Well worth it for ravenous fans of quest stories.
Charlie and his best friend, Violet, return, this time to save the Witch Queen of Toledo—who may not need saving after all.
Since readers left him in Charlie Hernández and the League of Shadows (2018), Charlie has been trying to improve his control over his morphling powers, which allow him to manifest as different animals. His adult handler, Queen Joanna, is supposed to be there to help him, but one day he and Violet find she has been kidnapped, so they take it upon themselves to rescue her. The clues she seems to have left behind lead them to Brazil and beyond; just as in the first installment, they dodge gods, beasts, and monsters of Iberian lore and legend along the way. Mexican-American Charlie is able to identify the creatures they find as they traverse South America (thanks to some magical modes of travel) while white-presenting Violet is the mastermind who figures ways out of tricky situations. Predictably, they get out of all the traps they find themselves in, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t truly gruesome and scary events along the way. Spanish and Portuguese are unitalicized and, thankfully, not translated in line but rather left to context. Oddly, Brazilian trickster god Saci peppers his sentences with a fair bit of Spanish, even at times when it seems more linguistically logical to use Portuguese. Readers who have not read the first volume should not have trouble catching up, but it does require quite an attention span to keep track of people and events.
Well worth it for ravenous fans of quest stories. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 22, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-5344-2661-0
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: July 23, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
Not as strong as the series opener, but the space battles galore will satisfy returning fans.
Lunar Jones and Dread the dragon rally the Dread Knights to defend Mars from attack by Triton, the dragon from Neptune’s largest moon.
About a year has passed since 14-year-old Lunar Jones became a dragoon and bonded with Dread, the planetary dragon of Mars. In this second series entry, Mars is now productive and again accepting Earthers as settlers, while Lunar adjusts to being in a leadership role, despite being younger than most of those he commands and “responsible for protecting all of Mars.” Proctor (strategy), Doc (programming), Little Will (lead scout), and Mara (who’s nicknamed “Wildcard”) reprise their crucial roles, while the story is fleshed out with other familiar faces, a batch of new recruits, and dragoons and dragons from throughout the solar system. Upon the approach of unknown vessels into Mars’ atmosphere, Lunar and Dread recall uncomfortable rumors about hostility from Neptune’s dragons, and the battles begin. Lunar narrates most chapters; occasional sections are told from Proctor’s point of view. A whiff of romantic attraction doesn’t impede the nonstop action, and the epilogue points to more entries to come. The dragon backstory holds together, although several innovations that appear at just the right time and support healing or offer battle advantages feel like overly easy solutions. Most humans present white.
Not as strong as the series opener, but the space battles galore will satisfy returning fans. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9781665946544
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Aug. 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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