Book Review: The Sugar Queen

Book: The Sugar Queen by Sarah Addison Allen

Edition: Hardcover

Rating: 5 stars

Review:

I really liked The Sugar Queen it was a lot more interesting than I thought it would be. The story which incorporates magical realism throughout follows several characters as their lives interconnect.

The story opens with 27 year old Josey Cirrini finding a strange woman, Della Lee Baker sitting in her closet. If that wasn't strange enough it was also bad timing, Josey had no time to deal with Della Lee's stubbornness to leave since she had to take her very disapproving mother Margaret to the doctor.

Despite being in her 20s, Josey who lives with her mother, has a life that is devoid of any sort of zest and she is so downtrodden from constantly trying to seek her dismissive mother's approval. Josey comes from a prominent family, her late father Marco revitalized their small town and ever since she was a little girl she could never live up to the legend that was her father nor the beauty of her mother. She has been trying to make amends for her actions as child that she seemed to have given up on enjoying her life all together.

She secretly has a crush on the mailman Adam Boswell who she has this uncanny ability of knowing when he's around. Josey also secretly hides junk food, romance novels and travel brochures in a secret compartment in the very closet that her uninvited guest Della Lee is staying in. Josey's less than stellar life needed the change that came from Della Lee's impromptu interruption.

Josey wasn't the only one whose life needed a bit of a reboot, Chloe Finley was dealing with the heartbreak of finding out that her boyfriend Jake Yardley had cheated on her. Chloe owns and runs a small diner and thanks to Della Lee requesting a grilled cheese and tomato sandwich that Josey unexpectedly made a new friend. Which is just what Chloe needed because she was tired of pushy and insistent books showing up when she didn't need nor want to read them. That's thing about Chloe, ever since she was a little girl, books have mysteriously and magically appeared to her. The heartbreak she was experiencing was so intense and she had no desire to read what the books wanted her to read especially in regards to forgiveness. Chloe also needed a way to define herself and her life now that she was no longer in a relationship with Jake.

The story also focused on Josey's mother Margaret and the extremely complex relationship between mother and daughter. As well as the story focused on Adam whose life appeared to stall after he had a terrible ski accident while Jake was trying to do everything he could to win Chloe back after making such a horrendous and life altering mistake. He never meant to hurt Chloe but that's exactly what he did and nothing he did or could say was making the situation any better. While all of that was going on, you see how Della Lee played a part in Josey finding a way to break out of the confined box she had placed herself in to actually be able to start to build a life for herself.

This is a quick yet engaging read that I read pretty fast. It's actually taken me longer to write the review than I did reading the story. I was trying to gather the words to express how interesting this story was. It's whimsical, warm, humorous, emotional and at times dark and unexpected. In a way so many of the characters lives undergo a change that happened as a way for growth and discovery even if it's sometimes bittersweet.