Death Meets Cute by J. Penner Format: eARC
Source: supplied by publisher via Edelweiss
Formats available: paperback, ebook, audiobook
Genres: cozy fantasy, fantasy, fantasy romance, grumpy/sunshine romance, romantasy
Pages: 304
Published by Poisoned Pen Press on April 28, 2026
Purchasing Info: Author's Website, Publisher's Website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Bookshop.org, Better World Books
Goodreads
"Filled with so much love, heart, and delicious baked goods." —Rebecca Thorne, USA Today bestselling author of Can't Spell Treason Without Tea
I am more than capable of being evil today. I think…
Iris Weyward wants to be bad. Truly bad. Terrifyingly, gloriously villainous. But after helping her sisters unleash a spell to throw the realm into chaos, Iris is left feeling strangely empty—and still not the villain of her dreams. So, she sets off for the quiet town of Fraywell to build her wicked legacy alone.
Things start a crooked little cottage, a reputation for curses and potions, and a healthy dose of fear from the locals. But when her ogre bodyguard disappears, Iris needs new muscle. Good thing a fearsome orc just toppled over in her yard. Naturally, she decides to reanimate him. It's a perfect solution.
Only, Talon isn't the brooding warrior she was hoping for. He's gentle. He bakes. Worst of all, he's nice. But Iris can't possibly have a thing for her new employee. She's supposed to be the most wicked witch in town!
While Iris struggles to turn Talon into the enforcer she deserves, her sisters arrive seeking help—their magic is fading, and the cause may be closer than any of them realize. The timing couldn't be worse, and falling for an orc wasn't supposed to be part of her villain era, but it might turn out to be the best spell she's ever cast…
My Review:
What’s a witch to do when a blessing has curdled into a curse? Not that the Weyward Sisters generally have much to do with blessings because they have a well-earned reputation for evil to maintain. After all, they’re the ones responsible for the recent mess with that Scottish King who came to such a terrible end.
Then again, he did kind of ask for it. Which is precisely the kind of wickedness that Dahlia, Iris and Poppy Weyward are (in)famous for. But it’s hard to do anything really evil when one’s magic is fading, and that’s been true for the Weyward Sisters for the past year. Since they went their separate ways.
Because they couldn’t stand the sight or sound of each other a minute longer.
Which is exactly why Iris Weyward keeps putting off reading the letter her sisters sent her. No matter how much its presence taunts her amid the chaos piling on the table in her slightly out of the way cottage. A cottage that is JUST far enough outside the village of Fraywell to seem appropriately mysterious for her villainous intentions.
Intentions that aren’t going well. A deadly potion here, a poisonous apple there, earning just enough to keep herself afloat – barely – with her dreams of glorious villainy waging a seemingly unending battle with her lack of magic and occasional impulses that are much too good-adjacent to be comfortable for an evil witch.
The only person Iris intends to be ‘good’ to is her familiar, Quince. Because their relationship is symbiotic, and being good to Quince is also being good to herself. And because Quince is a hedgehog with attitude who will poke her with all his quills if she doesn’t feed (and cuddle) him on a regular basis.
Iris is just certain she needs to impress her villainy on the local population more than she has been. They’ve gotten used to her after a year in residence. She needs a menacing new bodyguard to project her evil image with a bit more villainous ‘oomph’ than the one that left her to take a vacation with his family. (A concept that makes Iris shudder with, well, horror.)
When ‘providence’ provides her with a half-orc conveniently just expired in her garden, she’s sure it’s a sign. Even with her fraying magic, she’s sure she can raise him from the dead and bind him to her service. But she’s not a monster. She summons his spirit and asks for his consent before she starts on necromancy.
Iris gets absolutely nothing she expected from this transaction. She was looking for a mean, menacing mercenary. Talon Gefroy may look the part – and look better than Iris wants to think about – but he’s NICE. Even (cringe, shudder) sweet. He cooks, he cleans, he bakes cookies. He even gives names to her chickens!
