A mostly promising debut.
To save her friend and sister, a young girl embarks on a treacherous mission.
Just five years ago, the island of Midaga was protected by the Twelve, warriors endowed with a magical treasure and animal power from the Asian zodiac. But then the villainous Dragonlord took control, eliminating the Twelve and their apprentices, or Heirs. Since then, all individuals with zodiac powers have been hunted or forced into hiding. When Usagi’s sister, Uma, and friend Tora are kidnapped by the Dragonlord’s men due to their powers, she joins forces with a group of bandits who turn out to be renegade Heirs trained by the last surviving Warrior, Horangi the Tigress. Usagi, endowed with powers of the wood rabbit, finds herself torn: Should she immediately rescue her friend and sister or prove her worth by climbing Mount Jade and training to become an Heir? Rumors that the Dragonlord plans to execute his weak captives accelerate everything, cutting short her training and sending Usagi and the Heirs to infiltrate the Dragonlord’s lair. Although this fantasy is not based on a specific culture, the majority of characters’ names have East Asian derivations. Unfortunately, other aspects of the worldbuilding are not so solid. Oddly for a book set on an island, for instance, there’s no mention of the ocean or ports and very little consumption of seafood. Obstacles are frequent but resolve quickly, limiting suspense but keeping pages turning.
A mostly promising debut. (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: July 2, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-06-282127-0
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: April 13, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
An enthralling fantasy debut exploring exploitation by those in power.
Will 12-year-old Nura be able to outsmart the trickster jinn and save herself and her friends?
Nura lives in the fictional Pakistani town of Meerabagh, where she has worked mining mica to help support her family of five—her mother, herself, and her three younger siblings—since her father’s death. In the mines she has the company of her best friend, Faisal, who is teased by other kids for his stutter, and she enjoys small pleasures like splurging on gulab jamun. Although Maa wants Nura to stop working and attend school, she has no interest in classroom learning and hopes to save up to send her younger siblings to school instead so they can break the family’s cycle of poverty. Following a mining accident in which Faisal and others are lost in the rubble, Nura goes to the rescue. In her quest, she is plunged into the magical, glittering jinn realm, where nothing is as it seems. The author seamlessly weaves into the worldbuilding of the story commentary on real-life problems such as the ravages of child labor and systems that perpetuate inequities. An informative author’s note further explores present-day global cycles of oppression as well as the life-changing power of education. This action-packed story set in a Muslim community moves at a fast pace, with evocative writing that brings the fantasy world to life and lyrical imagery to describe emotions.
An enthralling fantasy debut exploring exploitation by those in power. (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: July 5, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-7595-5795-6
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Jimmy Patterson/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2022
A vibrant celebration of art’s power to console and heal.
Zora, 12, shares her mother’s artistic gifts, but when grief and guilt lead her to destroy years of drawings, the results are astonishing.
Voom is Zora and her mom’s word for the artistic impulse that bubbles up inside. After disclosing her leukemia diagnosis to Zora and her sister, Frankie, Mom promised the girls she’d beat it. Ten months later, their far sicker mom is hospitalized in Pittsburgh, where the girls share their bus driver grandmother’s basement apartment. Mom continues to be optimistic and avoid acknowledging the possibility of death. Frustrated and needing to hear a realistic prognosis, Zora uses her art to show her mother the truth of how ill she looks. Later that night her mom dies—and Zora’s Voom goes away. When Grandma Wren disappoints Frankie on her seventh birthday, Zora’s guilt-fueled anger erupts. Over Frankie’s protests, Zora scribbles out her drawings until the scribbles fight back, pulling the girls into Pencilvania, a world where each of Zora’s creations lives. Most of her now-animated drawings welcome her—except for one scribbled-out horse who kidnaps Frankie. Guided by a seven-legged horse, the Zoracle (a composite of her early self-portraits), and other charming creations, Zora sets out to rescue Frankie and rediscover the wellspring of creativity that forms her mother’s legacy. Presumed White, the humans are well rounded and believable. Pencilvania’s inhabitants, conceived with humorous, metafictional whimsy, are enlivened with copious, inventive illustrations.
A vibrant celebration of art’s power to console and heal. (Fiction. 8-12)Pub Date: Oct. 5, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-72821-590-7
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Sourcebooks Young Readers
Review Posted Online: Aug. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 1, 2021
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