Strong young women lead in this atmospheric tale that’s oozing with magic, secrets, and temptation.
The magic flows as easily as the champagne as cousins strive to best one another to earn the title of Holtzfall Heiress by winning the sometimes-deadly Veritaz Trials.
When Verity Holtzfall turns up dead—and her bodyguard knight, Alaric Rydder, is missing—everyone in Walstad knows that a new heiress must be chosen according to the centuries-old Veritaz, which tests the virtues of eligible candidates. Along with teenage cousins Nora (Verity’s daughter), Modesty, Constance, and Clemency, a fifth cousin, Lotte, appears, released from the convent where she’s been living, until recently unaware of her Holtzfall bloodline. The trials are always different, testing “bravery, or honesty, or temperance, or any of a dozen other virtues” in unexpected ways. The winner receives all the entrants’ magic. In Walstad, a society whose worldbuilding features Scandinavian cultural influences, the self-congratulatory upper crust lives in luxury, while activists called Grims agitate for reform. This sprawling story’s multiple narrators never lose their footing, even as they race along the twisty pathways of forbidden love and shocking alliances and reveals. Dark-haired Nora’s father was a “desert-born” Mirajin; references to his Arab-coded culture evoke some Orientalist tropes. Other major characters read white. The cliffhanger conclusion of this riveting series opener that explores themes of trust and growth will leave readers eager for the next installment.
Strong young women lead in this atmospheric tale that’s oozing with magic, secrets, and temptation. (family tree) (Fantasy thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: April 1, 2025
ISBN: 9780451479662
Page Count: 512
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: Dec. 28, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter.
After a Nigerian British girl goes off to an exclusive boarding school that seems to prey on less-privileged students, she discovers there might be some truth behind an urban legend.
Ife Adebola joins the Urban Achievers scholarship program at pricey, high-pressure Nithercott School, arriving shortly after a student called Leon mysteriously disappeared. Gossip says he’s a victim of the glowing-eyed Changing Man who targets the lonely, leaving them changed. Ife doesn’t believe in the myth, but amid the stresses of Nithercott’s competitive, privileged, majority-white environment, where she is constantly reminded of her state school background, she does miss her friends and family. When Malika, a fellow Black scholarship student, disappears and then returns, acting strangely devoid of personality, Ife worries the Changing Man is real—and that she’s next. Ife joins forces with classmate Bijal and Benny, Leon’s younger brother, to uncover the truth about who the Changing Man is and what he wants. Culminating in a detailed, gory, and extended climactic battle, this verbose thriller tempts readers with a nefarious mystery involving racial and class-based violence but never quite lives up to its potential and peters out thematically by its explosive finale. However, this debut offers highly visually evocative and eerie descriptions of characters and events and will appeal to fans of creature horror, social commentary, and dark academia.
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9781250868138
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: June 8, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
Immersive and engaging, despite some flaws, and destined to capture imaginations.
Magic, mystery, and love intertwine and invite in this newest take on the “enchanted circus” trope.
Sisters raised by their abusive father, a governor of a colonial backwater in a world vaguely reminiscent of the late 18th century, Scarlett and Donatella each long for something more. Scarlett, olive-skinned, dark of hair and attitude, longs for Caraval, the fabled, magical circus helmed by the possibly evil Master Legend Santos, while blonde, sunny Tella finds comfort in drink and the embraces of various men. A slightly awkward start, with inconsistencies of attitude and setting, rapidly smooths out when they, along with handsome “golden-brown” sailor Julian, flee to Caraval on the eve of Scarlett’s arranged marriage. Tella disappears, and Scarlett must navigate a nighttime world of magic to find her. Caraval delights the senses: beautiful and scary, described in luscious prose, this is a show readers will wish they could enter. Dresses can be purchased for secrets or days of life; clocks can become doors; bridges move: this is an inventive and original circus, laced with an edge of horror. A double love story, one sensual romance and the other sisterly loyalty, anchors the plot, but the real star here is Caraval and its secrets.
Immersive and engaging, despite some flaws, and destined to capture imaginations. (Fantasy. 14 & up)Pub Date: Jan. 31, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-250-09525-1
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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