Mystery lovers will be pleased to have this whodunit, which is neither Victoriana nor steampunk
The brilliant daughter of Detective Sgt. Moriarty meets posh Sherlock Holmes, so obviously there will be murders.
Mori's got her hands full putting up with idiots at school, grieving her six-months-dead mum, and protecting her three younger brothers from their alcoholic and abusive father. Not so long ago, her family was happy: her dad spent time being manly with the boys, while Mori learned about martial arts and sleight of hand from her mother. With all that over, Mori has no intention of becoming friends with arrogant classmate Sherlock. Despite her best efforts to stay away from him, though, Mori fails. Both his intelligence and his affection for her are deeply compelling, and that's not to mention how interesting it is to be solving a murder with one of the few clever people she knows. When the crime they're investigating starts hitting too close to home—reminding Mori of her beloved mother's many secrets—she no longer wants Sherlock to be a part of her investigation. The story is set in present-day London and narrated affectingly by Mori. The conclusion leaves space for the fated collapse of the Holmes/Moriarty relationship in later series entries, putting a nice potential twist on the good girl–bad boy trend.
Mystery lovers will be pleased to have this whodunit, which is neither Victoriana nor steampunk . (Mystery. 13-15)Pub Date: Sept. 15, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4814-2303-8
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: June 9, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
What could be interesting worldbuilding drowns in infelicitous prose and inexplicable machinations
Urban fantasy whose original ideas aren't sustained by the overall package.
In this sequel to Lightbringer (2011), Wendy just tries to survive in the complicated dual world she inhabits. She's inherited the duties of a Reaper from her mother, who recently died and then became an evil adversary—in that order. Wendy exists simultaneously in the worlds of the living and the dead, taking care of her siblings in the real world but using her Light to destroy maggoty Walkers in the parallel Never, the world of the dead. When a new and dangerous opponent arises among the dead, Wendy's erstwhile (and deceased) boyfriend, Piotr, navigates the overly complex metaphysics and politics of the Never in an attempt to help her. Meanwhile, Wendy discovers a never-known family of aunts, grandmothers and female cousins, Reapers all, and most definitely not on her side. Realism is not enhanced by Piotr's friends: Lily, who, like the Tiger Lily of Peter Pan for whom she is named, plays generic exotic Indian rather than an individual from an actual tribe, and ghostly flapper Elle, whose Damon Runyon–esque dialogue ("it's the cat's meow to doll up and ritz it up for a night again") feels as forced as Piotr's frequent das and nyets.
What could be interesting worldbuilding drowns in infelicitous prose and inexplicable machinations . (Fantasy. 13-15)Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-61614-632-0
Page Count: 340
Publisher: Pyr/Prometheus Books
Review Posted Online: June 12, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Brynna’s guilt-induced psychosis makes for a page-turner in the spirit of Lois Duncan’s classic I Know What You Did Last...
After the death of her best friend, a high school girl is haunted by something: Whether it’s conscience, ghost or merely human demons is unclear.
When Brynna’s best friend, Erica, drowns, Brynna—who dared Erica into the night swim that led to her death—becomes addicted to drugs and alcohol, culminating in a drunken driving arrest. Now in a new city and at a new school and seeing a court-appointed therapist, Brynna simply wants to skate through school unnoticed. Through no effort of her own, she’s immediately sucked into a clique of gregarious classmates, finding herself with friends and a boyfriend, hopeful despite herself, à la Bella Swan. But Brynna keeps seeing Erica on street corners, reliving the drowning in dreams and receiving text messages from her dead friend. Is she losing her mind? Is someone from her old town tormenting her? Or worse, is one of her new friends the source of this torture? So tightly wound is Brynna’s spiral into degenerating paranoia that the frankly ridiculous, scarcely foreshadowed reveal is barely a blip—her increasing terrors are believable and tension-racked. Her happy aftermath is less so, but nobody reads Cooney-style thrillers for the realistic resolution.
Brynna’s guilt-induced psychosis makes for a page-turner in the spirit of Lois Duncan’s classic I Know What You Did Last Summer; it will undoubtedly please the thriller-loving crowd . (Thriller. 13-15)Pub Date: July 1, 2014
ISBN: 978-1-4022-9457-0
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: June 3, 2014
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2014
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