A dark and inviting supernatural thriller.
A teenage girl learns that she’s part angel in this debut YA fantasy.
Sixteen-year-old Achaia Cohen thinks that she and her father, Shael, move around so much because he’s a writer who’s always on assignment. It’s actually because he’s one of the Nephilim—the guardian angels of God. Years ago, his charge had been U.S. Sen. Anna Connolly, as per God’s plan, but they fell in love and had a child. After a demon killed Anna, Shael traded his angelic soul to Lucifer for the chance to raise Achaia, the only human/Nephilim hybrid in existence. Now, in New York, Shael continues the difficult task of protecting his daughter, who’s unaware of her lineage, from evil forces. As demons stalk the pair, Shael enlists his angelic colleague, Naphtali, for added defense. More aid comes in the form of several Nephilim disguised as high school kids: Noland, Olivier, Yellaina, Emile, and Amelia. They help Achaia settle into school and city life while keeping their angelic superpowers (and wings) hidden. Still, Achaia feels like a hostage, as her father is always afraid for her safety. Then Shael vanishes, and Achaia must confront the truth about her background. For this series opener, Ange sculpts a heroic teen saga in the mold of X-Men comics, substituting a speedster (Olivier), a firestarter (Noland), and a language expert (Yellaina) for the latter’s mutant heroes. At one point, she appealingly nods to the supreme deity’s cultural malleability: “Today, God appeared as a tall man wearing white robes, his skin changing colors in ever-shifting hues of black, white, olive, and maple.” The imagery is often graceful, as well: “Shael sat silently, letting [Lucifer’s] words meet him like the tide on the beach.” The concept of free will weaves its way into the action-oriented plot, which also includes romance elements; Achaia’s half-human nature allows her to make decisions that her full-Nephilim cohort can’t, and following one’s heart is shown to be more important than strict adherence to heavenly mandate. Ange leaves all the pieces in place for a grander sequel.
A dark and inviting supernatural thriller.Pub Date: Nov. 11, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-947992-00-9
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Marturia Publications
Review Posted Online: July 26, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.
In this YA graphic novel, an alienated Métis girl learns about her people’s Canadian history.
Métis teenager Echo Desjardins finds herself living in a home away from her mother, attending a new school, and feeling completely lonely as a result. She daydreams in class and wanders the halls listening to a playlist of her mother’s old CDs. At home, she shuts herself up in her room. But when her history teacher begins to lecture about the Pemmican Wars of early 1800s Saskatchewan, Echo finds herself swept back to that time. She sees the Métis people following the bison with their mobile hunting camp, turning the animals’ meat into pemmican, which they sell to the Northwest Company in order to buy supplies for the winter. Echo meets a young girl named Marie, who introduces Echo to the rhythms of Métis life. She finally understands what her Métis heritage actually means. But the joys are short-lived, as conflicts between the Métis and their rivals in the Hudson Bay Company come to a bloody head. The tragic history of her people will help explain the difficulties of the Métis in Echo’s own time, including those of her mother and the teen herself. Accompanied by dazzling art by Henderson (A Blanket of Butterflies, 2017, etc.) and colorist Yaciuk (Fire Starters, 2016, etc.), this tale is a brilliant bit of time travel. Readers are swept back to 19th-century Saskatchewan as fully as Echo herself. Vermette’s (The Break, 2017, etc.) dialogue is sparse, offering a mostly visual, deeply contemplative juxtaposition of the present and the past. Echo’s eventual encounter with her mother (whose fate has been kept from readers up to that point) offers a powerful moment of connection that is both unexpected and affecting. “Are you…proud to be Métis?” Echo asks her, forcing her mother to admit, sheepishly: “I don’t really know much about it.” With this series opener, the author provides a bit more insight into what that means.
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.Pub Date: March 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-55379-678-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HighWater Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 28, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The format of this taut and moving drama forcefully regulates the pacing; breathless, edge-of-the-seat courtroom scenes...
In a riveting novel from Myers (At Her Majesty’s Request, 1999, etc.), a teenager who dreams of being a filmmaker writes the story of his trial for felony murder in the form of a movie script, with journal entries after each day’s action.
Steve is accused of being an accomplice in the robbery and murder of a drug store owner. As he goes through his trial, returning each night to a prison where most nights he can hear other inmates being beaten and raped, he reviews the events leading to this point in his life. Although Steve is eventually acquitted, Myers leaves it up to readers to decide for themselves on his protagonist’s guilt or innocence.
The format of this taut and moving drama forcefully regulates the pacing; breathless, edge-of-the-seat courtroom scenes written entirely in dialogue alternate with thoughtful, introspective journal entries that offer a sense of Steve’s terror and confusion, and that deftly demonstrate Myers’s point: the road from innocence to trouble is comprised of small, almost invisible steps, each involving an experience in which a “positive moral decision” was not made. (Fiction. 12-14)Pub Date: May 31, 1999
ISBN: 0-06-028077-8
Page Count: 280
Publisher: HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1999
PERSPECTIVES
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