★Doocy, Maiga. Sorcery and Small Magics. Orbit. (The Wildersongs Trilogy, Bk. 1). Oct. 2024. 400p. ISBN 9780316576758. pap. $19.99. FANTASY

DEBUT Flippant Leovander Loveage adores poking at dour Sebastian Grimm, his dedicated and respectable classmate, between visits to the pub and gambling dens. In a cozy fantasy novel, this means that Leo and Grimm will fall in love, but their path is anything but straightforward. It begins with a magical mishap that curses Leo, binding him to Grimm. Though neither feels anything but horror at the situation, they’ll journey together past the borders of their homeland, into the magical wilds, in search of a sorceress from a storybook. They’ll brave nightmarish creatures, violent library thieves, and Leo’s own warped magic as the curse tightens its grip. But they’ll also discover the charm lurking within the horrors—and hidden behind the walls they’ve built around their own hearts. Leo’s narration is delightfully meandering, but though he’s the prankster, he believes he’s the butt of the jokes that matter. This gives readers a peek at the pain he conceals—and that may just change Grimm’s poor opinion of him. VERDICT This Ghibli-esque slow-burn fantasy delivers on every promise it offers when it drops Diana Wynne Jones’s Howl’s Moving Castle inside Patricia A. McKillip’s The Forgotten Beasts of Eld.