Courtesy of Cupid

“Courtesy of Cupid,” by Nashae Jones, is a sweet middle grade story about Erin Johnson, or EJ to her friends. Her best friend, Bruno, is always there for her, until he seems to be drifting away, at least spending time thinking about a girl he likes. Their relationship falters a bit as a result of this love interest, which isn’t helped any by Erin’s competitiveness with fellow eighth grader, Trevor Jin.

Erin suffers embarrassment at the hands of her mother on her thirteenth birthday, and the fact that many of her classmates are there to see it doesn’t help matters. When her mother reveals to her the next day that her father is Cupid—yes, the one and only love god—she thinks her mother has gone off the deep end. That is, until she realizes that magical things seem to be happening all around her, especially in relation to crushes. When she decides to use her newly discovered powers to make Trevor fall in love with her so she can beat him as she strives to become president of the Multicultural Leadership Club, life starts to get out of hand. She soon realizes that she doesn’t know how to determine what is real and what isn’t.

Trevor seems to like her, and she thinks she may just be falling for him in return, but is it the real thing or just her magic making it happen? Is her best friend going to come back around to her, or is he lost to his new love interest and his burgeoning friendship with his twin, Ben, with whom there’s been a bone of contention the last several years? Erin’s quest to help everyone get what they want—or what she feels they deserve—isn’t without questions. However, she seems to be losing what she wants in the process. She just has to find the right questions to ask to find the answers that will make her life more understandable—at least for the time being. Maybe then she can pick up the pieces of her life and find a way to put them all back together.

“Courtesy of Cupid” is a story of friendship and crushes, but more than that, it is about coming to understand oneself, facing hard truths, and being vulnerable and open to change.