Data, devotion, and a very inconvenient magical crisis—what could possibly complicate this assessment?
When Tinselcroft's celebration magic starts failing spectacularly two weeks before the town's biggest wedding, community healer Sage knows they're in trouble. But the real crisis arrives in the form of Dr. Julian Thorne, the Council's most rigorous academic researcher, armed with calibrated instruments and a mandate to prove their collaborative magical practices are dangerously unregulated.
Julian's entire career has trained him to distrust exactly the kind of intuitive, emotion-based magic Sage's community embodies. His measurements say one thing; Sage's healing records say another. And as they're forced to work together investigating the magical disruptions, their opposing approaches create friction that's part professional clash, part undeniable chemistry.
Between flickering enchantments, bureaucratic deadlines, and a looming wedding that might turn into a magical disaster, Sage must prove that collaborative magic isn't chaos—it's connection. But convincing Julian means bridging the impossible gap between empirical data and holistic wisdom...and maybe discovering that some partnerships can't be measured in quantifiable terms.
Fans of slow-burn academic rivals-to-lovers, small-town magical mysteries, and buttoned-up researchers learning that the heart has its own kind of logic will devour this thoughtful, tender romance about finding common ground when your frameworks—and your feelings—don't quite align.
Genre: Romance
When Tinselcroft's celebration magic starts failing spectacularly two weeks before the town's biggest wedding, community healer Sage knows they're in trouble. But the real crisis arrives in the form of Dr. Julian Thorne, the Council's most rigorous academic researcher, armed with calibrated instruments and a mandate to prove their collaborative magical practices are dangerously unregulated.
Julian's entire career has trained him to distrust exactly the kind of intuitive, emotion-based magic Sage's community embodies. His measurements say one thing; Sage's healing records say another. And as they're forced to work together investigating the magical disruptions, their opposing approaches create friction that's part professional clash, part undeniable chemistry.
Between flickering enchantments, bureaucratic deadlines, and a looming wedding that might turn into a magical disaster, Sage must prove that collaborative magic isn't chaos—it's connection. But convincing Julian means bridging the impossible gap between empirical data and holistic wisdom...and maybe discovering that some partnerships can't be measured in quantifiable terms.
Fans of slow-burn academic rivals-to-lovers, small-town magical mysteries, and buttoned-up researchers learning that the heart has its own kind of logic will devour this thoughtful, tender romance about finding common ground when your frameworks—and your feelings—don't quite align.
Genre: Romance
Used availability for Wynn Valentine's The Noel Protocol