She’s thinking that he’s just not right for the job until her sisters arrive. Just as they said they would in that letter Iris never read. They’ve all lost their magic. They’ve figured out that they are cursed AND that they need to work together to find the counter.
They’re planning to stay in Iris’ little cottage, WITH IRIS, until they find the answer. However long THAT might take. Even though they get on each other’s last nerve even more than they did a year ago when they separated.
Suddenly, Iris needs Talon. Not for the role she intended for him, but for the role that he’s actually filling. Iris is not about to cook, clean, wait on and cater to her sisters. But she doesn’t have to. She has Talon for that. And just possibly for a whole lot more.
But first, she’ll have to tell him the evil truth about herself. Curses, sisters, and all.
Escape Rating A-: I had a good time with the author’s Adenashire series (start with A Fellowship of Bakers & Magic and prepare for a delightfully cozy and delicious read) and was hoping for more of the same with this book as it’s a bit of a wait until the author’s next Adenashire book, A Fellowship of Curses & Cats comes pussyfooting out.
I almost referred to Death Meets Cute as the start of a new series, and that might turn out to be right after all. It absolutely could be. This story stands alone, and Iris certainly gets her happy ever after, BUT she has two sisters to think about. So hopefully…
But first there’s this story, and it’s one of those ‘book in a blender’ things, even if all the books that get thrown into that blender are all cozy fantasies in one way or another.
Of course there’s Adenashire, and Fraywell sounds like the kind of place that would fit right into that world. If it turns out to be after all, I would be pleased but not surprised. Either way, it’s a very similar vibe, in that it’s a place where magical and non-magical people and beings live side-by-side and tolerate each other – or sometimes don’t – in the ways that people in small towns in other cozy genres generally do and don’t.
So if you like cozy fantasy, particularly in series like Adenashire, Legends & Lattes and Tomes & Tea (Can’t Spell Treason Without Tea), you’ll probably enjoy visiting Fraywell as well.
But there are two other books that need to go into that blender, books that add a little bit of danger and spice to what would otherwise be a sweet grumpy-sunshine fantasy romance. Because there are two stories at the heart of Death Meets Cute. The obvious one is that grumpy/sunshine romance between grumpy Iris and sunshine Talon.
The second, however, is the story of the fraying sisterhood between Dahlia, Iris and Poppy Weyward, and the way they’ve brought this curse upon themselves. That’s a story about the very fine line between curses and blessings, and how easy it is for the one to turn into the other – in either direction. If that’s the part of Death Meets Cute that appeals, take a look at The Crescent Moon Tearoom by Stacy Sivinski because it also tells a heartwarming story about the bonds of sisterhood and how easily those bonds can be frayed, or even broken. And that there can be terrible consequences when there’s magic involved.
The part of this that’s most purely interesting, at least to this reader, revolves around the question of what it means to be ‘evil’ along with the question of whether evil and villainy are in the eyes of the beholder. At first, that part of the story made me think of both Wooing the Witch Queen, the first book in the Queens of Villainy series, and Violet Thistlewaite Is Not a Villain Anymore. The so-called Queens of Villainy are only really considered villainous by members of the patriarchy who are pissed that they’ve chosen to rule their kingdoms themselves, while Violet has rejected real villainy and is doing her damndest to make amends for her previous actions.
Because it seems like the Weyward Sisters don’t REALLY want to be EVIL. And, that the image they want to project is in conflict with their core selves, causing them to lash out, mostly at each other. None of them want to be ‘goody-two shoes’, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be helpful and supportive and even friendly to people who act the same way towards them.
And they are all more than willing to do terrible things to people who deserve it. Or who ask for it in the same way that you can’t cheat an honest person. So they’re not really evil after all, although they might be a bit like Gretsella, the Somewhat Wicked Witch of Brigandale. Like Gretsella, the Weyward Sisters are all more than willing to deliver retribution to the deserving. And is that so bad?
Hopefully, we’ll get to find out!
