An engrossing mystery with a haunting and convincing conclusion.
In the Arab Abbasid caliphate of Harun al-Rashid in Baghdad, 14-year-old Nardeen Baramika seeks revenge on the man responsible for her family’s deaths in this novel from Algeria, translated from Arabic.
Having fallen out of favor, the once-powerful noble Baramika family, who are Muslims of Persian origin, are being hunted down and executed by al-Rashid. But when the caliph’s men discover the family’s new home, Nardeen’s nonpolitical father—a physician and transcriber of medical texts—sends a confused Nardeen outside to safety, promising to follow with the rest of the family. After returning to find Baba, Mama, and her three siblings murdered and branded as Zoroastrian apostates implicated in poisoning the caliph’s cousin, Nardeen is beaten unconscious by a servant of Al-Aasefi, a family friend turned accuser, who’s seeking a manuscript Nardeen saw in Baba’s library. After she comes to in the Bimaristan medical school, Nardeen learns she’s slated to be sold into slavery, but she impresses Muallim Ishaq, a respected and renowned Jewish medical professor, with her strong memory and medical knowledge. The professor, who respected Nardeen’s father and feels sorry for her plight, buys her and helps her prepare to seek vengeance. But as Nardeen grows in knowledge and cunning, she finds herself running out of time to untangle the complicated truth. Morani weaves a compact and compelling tale of revenge, intrigue, and moral ambiguity with a fascinating historical setting.
An engrossing mystery with a haunting and convincing conclusion. (map, glossary, historical notes) (Historical mystery. 13-18)Pub Date: May 7, 2024
ISBN: 9781911107859
Page Count: 140
Publisher: Neem Tree Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 17, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter.
After a Nigerian British girl goes off to an exclusive boarding school that seems to prey on less-privileged students, she discovers there might be some truth behind an urban legend.
Ife Adebola joins the Urban Achievers scholarship program at pricey, high-pressure Nithercott School, arriving shortly after a student called Leon mysteriously disappeared. Gossip says he’s a victim of the glowing-eyed Changing Man who targets the lonely, leaving them changed. Ife doesn’t believe in the myth, but amid the stresses of Nithercott’s competitive, privileged, majority-white environment, where she is constantly reminded of her state school background, she does miss her friends and family. When Malika, a fellow Black scholarship student, disappears and then returns, acting strangely devoid of personality, Ife worries the Changing Man is real—and that she’s next. Ife joins forces with classmate Bijal and Benny, Leon’s younger brother, to uncover the truth about who the Changing Man is and what he wants. Culminating in a detailed, gory, and extended climactic battle, this verbose thriller tempts readers with a nefarious mystery involving racial and class-based violence but never quite lives up to its potential and peters out thematically by its explosive finale. However, this debut offers highly visually evocative and eerie descriptions of characters and events and will appeal to fans of creature horror, social commentary, and dark academia.
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9781250868138
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: June 8, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
Entertaining, heartfelt, and suspenseful: a superb addition to a beloved series.
Eighteen-year-old sleuth Stevie Bell is back to investigate another mystery in this stand-alone addition to the Truly Devious series.
Stevie is nursing a broken heart following her recent split from boyfriend David. Fed up with her parents’ lack of understanding and support—they regard her interest in solving murders as “creepy” and “weird”—she announces that she’s not coming home for Christmas. But now she’s at a loose end; spending winter break “alone on murder mountain” at Ellingham Academy, her Vermont boarding school, doesn’t seem ideal. So when the opportunity arises to accompany her close friend Nate to New York City, she willingly agrees. The third-person chapters switch between Stevie’s contemporary experience among a group of eccentric, often-clashing residents of a Manhattan apartment building and a young woman named Blue who becomes entangled in a cult in the 1970s. A trail of clues is laid that Stevie can’t resist following. Readers will be kept guessing how the intertwining storylines fit together until the very end. The novel expands to explore Stevie’s relationships and growth, including her ongoing management of her anxiety disorder. The marvelously clever dialogue, abundance of heart, and witty, memorable, and well-rounded cast elevate this beyond standard mystery fare. Both timelines establish the New York City setting as its own character. Stevie and Blue read white.
Entertaining, heartfelt, and suspenseful: a superb addition to a beloved series. (map) (Mystery. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2026
ISBN: 9780063256019
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2026
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