TATTOOED ANGEL

Stacy Goldman and her vampire hunting friends return for more danger in Furlong’s YA fantasy novel.

On the surface, Stacy Goldman is a typical teenager, balancing school, friendships, and the challenges of being the new girl in town. But—fortunately, for the city of Richmond, Virginia—Stacy is no ordinary girl. A genius and a chess master, Stacy has a gift for strategy well beyond her years, a knack she will have to rely on to save the lives of those she loves. A pack of vampires lurks in the shadows of this quaint Virginia town, led by a beautiful and beastly matron named Matilda, who operates in plain sight, posing as her own great-granddaughter and shaping Richmond’s destiny with her influence. Bad as she is, Matilda is only one threat facing Stacy and her friends: Richmond is also a haven for a Hellish entity called The Man with No Face, along with a host of supernatural creatures with allegiances of their own. As police uncover a trail of bodies stripped of their flesh to the very bone, Stacy and her friends must work alongside unfamiliar forces to stop the evil from spreading beyond control. In this installment of the author’s Hidden City series, Stacy evolves from a girl uncertain of her place in the world to a young woman capable of saving it (“The earth itself had guidance for me if I could hear it. If I agreed to release my resistance and allow myself to listen”). Drawing upon her knowledge of chess, Stacy outsmarts her adversaries at every turn while growing in self-confidence and empathy. Though the novel may seem intimidatingly long to some adolescent readers, it is fast-paced and thoroughly spooky, keeping pages turning without excessive gore or sexual content. While readers must suspend disbelief regarding werewolves, shapeshifters, and vampires, the author does a thoughtful job of explaining these phenomena as genetic mutations, lending a touch of realism while advancing the otherworldly plot.

Supernatural scares abound in this suspenseful coming-of-age tale.