A psychologically astute, highly original debut—complex, eerie and utterly believable. Stay tuned for the projected sequel.
Magic, driven underground in the 17th century, is trying to return—but will the result be salvation or apocalypse?
After her father dies, Astrid Lethewood is astonished to discover that he was far from the drunken wastrel the town of Indigo Springs, Ore., assumed. In fact, he crafted, of magical objects called “chantments,” a lipstick that gives the wearer glamour, an amulet of persuasion, a kaleidoscope that allows the user to see through solid objects, etc. Dad made the chantments to send to deserving people and thus help magic spread; he told nobody because the witch-finders are still lurking, ready to denounce and burn. The source of the magic is vitagua, a blue fluid that pools beneath Dad’s house. Astrid was his apprentice, so why can’t she remember anything of the lore and techniques he taught her? The arrival of old friend Sahara Knax further complicates matters, as she immediately seizes on the magic and tries to change things and people. Meanwhile, sometime in the future, police negotiator Will Forest interrogates an extremely confused Astrid in a secure underground prison. Sahara, now brimming with magic, has founded a cult dedicated to saving the planet—by any means, including violence and magically transforming living things into monstrosities.
A psychologically astute, highly original debut—complex, eerie and utterly believable. Stay tuned for the projected sequel.Pub Date: Nov. 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-7653-1947-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Satisfying on all levels of the reading experience: thrilling, emotionally resonant, and cerebral. Escape to Witch Mountain...
The product of a long-running alchemical experiment, twins Roger and Dodger struggle to understand their unique circumstances and gain control over them.
In the late 19th century, ambitious young alchemist Asphodel Baker tried to rewrite reality to create a better world. She set in motion a long-range plan to incarnate the alchemical Doctrine of Ethos, encoding her scheme in a series of children’s books destined to become classics. In the present day, the considerably more ruthless James Reed, who is her creation and her killer, breeds twins designed to each incarnate half of the Doctrine; once they have fully matured, united, and manifested as “the living force that holds the universe together,” he will seize their power to control everything. Failed experiments are terminated. Roger Middleton, brilliant with languages, develops a strange telepathic connection with Dodger Cheswich, a math genius living across the country from him. Despite all of Reed’s brutal and covert efforts to keep the pair apart so their abilities will flower fully, they cannot help re-encountering each other and then separating in the wake of tragedy. Their attempts to avoid becoming one of Reed’s failures force them to draw upon their more arcane powers: Roger can persuade people—and reality itself—to bend to his wishes, while Dodger can actually reverse time back to a certain fixed point. With the help of Erin, the living incarnation of Order, they must craft the timeline that allows them to survive long enough to realize their potential. Books that include magic range across a spectrum that puts rules-based, logical magic on one end and serendipitous magic with no obvious cause or structure on the other. This book falls intriguingly far on the logic end; with its experiments and protocols, it redefines what is typically meant by science fantasy. If there’s a flaw in McGuire's (That Ain’t Witchcraft, 2019, etc.) gripping story, it’s that it isn't clear how Reed could really gain complete control over the Doctrine long term, nor why Reed’s followers actually believe that he would cede any of the Doctrine’s power were he to gain it.
Satisfying on all levels of the reading experience: thrilling, emotionally resonant, and cerebral. Escape to Witch Mountain for grown-ups.Pub Date: May 7, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-19552-4
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Feb. 27, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Though the book is vastly overelaborate, the steady pace and intricately fascinating details are relentlessly gripping; fans...
Second part of Islington’s doorstopper epic fantasy trilogy (The Shadow of What Was Lost, 2016), set in a world of the Gifted, whose magic lies in being able to tap into their own life force, and the Augurs, who wield a higher-order magic.
Islington supplies a "refresher" of the events of Book 1 that isn’t as helpful as you might suppose for reasons that will soon become clear. The laws that kept the Augurs and the Gifted constrained have been changed to allow them to defend Andarra against mysterious invaders. Three 16-year-olds who became friends at a school for the Gifted, Davian, Wirr, and Asha, now face different futures. Davian must learn to control his Augur powers and determine why the Boundary, put in place many years ago to keep out an invader called Aarkein Devaed, is weakening. Wirr, who, following his father’s death, is now Prince Torin the Northwarden, suspects that the story his father told him was false and must also deal with his interfering mother. By means of treachery, Asha’s Gifted powers have been suppressed, turning her into a Shadow; determined to find out how and why, she may discover more than she bargained for. Their friend Caeden has learned he’s an immortal; worse, he was once Aarkein Devaed but could not bear the crushing guilt and deleted his memories. Now he finds he needs them back; but is he really as evil as everybody says and he himself believes? With the narrative lacking the clear theme usually found in epic fantasy, the particulars assume critical importance; without them readers will be unable to decipher such magnificently gnomic passages as: "Andrael’s ridiculous weapon did its job and took my Reserve, so the Siphon is now bonded to Ashalia rather than me. If you want to seal the ilshara, she will need to find the final Tributary. The one that you set aside for Gassandrid, until he began to suspect and split himself."
Though the book is vastly overelaborate, the steady pace and intricately fascinating details are relentlessly gripping; fans of the first volume won’t be disappointed.Pub Date: Aug. 22, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-316-27411-1
Page Count: 704
Publisher: Orbit
Review Posted Online: June 5, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2017
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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