A Potion to Die For: A Magic Potion Mystery

Carly Bell Hartwell owns and operates the Little Shop of Potions in Hitching Post, Alabama. Hitching Post is the number one spot for couples to get married (and sometimes divorced) and her love potions certainly keep her in business. That is until the day that she discovers Nelson Winston, the town's lawyer, dead in her shop, holding one of her potions. The problem is that Carly didn't kill Nelson and she never sold him a potion, so Carly must find the person who framed her and wanted Nelson dead.I've really enjoyed Heather Blake's other series, the Witchcraft Mysteries, and when I heard she was writing another witchy series, I was excited. Finally release day rolled around and I couldn't wait to immediately start A Potion to Die For. I'm happy to report that A Potion to Die For lived up to all my expectations of a really interesting and tantalizing debut in a new series!Carly is a fun character. She's nursing a broken heart from local police office, Dylan Johnston, and after two failed attempts to get married to Dylan, she's trying to heal and move on with her life. Unfortunately with the murder of Nelson Winston she literally comes face to face with Dylan again and the results are hotter and more sparkly than fireworks!! Carly and Dylan certainly still have chemistry and Heather Blake provides us readers with lots of toe-curling moments between the two of them!!Carly and Dylan aside there is a lot to love about the occupants of Hitching Post. There are her crazy aunts, triplet sisters - one that wields a shotgun at anyone that tries to enter her property. Like crazy mama's? Well Carly has one that you're not going to forget in a hurry!! And you can't miss Delia, Carly's cousin who has the misfortune to be born just minutes after Carly, meaning she doesn't control the family "secret potion", the infamous Leilara. Since Delia runs a shop of hexes she sure would like to get her hands on it!!This mystery was really well plotted out and left me stumped. Even when the murderer is presented to Carly, I still couldn't believe it!!Hitching Post is a beautiful town full of southern charm, ladies and gents that sip ice tea and magic oozing from every corner. I was absolutely charmed by the occupants, the town and the mystery and I can't wait for another chance to experience murder and mayhem with Carly and her family.

I pre-ordered this book since I have not yet not liked a Heather Webber/Blake book. However, when I first picked it up, I found myself not interested in the story. In fact, I found myself putting the book down after getting a third of the way through it. I fell in love with Nina Quinn and Lucy Valentine on the first few pages of their books. I was hooked on Darcy Merriweather's story by the end of the first chapter. However, I wasn't sure if I liked Carly, so I did the unthinkable. I stopped reading it.A couple of months later, after looking through the carousel on my Kindle Fire, I decided to give it another try. Low and behold, this turned out to be a great story.What I realized was that this book is laying the framework for the direction of this series. It starts off slowly...Carly is a witch who makes healing potions. However, due to the order of her birth, she inherited the "magic" ingredient from her grandmother that makes her potions more powerful. Carly is devoted to her unorthodox family, which includes her cousin who is a dark witch and her enemy and her aunt with a trigger happy finger. Of course, her main love interest happens to be her ex-fiancee, a cop, who she appears to be unable to marry (2 failed wedding attempts.)Imagine Carly's surprise when she goes to open up her shop one morning and there is a dead body on the floor holding one of her potion bottles. Carly must find the killer in order to clear her name so that her shop does not go out of business.What I liked about this story was how the main character grew from the beginning of the book to the end of the book. This is a good start to a new series. I look forward to the next book in this series........

Welcome to beautiful Hitching Post. Where it has a lovely southern atmosphere surrounded by mountains (sorry no cell service here), get married in one of our lovely wedding chapels outside of Las Vegas, and don't forget to stop by either of our shops run by our own town witches for something to help you on the magical day - or give the whammy to someone you do not like.At least that is what should be on the brouchures, but for Carly Hartwell, owner of one of the two witch stores, things are a little crazy when the local forcaster predicts the weeks weather and a chance for divorce. Normally this would be a busy time for her, but when she and her dark magic cousin Delia discover the body of a local lawyer in her workshop with one of her potion bottles in his hand she wonders how he got there. But things go from bad to worse as her ex-fiance returns to the local police force (he left her at the altar which lead to a fire in a chapel), the local gym coach drives into her house (also with a potion bottle in his hand), someone is trying to get one of her Aunts to sell her house (while avoiding the incoming gunfire), and add to her Momma's plan to drive business to her wedding chapel and drive the other chapel's owner crazy. But as she snoops around town, she learns not all is right in her picturesqe town and can she locate a killer before she ends up the next victim.Overall it was not a bad book, I love her other series and already preordered it for my Kindle. This had a lot of kooky characters, senarios, and a mystery in a mystery. It is a little more convoluted than the Wishcraft series, it still is a solid read and will need to see what happens next.

It took a couple of false starts reading this book but in the end I read it over a weekend. The story was well thought out and you were kept guessing until the end. Overall an enjoyable read and I would buy the next book in the series.

New series by Heather Blake, like it as much as her Wishcraft one.

A fun and refreshing quirky story.I really enjoyed it, looking forward to see the sequel "One Potion in the Grave".

What a lovely start to this series. I really do like all the characters and, oh my, Carly and Dylan - what a love story.

Great characters, love the small town, the interaction between the characters is believable you leArn to care about what happens to them.