Futuristic and atmospheric high-stakes climate fiction with an intriguing premise and character arcs.
In a claustrophobic and unsettling underwater dystopia in the year 2089, the world’s green energy depends entirely on ProCorp’s deepwater mining of bacteria.
Three teens from very different backgrounds find their lives intersecting at Green Valley Sumac, one of the vast Subsurface Mining and Colonization Stations located deep within the Kermadec Trench near New Zealand. In the abyssal zone, society is divided into distinct groups, including miners, engineers, and scientists, creating artificial barriers that mirror real-world inequalities. Maia Maxon, an ambitious, wealthy 16-year-old engineer, is a new arrival at the station. Betty Styles, who’s also 16 and Maia’s highly experienced guide, is a Digger from a lower-class mining family who can’t escape the station’s rigid social hierarchy. Eighteen-year-old biologist Audley McVeigh has suspicions about ProCorp’s operations that may threaten his safety and future. Debut author Read’s worldbuilding is vividly realized, with bloated sea creatures, failing ecosystems, and fish-themed humor adding both atmosphere and unease. The result is a constant sense of anxiety and confinement coupled with an urgency associated with survival stories and environmental horror. The rotating perspectives of Maia, Betty, and Audley, who present white, provide insight into the station’s complex social structure while highlighting themes of trust, resilience, friendship, and corporate greed. This series opener resolves some mysteries surrounding recent mining accidents, and the plot steadily builds tension, culminating in a cliffhanger ending.
Futuristic and atmospheric high-stakes climate fiction with an intriguing premise and character arcs. (Science fiction thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2026
ISBN: 9780571390526
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Faber & Faber
Review Posted Online: July 6, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: today
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
Black is building a complex mythology; now is a great time to tune in.
Black is back with another dark tale of Faerie, this one set in Faerie and launching a new trilogy.
Jude—broken, rebuilt, fueled by anger and a sense of powerlessness—has never recovered from watching her adoptive Faerie father murder her parents. Human Jude (whose brown hair curls and whose skin color is never described) both hates and loves Madoc, whose murderous nature is true to his Faerie self and who in his way loves her. Brought up among the Gentry, Jude has never felt at ease, but after a decade, Faerie has become her home despite the constant peril. Black’s latest looks at nature and nurture and spins a tale of court intrigue, bloodshed, and a truly messed-up relationship that might be the saving of Jude and the titular prince, who, like Jude, has been shaped by the cruelties of others. Fierce and observant Jude is utterly unaware of the currents that swirl around her. She fights, plots, even murders enemies, but she must also navigate her relationship with her complex family (human, Faerie, and mixed). This is a heady blend of Faerie lore, high fantasy, and high school drama, dripping with description that brings the dangerous but tempting world of Faerie to life.
Black is building a complex mythology; now is a great time to tune in. (Fantasy. 14-adult)Pub Date: Jan. 2, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-316-31027-7
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Sept. 25, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2017
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