A suspenseful, intriguing, and highly original fantasy tale from a promising new author.
Bailey’s debut dark-fantasy novel offers a tale of old grudges, forbidden magic, and gruesome monsters.
As the story opens, the Unified Tribes that rule the lands are fractured, and the many different magical Realms of existence, including the Ethereal Realm and the Soul Realm, are no longer accessible to the denizens of the Terrestrial Realm. A tyrannical chief known as the Sachem has enslaved and slaughtered many innocent people in a reign of terror, with a supposed aim of keeping the peace, while his wife, Jalice, lives in cloistered indulgence in his fortress. Some whisper that the chief has been possessed by a dokojin, an otherworldly demon that feeds off pain. Jalice’s royal decoy, Delilee, and the assassin Annilasia have hatched a plot to kidnap Jalice and use magic to install Delilee in her place as part of a plan to uncover the truth behind the Sachem’s rise to power. But Annilasia gets more than she bargained for as she and Jalice are beset by hitmen, bloodthirsty abominations, and hungry dokojin, while also dealing with their bitter distrust of each other. Is Jalice truly the Sachem’s accomplice, and if so, why are there gaps in her memory? And what awaits them in the Black House, where an infernal bargain was struck many years ago? Overall, Bailey’s story, set in a distinctly non-Western fantasy world with an engaging mix of magic, spiritualism, and post-apocalyptic lore, is a tightly paced and exciting adventure. It occasionally succumbs to common pitfalls of high concept fantasy—namely, an overabundance of in-universe terminology and long-winded prose. However, the author manages to organically reveal important details of the world and its inhabitants along the way, while constantly heightening the stakes for his central characters. The book’s scenes of action and eldritch horror are especially well handled, but its greatest strength is Bailey’s commitment to developing the nuanced cast.
A suspenseful, intriguing, and highly original fantasy tale from a promising new author.Pub Date: Sept. 22, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-73436-161-2
Page Count: 388
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: April 2, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A gruesome yet illuminating coming-of-age story that will keep readers awake night after night.
Grimms’ Fairy Tales meets Mommie Dearest in a twisted debut novel about the complex hungers of mothers and daughters.
Margot, also known as “Little One,” lives with her mama in a homestead in the forest. “The people out there, Little One, they will never understand us,” her mother tells her. “We aren’t like them. We’re woven from different cloth.” Margot’s mama takes in “strays,” lost souls who don’t have homes, inviting them in, warming them, plying them with tea and blankets—before roasting them with potatoes or crisping them in butter and rosemary from the garden. Tied to her mother by both fear and a fierce love, Margot learns from the older woman’s hunger until it becomes her own. “Her story had to be mine,” Margot muses about a beautiful stray she encounters on her walk home from school. “I wanted to plant those eyes of hers like the pit of a fruit tree in my stomach.” But Margot slowly realizes that things that seem to satiate her mother’s hunger never quite satisfy her, and her own ache for contact with the outside world leads her to develop bonds with a kindly school bus driver and a classmate named Abbie. The question remains, though, whether these relationships will be able to fill the ache she feels. After all, Margot tells readers she was raised not on breast or bottle, but on blood. One day, Eden, a beautiful stranger, appears in the midst of a snowstorm, changing Margot’s and her mother’s lives forever. The rich, almost unguent prose carries the story through its gruesome developments without, surprisingly, being gratuitous, as it digs deep into the viscera of the complicated relationships between mothers and daughters, lovers, and one’s own physical and emotional hungers.
A gruesome yet illuminating coming-of-age story that will keep readers awake night after night.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2025
ISBN: 9780063374607
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2025
Aggressively formulaic yet still appealing in its own way.
Humans have a series of eventful encounters with powerful creatures who maintain a very stringent set of rules.
Across the river from the mundane human towns lies the Isle of Wyrd, inhabited by the magical beings known as the Arcana, who will, for the right price, read your future and offer you the possibility of changing your fate. It can be a refuge for the vulnerable but a deadly danger to the reckless and unprepared. Changing your fate can involve physical transformation and transportation to all kinds of odd locations, and both are directly shaped by what you say or intend. An author escaping her abusive fiancé, a pair of brutally selfish but well-connected brothers, a pack of teenage bullies and their kind-hearted potential victim, a college professor whose obsessive quest for knowledge overpowers his courtesy and common sense, and a police detective who yearns to understand the truth about herself all get what they deserve by setting foot on the island. Although a lot happens, there isn’t a solid throughline of plot; this first in a series is clearly more about explaining the world, introducing the characters, and setting the stage for future books. Yes, multiple people face perils, but because of well-equipped allies and good planning, the bad guys don’t really stand a chance. There’s also no climactic confrontation between most of the bad guys and their slated victims; the majority receive their comeuppances by magically guided misfortune, the catastrophic consequences of disobeying the rules, or a minor character hired by the good guys. As noted at the launch of her previous series (Lake Silence, 2018), Bishop has a true gift for remixing the same plot elements over multiple books and making you like it, somehow. You’re going to get violent, stupid people who, despite multiple warnings, manage to piss off incredibly powerful beings and get shredded, while polite, kind-hearted people will earn those same powerful beings’ friendship and protection.
Aggressively formulaic yet still appealing in its own way.Pub Date: Nov. 11, 2025
ISBN: 9780593954089
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Nov. 8, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
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