This book has been on my TBR list for a while, and I honestly am sad that it took me this long to read it because it was such a joy! This was the last Sarah Gailey book that I had yet to read, and it was as witty and wonderful as I’ve come to expect all of their writing to be. They really capture the in-between-ness of the changes that come with the end of high school and then played them up in the most extreme way, and I really think that this is something that they really shine at as an author.

Behind a layer of magic, this story is so unapologetically realistic about the end of high school. When We Were Magic is one of those books about teenagers that, while they definitely are somewhat mature for their age, really reads like it’s truly from the perspective of teenagers. There’s so much awkwardness around crushes, relationships with parents, and navigating labels and how the characters understand themselves that it just felt undeniably high school.