FROGS & FRENCH KISSES
Sarah Mlynowski
Delacorte Press
Fiction
ISBN-10: 038573185X
ISBN-13: 9780385731850
304 pages

In this sequel to BRAS & BROOMSTICKS, Rachel is resigned to acting as her young witch sister Miri's mentor since Rachel sadly has no magical powers of her own. Their mom, a "nonpracticing" witch, has eased up on the "no magic" rules, so Miri takes Rachel out for a nighttime spin on a high-flying broomstick. Her flying skills need a little polishing, landing the sisters in a pasture of cattle. Miri bonds with the cute cows and is horrified to discover that they're ultimately headed for a grocery meat counter. Rachel persuades Miri to use her magical powers to save the cattle. When the cows vanish from the field, her good works unleash nearly obsessive "save the world through witchcraft" tendencies in Miri.

Rachel dreads returning to school. After all, the last time she saw her fellow students, she inadvertently knocked A-list London off a stage, breaking London's leg. Rachel also stood up her crush, Raf --- and generally made an unbelievable fool of herself.

When Rachel arrives at school, her fellow students are outside the building because the gym is full of...COWS. Uh oh. Now Miri, with Rachel's help, must figure out what to do about the cow problem. The sisters would probably be in way more trouble at home for this caper, but their mom is distracted by her first date in years.

Meanwhile, Rachel's life is a disaster. London (who just happens to be the school's most popular girl) is bent on revenge for her broken leg. Rachel's best friend Tammy probably has mono. If Tammy can't come to school, Rachel will be entirely alone since no one else will speak to her. Rachel's many enemies have added her photo to the freaks website. And then things get really bad.

Miri, good witch sister that she is, comes to Rachel's aid by putting her Save the World spells momentarily on hold in order to cast a couple of Save My Tormented Sister spells, including a love spell for the elusive Raf. But the love spell doesn't appear to be working. Not only does Raf continue to ignore Rachel, his older brother appears to hate her. Well, as we all know, using magic is very uncomplicated...NOT.

As with BRAS & BROOMSTICKS, this fast-paced story is full of Rachel's hilarious asides and misadventures. (A few scenes made me laugh out loud. Note to self: do NOT read Sarah Mlynowski in public places. Or while drinking coffee.) Although Rachel continues to be sometimes irritatingly self-obsessed, she takes the sting out of it by cheerfully acknowledging this trait in herself. Rachel makes for great comic relief next to the earnest but endearing Miri, who so badly wants to save the world. A subplot involving Rachel's mother works well, and I love that Rachel's stepmother is not an evil one. The plot takes a couple of unexpected turns --- and I defy anyone to read the very end of this book and not immediately hanker for the next in the series. As Rachel herself would say, this book is "abracatastic": pure magical reading enjoyment.

   --- Reviewed by Terry Miller Shannon (terryms2001@yahoo.com)

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