of the characters, allowing listeners to easily distinguish between the characters, so the flow of the story is not interrupted. I also have heard her narration on Gordon Korman’s recently released Linked and look forward to listening to more titles narrated by her.

Finally, readers may wonder why Mr. Fodi doesn’t have things all cleaned up nice and tidy at the end. There are unresolved family issues, some characters may still not be friends, and some may be missing, but that’s life – it’s messy. Or, perhaps there is another story to tell? One can only hope.

On February 24, I had the pleasure to listen to Lee Födi discuss and answer questions about Spell Sweeper as part of the MG Lit Online Book Club. I highly recommend you watch the 40 min Zoom video.

3 – Similar Titles

Nevermoor Series by Jessica Townsend

Talespiners Series by Scott Reintgen

Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins 

2 – Picture Book Connections

The Paper Kingdom by Helena Ku Rhee and illustrated by Pascal Campion 

Journey Trilogy by Aaron Becker

1 -Creator Contact

Lee Födi is on Twitter, Goodreads, Instagram and has a website. 

First Line Blastoff

There’s nothing magical about a broom.

Other Books By This Author:

The Guardians of Zoone, The Secret of Zoone and Kendra Kandlestar and the Search for Arazeen