Totally Psychic - by Brigid Martin (Hardcover)

I loved Totally Psychic by Brigid Martin it was a lovely story. In this story, the main character, Paloma Ferrer, is from a family of psychics. Her Abuela is famous for it. The story goes through how Paloma navigates through her new psychic abilities, which was very interesting. She ends up causing a lot of trouble throughout the story that she eventually learns from these mistakes. There are five rules to follow that go along with her new abilities. Number one is that she must not force contact with any spirits because it can open up a portal to negative energy. Number two is that she must never talk to evil spirits because they can stick around and follow you everywhere. Number three, she must never ask how the specific spirit died. Number four, she must never repeat everything the spirit tells her. Some things are best left alone. She breaks this rule and learns the hard way her consequences for her actions. Number five, these readings are supposed to help heal the spirits and their realitive/friends. They aren't meant to damage them. Paloma learns the hard way when she breaks this one as well. Before she moves her, Abuela gives her a gift to help with her psychic abilities. This gift includes: a mirror, blessed candles, a Book of Flowers, and a notebook. The notebook is meant for writing down any thoughts and visions Paloma has that is related to her abilities. The book of Flowers is information passed down from the ancestors before her about her specific ability. The candles are meant for protection and to close the portals. The special mirror is for her to help communicate with spirits and her family. All these objects play an important role in the story. All of Paloma's family have special psychic abilities. Paloma is a flower medium, and her younger sister is able to record ghosts on videos through her phone. Their Abuela is a famous psychic while their Abuelito is a chef. Their Father is a chef and mother a florist. Their mom runs a shop out of her van. Their uncle Esteban is a numerologist, aunt Rose, an Astrologist, cousin Geraldo, an object reader, and cousin Dania, a culinary Clairvoyant. Their Aunt Maria is a dream analyst, and Uncle Julian and Uncle Raul are empaths and animal Psychics. All of their abilities play a part in the story and are quite interesting. My favorite would probably be Aunt Rosa's ability of being an Astrologist. The plot and character development of this book is very well written. My favorite of the spirits has got to be Dustin and Oreo that scene of when he met Oreo was so cute. One character I disliked was Willows grandpa it was not ok/right for him to be so pushy towards Paloma sharing the family secret. Also, in some parts Paloma was in the right while others her mom was. In my opinion Paloma should have listened to her gut and never used the ouija board that led to so much trouble. I really love the cover of the book it fits the story perfectly. If you love books that contain magic, definitely give this book a try.

Totally Pyschic is a middle grade story about a girl named Paloma who can see ghosts. The story follows Paloma as she moves across the country away from her super famous abuela who is a professional medium. In her new home, Paloma starts a social media account where she does live ghost readings to help people get closure with their loved ones. I think that this story was absolutely adorable. I loved the ghosts and Paloma’s interaction with them; it definitely made me see ghosts in a new light.I really enjoyed seeing Paloma’s journey of moving across the country and having to adapt to a different place. I will say that at first, her mom and sister were absolutely unbearable, but the further the story went on, the better they got. I thought the writing was really simple and easy to read which is perfect for middle grade. The plot kept me invested and there wasn’t a dull moment in this book

Paloma is part of a family of psychics in Miami where everyone has a gift, such as talking to ghosts, interpreting dreams or finding lost pets. Paloma has just turned twelve and has discovered that she is just like her grandmother, a famous medium who conducts seances and goes on tours. Paloma's parents have uprooted Paloma and her sister and moved to California, away from their large extended family. Paloma has to go to a new school and make new friends. She decides to host seances at school and stream them on social media to convince her grandmother to take her on tour with her. She wants to impress her new friends with her psychic abilities, ends up breaking some important rules when it comes to seances and creates supernatural chaos with a collection of out-of-control ghosts. Totally Psychic is well written, engaging, creative and fun with some important lessons about family, rules, peer pressure and boundaries. Paloma is a very relatable character for middle school students as she works through conflicts with her family and relationships with her old and new friends.

Paloma has psychic powers and dreams of being famous like her grandma, a medium to celebrities. Initially upset when her parents move her and her sister from Miami to Los Angeles, Paloma soon conjures up a plan to start her own psychic readings service and the move doesn’t seem so bad after all. After something goes terribly wrong with a reading, Paloma finds herself in a bad situation. Can she fix the mess? TOTALLY PSYCHIC was a fun middle-grade paranormal fantasy full of family, friendship, and ghosts. The writing was appropriately catered to the middle-grade level. Paloma’s flower premonition power was interesting and I liked how that was included throughout the story. Pacing of the book was quite slow. There were some good lessons within the coming-of-age story. One thing that did make me sad while reading was the focus that 12-year-old Paloma and her friends had on social media and the importance they placed on getting as many followers as possible. TOTALLY PSYCHIC would be a good read for the middle-grade audience that enjoys paranormal stories. While I do like reading some middle-grade books as an adult, this one was paced a bit too slow for me to really love it. Thank you to Inkyard Press for the giveaway copy.

Totally Psychic was such a fun, cute middle grade book! This book follows Paloma as she learns how to channel her psychic abilities. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and I think many middle graders will enjoy reading this one as well. I loved how Paloma had a unique psychic ability where she gets messages and premonitions in the form of flowers. In this book Paloma and her family move from Miami to Los Angeles and Paloma initially struggles with the move and being far away from her Abuela, who is also a medium. Paloma’s parents and sister don’t understand her psychic abilities which is hard for her, especially since she dreams of being a famous psychic like her grandma. I think many kids will find Paloma to be a relatable character. Totally Psychic was a fun, lighthearted read and it touched on some good life lessons as well. This was a great debut by Brigid Martin and I will be looking forward to more books by this author! I definitely recommend this book for anyone who loves a good middle grade book!

While this middle grade novel does have many good qualities, it lacks any sort of spirit. Paloma is a psychic and can communicate with spirits. Her family moves across the country for her mother to escape family fame and notoriety. Paloma wants to prove herself to her grandmother and hosts readings at her school against her mother's wishes. Some chaos occurs and spirits start flooding all around her. I like the concept and idea of this story but all the characters are so flat and dull and just generic. Even though this is written for young readers, it doesn't have to be so simplistic. There were so many complexities about family, friendships, jealousy, pressure and even death that could have been addressed and explored in this novel. Instead it was one note the whole way through and didn't make me feel anything. I wasn't ever worried, sympathetic, or joyous with our characters. Hopefully this will reach the right readers but it wasn't for me.