Welcome to New Avalon, where everyone has a personal fairy. Though invisible to the naked eye, a personal fairy, like a specialized good luck charm, is vital to success. And in the case of the students at New Avalon Sports High, it might just determine whether you make the team, pass a class, or find that perfect outfit. But for 14-year-old Charlie, having a Parking Fairy is worse than having nothing at all—especially when the school bully carts her around like his own personal parking pass. Enter: The Plan. At first, teaming up with arch-enemy Fiorenza (who has an All-The-Boys-Like-You Fairy) seems like a great idea. But when Charlie unexpectedly gets her heart’s desire, it isn’t at all what she thought it would be like, and she’ll have resort to extraordinary measures to ditch her fairy. The question is: will Charlie herself survive the fairy ditching experiment? From the author of the acclaimed Magic or Madness trilogy, this is a delightful story of fairies, friendships, and figuring out how to make your own magic. 

I’d had this one on my TBR list for ages. I love Justine’s blog, and the premise of this story is just fantastic. If I got to have a fairy, I’d definitely go with the sleep fairy (no matter how much sleep you get you feel like you had 8 hours – bliss!).

I finally downloaded the audiobook, and it is the perfect book to listen too. Kate Atkinson does an amazing job. I’m not sure I’d have liked the book as much if I’d read it. Hearing the story, made me feel more connected to Charlie, and it made her longing to be rid of her fairy much easier to understand (Living in DC a parking fairy doesn’t sound too bad!). Listening made it far easier to get into the made up words too. The tone Kate spoke them in really helped.

The main story is, the classic, be careful what you wish for. I liked the other themes touched on too, especially the insulated state most of us live in, believing are country or city is the centre of the universe.

How To Ditch Your Fairy is a fun read and I really enjoyed it. I’ll certainly being picking up more books by Justine. I’m curious to see if they all feature made up language. I have this image of her and Scott Westerfeld (author of Uglies and Leviathan, which also feature made up words) saying their wedding vows in a completely fictional language!

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