Hidden Charm

Star Friends #8

by Linda Chapman, Lucy Fleming (Illustrator)

Do you believe in magic?
Ionie and her friends do! And when they meet the Star Animals, a whole world of magical adventure unfolds.

The Star Friends are enjoying the holidays, but it’s not all fun and games as they try to discover who summoned the Shades that caused chaos in Westcombe. During their investigations, they notice that the village is strangely quiet – even the popular café is empty! Could the two be connected? The girls need to pull together to solve this mystery before it spirals out of control!

Perfect for fans of MY SECRET UNICORN and THE RESCUE PRINCESSES, and for RAINBOW MAGIC readers looking to move on to a more challenging adventure.

Genres: Fantasy, Animals, Childrens, Mystery, Magic, Friendship, Cooking

160 pages, Kindle Edition

Published December 5, 2019

About the author

Linda Chapman was born in Liverpool in 1969. She had many different jobs before becoming a full-time writer in 1999 including working as a theatre stage manager, a dog trainer, a bookseller, a nanny, a teacher and a research assistant. She has written over 300 books for children, some under her own name, others under different names and she often collaborates with other authors. She is currently writing books with Julie Sykes and they are co-authors on the NYT bestselling Unicorn Academy series as well as Mermaid Academy, Forever Homes and Pocket Unicorns. Linda lives in Leicestershire with her husband, three children, two horses and three dogs. She has written many different series including: My Secret Unicorn, Star Friends, Best Friends Bakery, Stardust, Skating School and, most recently, Magic Keepers and Moonlight Riders.

Reviews

[tim jones · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent

Read this series with my 7 year old daughter and we loved all the books. Really exciting, and caught her imagination perfectly.

[Mary Pimbblet · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another enjoyable instalment of the Star Friends series. The story felt a little rushed at times but it was always interesting and unpredictable.
My seven year old has loved reading this whole series with me and we’re both sorry to reach the end of it.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Picking up where the previous title, the seventh in the series, left off, the Star Friends are still puzzled by the presence of Shades in Mrs. Jefferson's dolls and are determined to figure out who's been practicing magic in their town of Westport. Mia sees clues in her mirror, but she can't make out their meaning or significance. She and her three friends--Lexi, Violet, and Sita--are growing increasingly comfortable with their magical abilities, and they're all bonding even more closely with Bracken, Sorrel, Juniper, and Willow, their star animal friends. At first they follow various leads that nudge them to suspect a fortune teller or a businessman in another town, but eventually the girls realize the culprit is much closer to home and relates to the insatiable desire Mia and Sita and some other townspeople have for cake, delicious cake baked at the Copper Kettle cafe. So enticing are these baked goods that it's almost impossible to be satisfied with anything else or to think of anything else but eating more cake. (I can relate, and I've certainly not been nibbling on any magical or magic-laced cakes.) The descriptions of the girls' hunger and the behavior of their fellow citizens as the shop runs out of sweet treats is both humorous and frightening. As is often the case with these stories, it's easy to guess what's going on and predict the outcome, but the journey will still keep readers engaged. There's just enough reality with the girls worrying about having to leave fifth grade and move into the middle grades to counterbalance the fantasy and magic and make believers out of readers.

[寿理 宮本 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I didn't mean to start so late in the series. I started with this one just at random without paying attention to which book number it was.

It's not as accessible as, say, Baby-Sitters Club when it comes to jumping in at Book 8 and expecting to understand what's going on, but by the time the plot picked up (mostly about cake), I had a lot of clear ideas about cake, and everyone craving cake, and dang it I want cake.

Cute, but maybe start with book 1 first?

[Efox · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another Star Friends hit! It's break and weird things are still happening in the town. The girls and their star animals set out to solve the mystery. Things I especially enjoyed about this installment were the discussions of changes with the friends - they have slowly been developing more powerful, and different abilities with their magic over the series, but not all at the same time. It was a major theme in the previous installment as well - and I appreciate the emphasis on how change is hard for children and finding ways to be sensitive to your friends as they deal with it. Also, I really enjoyed this book because for the first time the person doing the dark magic wasn't doing it for the usual reasons, and that made my kids incredibly happy.

[Erietta · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked this book
Expect from being repetitive
I like the character development of Ionie and I think she can really be a nice girl and fit into the group
Right from the start I believed in her and her power to change to sth better of she ever wanted to
Really nice book series for kids!!

[Naayagi Thangavel · Rating 5 out of 5]

star friends and moon light riders are my favourite books.

I liked the power and the magical, the imaginary things.
Its nice to read this , feel like I am in the book and it feels like I am actually the person in the book.

[Joud Algorain · Rating 5 out of 5]

I like the illustration.
I like the star friends because they are good friends with their animals.
The story is amazing.
The best part is when the star friends helped each other .

[Ulvi · Rating 5 out of 5]

My kids have definitely enjoyed this series. This book was a nice end to it. I keep mentioning the illustrations because they are really well done.

[Heeva Rohani · Rating 5 out of 5]

OMG! I can’t believe that Mia and Lexi are cursed by the cakes too! 😮😮😮

[Jessica Tibbitts · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another cute one from this series. these are fun reads with my 9 year old.

[LaneReadsALot · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my favorite books in the series. :D

[Cute Rabbit · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book begins with the friends all in the clearing dicsussing who may have caused the shades in the dolls.They go to the copper kettle to buy ice creams.Mary the owner of copper kettle is sad because there hasn’t been any business for a while .The friends go to Mike and Ana house where maia gets some answers to the question who might have caused the shades & think it may have been mystic Maureen .
They go to the copper kettle the next day to ask about the business cards where Mike and ana got it from.Mary tells them that there aren’t anymore of them & the friends decide to go to the new Arina to find out more.They find a poster with a fair where they might be able to find mystic Maureen but the girls aren’t the right age to go to it.Ionie casts a glamour to go there (she pretends to be a fortune teller)
She doesn’t find mystic Maureen.Maia starts to feel like she can only eat the copper kettle cakes & Sita has the same thoughts as her.They help out at the copper kettle where they find mystic Maureen’s scarf and Maia is excited to tell the others.Lottie and ironie soon realise that there is a charm in the cakes and they must question Mary to why there are so many customers that suddenly appeared at her cafeThey head to the copper kettle where they find a way to take out the angry customers affected by the charm & find that mystic Maureen is Mary!The reason to why she put a charm in the cakes was because she thought it will help her business & she said that it didn’t specify that shades were bad.
The girls are happy and are able to solve the mystery!🔍