Touching on family relationships, grieving, growing up, first romance, and Norse mythology, this is an exciting fantasy with...
On the cusp of her 13th birthday, reluctant siren-in-training Lorelei Salt, who soon will be joining her sisters in luring ships to their dooms with their glorious singing, finds herself responsible for destroying the Sea Witch’s curse and saving her sisters’ lives in this debut novel set in present-day Maine.
Lolly’s mother, a member of the Penobscot nation, recently died in an accident, and her Jewish father is unmoored in his grief, playing his folk songs late at night and living in the apartment above the family’s diner while the girls manage on their own. When not in school or running the diner, Lolly’s three beautiful older sisters are under the control of the Sea Witch, a centuries-old outsider from Barbados who calls the girls to wreck ships. Lolly contends not only with a mean girl and a budding romance, but also with the bright green scales swirling up her legs and her hair turning platinum. When her best friend’s bullying, racist stepfather captures her sisters in nets, Lolly discovers why they have traded their souls and attempts to reverse the curse—at great expense to herself. Purposeful messages for inclusion and against stereotyping are scattered throughout.
Touching on family relationships, grieving, growing up, first romance, and Norse mythology, this is an exciting fantasy with a heart-stopping ending by an author to watch. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: Jan. 3, 2017
ISBN: 978-1-4814-6686-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Aladdin
Review Posted Online: Oct. 10, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious.
If you made a recording to be heard by the aliens who found the iPod, what would you record?
For 11-year-old Alex Petroski, it's easy. He records everything. He records the story of how he travels to New Mexico to a rocket festival with his dog, Carl Sagan, and his rocket. He records finding out that a man with the same name and birthday as his dead father has an address in Las Vegas. He records eating at Johnny Rockets for the first time with his new friends, who are giving him a ride to find his dead father (who might not be dead!), and losing Carl Sagan in the wilds of Las Vegas, and discovering he has a half sister. He even records his own awful accident. Cheng delivers a sweet, soulful debut novel with a brilliant, refreshing structure. His characters manage to come alive through the “transcript” of Alex’s iPod recording, an odd medium that sounds like it would be confusing but really works. Taking inspiration from the Voyager Golden Record released to space in 1977, Alex, who explains he has “light brown skin,” records all the important moments of a journey that takes him from a family of two to a family of plenty.
Riveting, inspiring, and sometimes hilarious. (Fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Feb. 28, 2017
ISBN: 978-0-399-18637-0
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Dial Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 18, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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