An uncomplicated fantasy plot allows a remarkable world and vibrant characters to shine.
A blind woman grows close to a demon as she helps him evade a wizard’s control in Scherzinger’s (The Henna Witch, 2019, etc.) fantasy novel.
In the imperial city of Abbysin, wizard Rovinkar convinces Imperial Chancellor Chenli Menthra that he, Rovinkar, can destroy the impenetrable Black Gate. This barrier may be the only thing preventing the Abbysin Empire from conquering other lands. Rovinkar summons an elemental demon to destroy the gate, but when he momentarily loses control, the demon escapes. The demon ultimately encounters Cerra, a woman who lost her eyesight when she was a child. Cerra sees the demon as a man “in her mind’s eye,” which seemingly breaks the demon from Rovinkar’s spell. The wizard hears of Cerra’s apparent powers and sends a mercenary after her. The demon, meanwhile, wants to find Rovinkar to ensure that he’s completely free of the wizard’s hold and won’t return to the black Void, where he’d resided for an immeasurable time. The demon takes Cerra with him on a journey to Abbysin, along with Cerra’s trusty horse, Sugar, and cat, Kamir. The woman and demon bond during their trek, but later, someone, or something, manages to separate them. Scherzinger deftly combines detailed worldbuilding with a simple story that’s centered on a mere handful of characters. Cerra is an exceptional protagonist; although she has clear superpowers, such as a telepathic link with the demon, they’re largely kept ambiguous. In fact, in one instance, Rovinkar is fearful of a power that readers already know that Cerra doesn’t have (and that, hilariously, involves her cat). The narrative also revels in pithy but vivid descriptions of the environment: “The passing of the great wave roiled the loose silts of the riverbed and boiled the water with great gulps of air shoved into the depths.”
An uncomplicated fantasy plot allows a remarkable world and vibrant characters to shine.Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-73246-843-6
Page Count: 446
Publisher: Blue Rune Publications
Review Posted Online: Jan. 30, 2020
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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