Savor the Sweetness and Spice: A Court of Sugar and Spice Review

3 min readNov 8, 2023

I’ve just finished listening to “A Court of Sugar and Spice” by Rebecca F. Kenney, narrated by Jessica Jeffries. This is the first book in the Wicked Darling Series. Let’s delve into the story a bit. It’s a captivating retelling of the Nutcracker Fairytale, featuring two sisters on a journey to their godfather’s home. In his will, their father stipulated that they would inherit their share of the estate once they married suitable partners, so they were entrusted to their godfather, who oversees this condition.

One of the sisters is Clara, an artistic soul who loves to paint, a passion her father did not approve of. The other one is Louisa, the daring and adventurous one who always seeks excitement wherever she goes. Upon their arrival at Drosselmeyer’s mansion (their godfather), they discover that he is a brilliant scientist or inventor of some sort, with robot-like servants and a room filled with extraordinary and strange inventions. Drosselmeyer sternly warns them against going to the third floor, deeming it off-limits. However, Louisa’s curiosity gets the better of her, and she decides to explore it.

On the forbidden third floor, Louisa stumbles upon a grand dollhouse filled with wooden dolls and a nutcracker. In a series of unfortunate accidents, she breaks the arm of one of the dolls and inadvertently injures her finger with a paper cutter, causing blood to drip onto the nutcracker. To her amazement, the nutcracker comes to life and reveals himself as a Prince (soon to be King) of the Faerie Realm. Though skeptical at first, Louisa shares this encounter with her sister, and they both meet the nutcracker prince, who asks them to help him break the curse and free him. According to him, his realm is in danger as the Rat King will be ruling now in his absence.

It turns out that Drosselmeyer is, in fact, a Fae hunter who has captured and transformed the faeries into wooden dolls, keeping them in captivity. The nutcracker prince implores the sisters to assist him in locating a portal to the Faerie realm, where they can free the imprisoned faeries. In a nutshell, they locate the portal and venture into the mystical Faerie Realm, where they encounter a beautiful sugarplum faerie who is the cousin of the Prince. Their collective journey leads them toward a magical pool, where they hope to undo the curse and save the Faerie prince. On the way, they encounter much anger including kidnapping by the rat king and fighting with rat soldiers. So, this is the crux of it.