A page-turner that promises future intrigue, special powers, and dragon adventures
In this series debut, a young girl uncovers information that threatens to shake the foundation of her world.
Mira Minkoba is known as the Hope-bearer. On the day she was born, a treaty uniting the six island-nations of the Fallen Isles was named after her. As the face and voice of the Luminary Council, her island’s governing body, Mira lives life in a gilded cage. The only time she feels free is when she’s with the dragons in the sanctuary. When Mira and her friends uncover a sinister plot involving the dragons, Mira takes it to the Luminary Council, but instead of addressing it, they banish her to the Pit, a tightly guarded underground prison. Faced with crippling anxiety, strange cellmates, and a cruel guard who will stop at nothing to uncover her secrets, Mira must keep her wits about her to survive, especially as it becomes clear that the dragon plot goes deeper than she ever imagined. In this first of the Fallen Isles Trilogy, Meadows sows the seeds for an exciting follow-up and creates a rich, vivid world with characters who blossom on the page. All of the novel’s characters are brown, but so far this detail—punctuated with numerous mentions of hair and braids—feels surface deep; however, there is variance in culture from island to island, and as the novel progresses, discrimination becomes a topic of concern in the Fallen Isles. Meadows also hints at other clans and kingdoms beyond the six island nations.
A page-turner that promises future intrigue, special powers, and dragon adventures . (Fantasy. 12-16)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-06-246940-3
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Katherine Tegen/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 1, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2017
Dark, seductive, but over-the-top: Characters and book alike will enthrall those who choose to play.
Garber returns to the world of bestseller Caraval (2017), this time with the focus on younger, more daring sister Donatella.
Valenda, capital of the empire, is host to the second of Legend’s magical games in a single year, and while Scarlett doesn’t want to play again, blonde Tella is eager for a chance to prove herself. She is haunted by the memory of her death in the last game and by the cursed Deck of Destiny she used as a child which foretold her loveless future. Garber has changed many of the rules of her expanding world, which now appears to be infused with magic and evil Fates. Despite a weak plot and ultraviolet prose (“He tasted like exquisite nightmares and stolen dreams, like the wings of fallen angels, and bottles of fresh moonlight.”), this is a tour de force of imagination. Themes of love, betrayal, and the price of magic (and desire) swirl like Caraval’s enchantments, and Dante’s sensuous kisses will thrill readers as much as they do Tella. The convoluted machinations of the Prince of Hearts (one of the Fates), Legend, and even the empress serve as the impetus for Tella’s story and set up future volumes which promise to go bigger. With descriptions focusing primarily on clothing, characters’ ethnicities are often indeterminate.
Dark, seductive, but over-the-top: Characters and book alike will enthrall those who choose to play. (glossary) (Fantasy. 12-16)Pub Date: May 29, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-250-09531-2
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Heartbreaking, historical, and a little bit hopeful.
January 1945: as Russians advance through East Prussia, four teens’ lives converge in hopes of escape.
Returning to the successful formula of her highly lauded debut, Between Shades of Gray (2011), Sepetys combines research (described in extensive backmatter) with well-crafted fiction to bring to life another little-known story: the sinking (from Soviet torpedoes) of the German ship Wilhelm Gustloff. Told in four alternating voices—Lithuanian nurse Joana, Polish Emilia, Prussian forger Florian, and German soldier Alfred—with often contemporary cadences, this stints on neither history nor fiction. The three sympathetic refugees and their motley companions (especially an orphaned boy and an elderly shoemaker) make it clear that while the Gustloff was a German ship full of German civilians and soldiers during World War II, its sinking was still a tragedy. Only Alfred, stationed on the Gustloff, lacks sympathy; almost a caricature, he is self-delusional, unlikable, a Hitler worshiper. As a vehicle for exposition, however, and a reminder of Germany’s role in the war, he serves an invaluable purpose that almost makes up for the mustache-twirling quality of his petty villainy. The inevitability of the ending (including the loss of several characters) doesn’t change its poignancy, and the short chapters and slowly revealed back stories for each character guarantee the pages keep turning.
Heartbreaking, historical, and a little bit hopeful. (author’s note, research and sources, maps) (Historical fiction. 12-16)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-399-16030-1
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Philomel
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2015
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