Primarily a setup for subsequent novels, but the boy-dragon duo makes this an admirable tale all its own.
In this opening of Halloran’s (Trial of the Dragon, 2016, etc.) latest YA fantasy series, a teen in a post-apocalyptic world endures totalitarian rulers and bonds with a dragon like no other.
After a nuclear war killed billions, a group called the Dominion took control. Thirteen-year-old Gabe lives in a city called Newton, which is actually a former hospital complex. This keeps civilians safe from wild dragons outside the walls. Children, in fact, are restricted from ever leaving Newton, but this doesn’t stop Gabe from trailing his father Saul’s dragon-hunting party. Though the men manage to slay a dragon and Gabe even helps, some declare the teen’s surprise presence a curse that caused the death of a few hunters. Saul salvages the dragon’s eggs, and Gabe later spots a leftover one that differs from the rest in color and size. The dragon that ultimately hatches is likewise unique, a runt Gabe names Squawk and who, because the boy is the first to touch the egg, bonds with him. Unfortunately, dragons in the compound are meant to bond with Dominion members, not lowly citizens. Now Gabe’s under the watchful eye of the Count, the Dominion’s chief enforcer, a woman who mercilessly wields Newton’s sole gun. He has good reason to fear for his well-being, and likely Squawk’s as well. Halloran’s story is a worthy start to his series, introducing curious elements such as the devastating war and someone inciting the Dominion by incessantly painting “NA” on Newton’s walls. Details come much later, but only enough to tease future books. Though the narrative’s simple, characters’ relationships are gleefully complex. The Count, for example, goes from viciously meting out punishment to behaving almost maternally toward Gabe. Mandy, too, the Dominion member who adopts Squawk (naming him Toby), seems romantically interested in Gabe, while he tries convincing her that the dragon responds to her commands. The boy’s link to his dragon is endearing, much more than an owner-pet connection, as Gabe essentially communicates with Squawk telepathically. The teen, meanwhile, suffers a good deal of maltreatment, but his steady resolve steers the story clear of inordinate bleakness.
Primarily a setup for subsequent novels, but the boy-dragon duo makes this an admirable tale all its own.Pub Date: Feb. 10, 2017
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: 297
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Dec. 16, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Characters flip between bottomless self-regard and pitiless self-loathing while, as late as the second-to-last chapter, yet...
Four Chicago sisters anchor a sharp, sly family story of feminine guile and guilt.
Newcomer Lombardo brews all seven deadly sins into a fun and brimming tale of an unapologetically bougie couple and their unruly daughters. In the opening scene, Liza Sorenson, daughter No. 3, flirts with a groomsman at her sister’s wedding. “There’s four of you?” he asked. “What’s that like?” Her retort: “It’s a vast hormonal hellscape. A marathon of instability and hair products.” Thus begins a story bristling with a particular kind of female intel. When Wendy, the oldest, sets her sights on a mate, she “made sure she left her mark throughout his house—soy milk in the fridge, box of tampons under the sink, surreptitious spritzes of her Bulgari musk on the sheets.” Turbulent Wendy is the novel’s best character, exuding a delectable bratty-ness. The parents—Marilyn, all pluck and busy optimism, and David, a genial family doctor—strike their offspring as impossibly happy. Lombardo levels this vision by interspersing chapters of the Sorenson parents’ early lean times with chapters about their daughters’ wobbly forays into adulthood. The central story unfurls over a single event-choked year, begun by Wendy, who unlatches a closed adoption and springs on her family the boy her stuffy married sister, Violet, gave away 15 years earlier. (The sisters improbably kept David and Marilyn clueless with a phony study-abroad scheme.) Into this churn, Lombardo adds cancer, infidelity, a heart attack, another unplanned pregnancy, a stillbirth, and an office crush for David. Meanwhile, youngest daughter Grace perpetrates a whopper, and “every day the lie was growing like mold, furring her judgment.” The writing here is silky, if occasionally overwrought. Still, the deft touches—a neighborhood fundraiser for a Little Free Library, a Twilight character as erotic touchstone—delight. The class calibrations are divine even as the utter apolitical whiteness of the Sorenson world becomes hard to fathom.
Characters flip between bottomless self-regard and pitiless self-loathing while, as late as the second-to-last chapter, yet another pleasurable tendril of sisterly malice uncurls.Pub Date: June 25, 2019
ISBN: 978-0-385-54425-2
Page Count: 544
Publisher: Doubleday
Review Posted Online: March 3, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2019
SEEN & HEARD
Dark and unsettling, this novel’s end arrives abruptly even as readers are still moving at a breakneck speed.
Ten years after her teenage daughter went missing, a mother begins a new relationship only to discover she can't truly move on until she answers lingering questions about the past.
Laurel Mack’s life stopped in many ways the day her 15-year-old daughter, Ellie, left the house to study at the library and never returned. She drifted away from her other two children, Hanna and Jake, and eventually she and her husband, Paul, divorced. Ten years later, Ellie’s remains and her backpack are found, though the police are unable to determine the reasons for her disappearance and death. After Ellie’s funeral, Laurel begins a relationship with Floyd, a man she meets in a cafe. She's disarmed by Floyd’s charm, but when she meets his young daughter, Poppy, Laurel is startled by her resemblance to Ellie. As the novel progresses, Laurel becomes increasingly determined to learn what happened to Ellie, especially after discovering an odd connection between Poppy’s mother and her daughter even as her relationship with Floyd is becoming more serious. Jewell’s (I Found You, 2017, etc.) latest thriller moves at a brisk pace even as she plays with narrative structure: The book is split into three sections, including a first one which alternates chapters between the time of Ellie’s disappearance and the present and a second section that begins as Laurel and Floyd meet. Both of these sections primarily focus on Laurel. In the third section, Jewell alternates narrators and moments in time: The narrator switches to alternating first-person points of view (told by Poppy’s mother and Floyd) interspersed with third-person narration of Ellie’s experiences and Laurel’s discoveries in the present. All of these devices serve to build palpable tension, but the structure also contributes to how deeply disturbing the story becomes. At times, the characters and the emotional core of the events are almost obscured by such quick maneuvering through the weighty plot.
Dark and unsettling, this novel’s end arrives abruptly even as readers are still moving at a breakneck speed.Pub Date: April 24, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-5011-5464-5
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: Feb. 5, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2018
© Copyright 2024 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
bookshelf
