An agreeable, slow-burning high-fantasy tale.
An orphaned girl joins a male-only magical sect in Patrick’s fantasy novel.
Twelve-year-old Arien has grown up in a small village orphanage. She knows nothing of a Seer’s prophecy when she was born, which foretold the end of her father’s bloodline and prompted her mother to spirit her away. Arien does know that she’s different from other kids, as she hears thoughts and can sense other people’s emotions. When Master Petro of the Brotherhood of Power offers to train her in the use of her abilities, she sees a chance to fit in, at last, and gain a surrogate family. But the Brotherhood is an order that’s made up of only boys and men. Even after Petro successfully argues for her inclusion, he and Arien must live apart from the other members of the group. Seven years go by, and Arien undergoes the trial to become a “Brother.” She later accompanies Petro to the court of King Mendel of Hamlin, where Petro is to be Mendel’s adviser; meanwhile, Arien is sent on a covert diplomatic mission. Will she succeed in ferreting out hostile intentions in the neighboring kingdom, or will her past catch up with her and bring ruin upon two lands? Patrick writes in a close third-person perspective involving many characters, offering a multifaceted but homogeneous narrative voice. The story moves slowly at first, avoiding contrived peril and instead slowly leading readers toward the larger, inescapable danger noted in the prologue. Arien and company will be recognizable types for fans of the genre, and many plot points have a similarly comfortable familiarity. Still, Patrick sometimes subverts genre tropes by, for example, forgoing an expected betrayal. These subversions are subtle but pleasing elements, as is the fact that the book is a stand-alone story instead of the start of a series. The author also demonstrates a good measure of restraint regarding sex and violence, presenting readers with a wholesome alternative to George R.R. Martin and other dark-fantasy writers.
An agreeable, slow-burning high-fantasy tale.Pub Date: Oct. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-937671-44-0
Page Count: 371
Publisher: Next Step Books
Review Posted Online: Sept. 5, 2019
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.
Sisters work together to solve a child-abandonment case.
Ellie and Julia Cates have never been close. Julia is shy and brainy; Ellie gets by on charm and looks. Their differences must be tossed aside when a traumatized young girl wanders in from the forest into their hometown in Washington. The sisters’ professional skills are put to the test. Julia is a world-renowned child psychologist who has lost her edge. She is reeling from a case that went publicly sour. Though she was cleared of all wrongdoing, Julia’s name was tarnished, forcing her to shutter her Beverly Hills practice. Ellie Barton is the local police chief in Rain Valley, who’s never faced a tougher case. This is her chance to prove she is more than just a fading homecoming queen, but a scarcity of clues and a reluctant victim make locating the girl’s parents nearly impossible. Ellie places an SOS call to her sister; she needs an expert to rehabilitate this wild-child who has been living outside of civilization for years. Confronted with her professional demons, Julia once again has the opportunity to display her talents and salvage her reputation. Hannah (The Things We Do for Love, 2004, etc.) is at her best when writing from the girl’s perspective. The feral wolf-child keeps the reader interested long after the other, transparent characters have grown tiresome. Hannah’s torturously over-written romance passages are stale, but there are surprises in store as the sisters set about unearthing Alice’s past and creating a home for her.
Wacky plot keeps the pages turning and enduring schmaltzy romantic sequences.Pub Date: March 1, 2006
ISBN: 0-345-46752-3
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2005
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.
A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.
"Nobody big except me" is the dream world of Holden Caulfield and his first person story is down to the basic, drab English of the pre-collegiate. For Holden is now being bounced from fancy prep, and, after a vicious evening with hall- and roommates, heads for New York to try to keep his latest failure from his parents. He tries to have a wild evening (all he does is pay the check), is terrorized by the hotel elevator man and his on-call whore, has a date with a girl he likes—and hates, sees his 10 year old sister, Phoebe. He also visits a sympathetic English teacher after trying on a drunken session, and when he keeps his date with Phoebe, who turns up with her suitcase to join him on his flight, he heads home to a hospital siege. This is tender and true, and impossible, in its picture of the old hells of young boys, the lonesomeness and tentative attempts to be mature and secure, the awful block between youth and being grown-up, the fright and sickness that humans and their behavior cause the challenging, the dramatization of the big bang. It is a sorry little worm's view of the off-beat of adult pressure, of contemporary strictures and conformity, of sentiment….
A strict report, worthy of sympathy.Pub Date: June 15, 1951
ISBN: 0316769177
Page Count: -
Publisher: Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: Nov. 2, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 1951
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