An action-packed introductory tale that’s somewhat hampered by shallow characterization.
Nicol’s fantasy novel offers a promising start to a new spinoff series, set in former role-playing game designer Rowe’s popular Arcane Ascension world.
The author of the Mage-Born fantasy novels presents an engaging new story in the LitRPG fantasy subgenre—one that’s grounded in the universe of Rowe’s work. It’s a world of complex magic where teams of climbers attempt to scale ancient towers known as the Soaring Spires, hoping to gain magical “attunements” and treasure. In this first installment, the Guiding Star Legacy team of six climbers, each with different attunements, skills, and powers, venture to the 19th floor of the Tortoise Spire. Four of them—thoughtful seer Seji “Sage” Hayden, intimidating healer Lani Nanashi, reckless fighter Nieve Yukihara, and timid “cloudcaller” Emiko Ryotsu, who can manipulate weather—share a tight bond from years of climbing together, exchanging teasing banter and affectionate nicknames. But their last ascent was so harrowing that two other team members quit, replaced by temporary hires Aldis Somers, a prickly telepath, and Hane, an enigmatic, solitary figure. Inside the spire is a dangerous magical realm where the climbers face challenges such as monsters, mazes, and illusions, which players of Dungeons & Dragons and other role-playing games will find familiar. Much of the narrative reads like a description of gameplay, moving from scene to scene without much motivation or suspense. The characters also seem somewhat underdeveloped; one could easily dub them “the bold one,” “the cute one,” or “the loner.” The complicated magic system with its eight attunements, each with six levels, five magical marks, and dozens of types of magical essences and crystals can be hard to follow, despite an explanatory prologue. However, as the story unfolds, the author introduces surprising elements and shocking twists, leading to a harrowing final life-and-death battle and setting up an intriguing premise for a continuing series. Some readers may find parts of the final confrontation overly dark, but fans of anime, RPGs, and the authors’ previous work will be eager to follow Guiding Star Legacy’s further adventures.
An action-packed introductory tale that’s somewhat hampered by shallow characterization.Pub Date: Nov. 14, 2022
ISBN: 9781039415034
Page Count: 424
Publisher: Podium Publishing
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A sad, lovely, and blood-soaked song of a book.
The fates of three people intertwine in a World War II–era New York where some people of color are blessed and cursed with magic in their hands.
Phyllis, a light-skinned African American woman who can “pass” under many circumstances, has impossibly dexterous hands that wield murderous knives in the service of Victor, a Russian mob boss, and believes her kills serve justice. Her once and future lover, Dev, a half-Indian undercover cop posing as Victor’s bartender, whose own hands can sense threats to himself and others, can’t quite reconcile his feelings for Phyllis with his duty to a department that will never truly accept him as one of them. And Phyllis’ best friend, Tamara, an African American snake dancer and aspiring impresario at Victor’s club, with an oracular gift of reading cards, hopes that if she pretends she doesn’t notice the violent foundation of Victor’s empire, it won’t touch her. But the truths that each refuses to acknowledge and the death-haunted pasts that refuse to stay buried have dangerous implications for all three of them, both on the streets of New York City and in the supposedly quiet Hudson Valley town where Dev, Phyllis, and Tamara take an uncertain refuge. Johnson’s secret history is a nuanced portrait of racism in all of its poisonous flavors, brutally overt and unsuccessfully covert. She explores in deeper detail an issue she touched upon in her two YA novels, The Summer Prince (2013) and Love Is the Drug (2014): the incredibly fraught, liminal space of being a light-skinned person of color. In musical prose, she also offers passionate and painful depictions of the love expressed in romance and friendship and the sacrifices such love can demand.
A sad, lovely, and blood-soaked song of a book.Pub Date: July 21, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-17534-2
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: April 12, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2020
PERSPECTIVES
PERSPECTIVES
A love letter to imagination, adventure, the written word, and the power of many kinds of love.
An independent young girl finds a blue door in a field and glimpses another world, nudging her onto a path of discovery, destiny, empowerment, and love.
Set at the turn of the 20th century, Harrow's debut novel centers on January Scaller, who grows up under the watchful eye of the wealthy Cornelius Locke, who employs her father, Julian, to travel the globe in search of odd objects and valuable treasures to pad his collection, housed in a sprawling Vermont mansion. January appears to have a charmed childhood but is stifled by the high-society old boy’s club of Mr. Locke and his friends, who treat her as a curiosity—a mixed-race girl with a precocious streak, forced into elaborate outfits and docile behavior for the annual society gatherings. When she's 17, her father seemingly disappears, and January finds a book that will change her life forever. With her motley crew of allies—Samuel, the grocer’s son; Jane, the Kenyan woman sent by Julian to be January’s companion; and Bad, her faithful dog—January embarks on an adventure that will lead her to discover secrets about Mr. Locke, the world and its hidden doorways, and her own family. Harrow employs the image of the door (“Sometimes I feel there are doors lurking in the creases of every sentence, with periods for knobs and verbs for hinges”) as well as the metaphor (a “geometry of absence”) to great effect. Similes and vivid imagery adorn nearly every page like glittering garlands. While some stereotypes are present, such as the depiction of East African women as pantherlike, the book has a diverse cast of characters and a strong woman lead. This portal fantasy doesn’t shy away from racism, classism, and sexism, which helps it succeed as an interesting story.
A love letter to imagination, adventure, the written word, and the power of many kinds of love.Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-316-42199-7
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Redhook/Orbit
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
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