An enjoyable, if rather leisurely, tale of Traveler life.
A college graduate reunites with his Traveler friends in Gallagher’s sequel to Lowlands (2017).
It’s been seven years since James Ward had any contact with the Dragons, an itinerant group of Travelers with Irish and British roots. He’d initially befriended them as a high schooler in New York City; now out of college, he hears from Vivien Widdershins, the Dragons’ queen. With no job prospects, James heads to Pennsylvania where the Travelers have taken up residence. He makes himself comfortable at their wooded settlement, which he dubs “Dragon Town,” but the person whom he’s most excited to see is at another nearby tribe’s encampment: Cornelia Parsons, who’s around the same age as him and was the first Traveler he met, all those years ago. As days become weeks, James helps with laundry and landscaping but he’s rather lacking at other jobs that require manual labor, such as woodwork and repair. He spends most of his time contemplating his future. He’s sure that his classics degree won’t lead to a viable career, so he seriously considers Vivien’s offer to be the Dragons’ exclusive solicitor. A permanent home with the Travelers wouldn’t be so bad; he has a fondness for their way of life, and others already think of him and Cornelia as an “item.” Before he can make a decision, though, a sudden police raid leads to the shocking deaths of two tribe members. The Dragons are distraught and worried, as there’s a possibility that one of their enemies made a false report of drug activity that led to the raid.
Gallagher delivers a winsome portrayal of Travelers in this second series installment. The Dragons are shown to display a natural kindness and welcome James into their community. Although the story centers on Dragon Town, there are some signs of discrimination from outsiders, despite the fact that Travelers do their best to keep mostly to themselves. However, the story often feels stagnant; James is essentially on vacation, and as a result, there’s minimal action. Readers may find the protagonist’s lackadaisical attitude off-putting; he boasts of a near-full-ride scholarship and being debt free, but he also deems his college major impractical without even bothering to look for work. Still, James at least appreciates his leisure, as aptly expressed in Gallagher’s unadorned prose: “I was always glad for a day’s rain or an afternoon’s downpour, to take the time to doze and listen to the heavy drops. Not to exaggerate; they didn’t work me all that hard. But it wasn’t the life I was used to.” Dragon Town, nevertheless, isn’t completely uneventful before the raid; for example, at one point, an unknown dog storms the property and seemingly targets a 4-year-old boy. In a more comical turn, James joins a Traveler to collect an overdue bill—which, in practice, necessitates stealing something of equal or lesser value. The startling deaths unsurprisingly send the plot in a new direction in later sections, which include time jumps and a clear setup for another installment.
An enjoyable, if rather leisurely, tale of Traveler life.Pub Date: May 25, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-60489-276-5
Page Count: 236
Publisher: Livingston Press
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2021
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.
A love story about a life of second chances.
In Nassau, in the Bahamas, casino detective Vincent LaPorta grills Alfie Logan, who’d come up a winner three times in a row at the roulette table and walked away with $2 million. “How did you do it?” asks the detective. Alfie calmly denies cheating. You wired all the money to a Gianna Rule, LaPorta says. Why? To explain, Alfie produces a composition book with the words “For the Boss, to Be Read Upon My Death” written on the cover. Read this for answers, Alfie suggests, calling it a love story. His mother had passed along to him a strange trait: He can say “Twice!” and go back to a specific time and place to have a do-over. But it only works once for any particular moment, and then he must live with the new consequences. He can only do this for himself and can’t prevent anyone from dying. Alfie regularly uses his power—failing to impress a girl the first time, he finds out more about her, goes back in time, and presto! She likes him. The premise is of course not credible—LaPorta doesn’t buy it either—but it’s intriguing. Most people would probably love to go back and unsay something. The story’s focus is on Alfie’s love for Gianna and whether it’s requited, unrequited, or both. In any case, he’s obsessed with her. He’s a good man, though, an intelligent person with ordinary human failings and a solid moral compass. Albom writes in a warm, easy style that transports the reader to a world of second chances and what-ifs, where spirituality lies close to the surface but never intrudes on the story. Though a cynic will call it sappy, anyone who is sick to their core from the daily news will enjoy this escape from reality.
Have tissues ready as you read this. A small package will do.Pub Date: Oct. 7, 2025
ISBN: 9780062406682
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.
A year in the life of the No. 2 boarding school in America—up from No. 19 last year!
Rumors of Hilderbrand’s retirement were greatly exaggerated, it turns out, since not only has she not gone out to pasture, she’s started over in high school, with her daughter Shelby Cunningham as co-author. As their delicious new book opens, it’s Move-In Day at Tiffin Academy, and Head of School Audre Robinson is warmly welcoming the returning and new students to the New England campus, the latter group including a rare midstream addition to the junior class. Brainiac Charley Hicks is transferring from public school in Maryland to a spot that opened up when one of the school’s most beloved students died by suicide the preceding year. She will be joining a large, diverse cast of adult and teenage characters—queen bees, jealous second-stringers, boozehounds young and old, secret lesbians, people chasing the wrong people chasing other wrong people—all of them royally screwed when an app called Zip Zap appears and starts blasting everyone’s secrets all over campus. How the heck…? Meanwhile, it seems so unlikely that Tiffin has jumped up to the No. 2 spot in the boarding-school rankings that a high-profile magazine launches an investigation, and even the head is worried that there may have been payola involved. The school has a reputation for being more social than academic, and this quality gets an exciting new exclamation point when the resident millionaire bad boy opens a high-style secret speakeasy for select juniors in a forgotten basement. It’s called Priorities. Exactly. One problem: Cinnamon Peters’ mysterious suicide hangs over the book in an odd way, especially since the note she left for her closest male friend is not to be opened for another year—and isn’t. This is surely a setup for a sequel, but it’s a bit frustrating here, and bobs sort of shallowly along amid the general high spirits.
A boarding-school fantasia, with Hilderbrand’s signature upgrades to the cuisine and decor. Sign us up for next term.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9780316567855
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2025
SEEN & HEARD
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