Next book

SISTERS' FATE

From the Cahill Witch Chronicles series , Vol. 3

The riveting, ambitious plot and strong, moral-yet-fallible heroine are a winning combination.

Tensions between the Brotherhood and the Sisterhood, complicated by a prophecy, come to a head in the Cahill Witch Chronicles trilogy’s conclusion.

Immediately following the events of Star Cursed (2013), Cate Cahill’s devastated. While she was liberating Harwood Asylum’s prisoners, the more aggressive Sisterhood faction succeeded in their devastating mind-magic attacks on the Brotherhood’s leadership. Worse, Cate’s own sister, in the name of protecting the Sisterhood, erased Finn’s memories of Cate. Additionally, Cate’s revealed to Maura that Tess is the prophesied oracle, a betrayal of her own. The sisters are just as fractured as the Sisterhood, now led by the Machiavellian Sister Inez, a compellingly rational villain. The Brotherhood’s in flux too, and the power vacuum produces a leader as ruthless as Inez. Inez is willing to sacrifice pawns (especially non-Sisterhood and nonwitch ones) to protect the Sisterhood (and her rule)—and the Brotherhood’s only too happy to help. Meanwhile, Cate makes contact with members of the actual Resistance—including a fugitive journalist—who are chiefly interested in promoting the common man, also oppressed by the Brotherhood. The alliance is timely; a terrible plague starts slipping through the city, and class distinctions greatly affect treatment. The tinderbox of oppression and power struggles create sparks enough for an explosive ending. Actions have real consequences, and the sisters’ believable dynamic leading up to the fulfillment of the prophecy is dead-on.

The riveting, ambitious plot and strong, moral-yet-fallible heroine are a winning combination. (Fantasy. 12 & up)

Pub Date: Aug. 14, 2014

ISBN: 978-0-399-257476

Page Count: 368

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: June 9, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2014

Awards & Accolades

Likes

  • Readers Vote
  • 44


Our Verdict

  • Our Verdict
  • GET IT


  • Kirkus Reviews'
    Best Books Of 2014


  • New York Times Bestseller

Next book

WE WERE LIARS

From the We Were Liars series

Riveting, brutal and beautifully told.

Awards & Accolades

Likes

  • Readers Vote
  • 44


Our Verdict

  • Our Verdict
  • GET IT


  • Kirkus Reviews'
    Best Books Of 2014


  • New York Times Bestseller

A devastating tale of greed and secrets springs from the summer that tore Cady’s life apart.

Cady Sinclair’s family uses its inherited wealth to ensure that each successive generation is blond, beautiful and powerful. Reunited each summer by the family patriarch on his private island, his three adult daughters and various grandchildren lead charmed, fairy-tale lives (an idea reinforced by the periodic inclusions of Cady’s reworkings of fairy tales to tell the Sinclair family story). But this is no sanitized, modern Disney fairy tale; this is Cinderella with her stepsisters’ slashed heels in bloody glass slippers. Cady’s fairy-tale retellings are dark, as is the personal tragedy that has led to her examination of the skeletons in the Sinclair castle’s closets; its rent turns out to be extracted in personal sacrifices. Brilliantly, Lockhart resists simply crucifying the Sinclairs, which might make the family’s foreshadowed tragedy predictable or even satisfying. Instead, she humanizes them (and their painful contradictions) by including nostalgic images that showcase the love shared among Cady, her two cousins closest in age, and Gat, the Heathcliff-esque figure she has always loved. Though increasingly disenchanted with the Sinclair legacy of self-absorption, the four believe family redemption is possible—if they have the courage to act. Their sincere hopes and foolish naïveté make the teens’ desperate, grand gesture all that much more tragic.

Riveting, brutal and beautifully told. (Fiction. 14 & up)

Pub Date: May 13, 2014

ISBN: 978-0-385-74126-2

Page Count: 240

Publisher: Delacorte

Review Posted Online: March 16, 2014

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2014

Next book

INDIVISIBLE

An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away.

A Mexican American boy takes on heavy responsibilities when his family is torn apart.

Mateo’s life is turned upside down the day U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents show up unsuccessfully seeking his Pa at his New York City bodega. The Garcias live in fear until the day both parents are picked up; his Pa is taken to jail and his Ma to a detention center. The adults around Mateo offer support to him and his 7-year-old sister, Sophie, however, he knows he is now responsible for caring for her and the bodega as well as trying to survive junior year—that is, if he wants to fulfill his dream to enter the drama program at the Tisch School of the Arts and become an actor. Mateo’s relationships with his friends Kimmie and Adam (a potential love interest) also suffer repercussions as he keeps his situation a secret. Kimmie is half Korean (her other half is unspecified) and Adam is Italian American; Mateo feels disconnected from them, less American, and with worries they can’t understand. He talks himself out of choosing a safer course of action, a decision that deepens the story. Mateo’s self-awareness and inner monologue at times make him seem older than 16, and, with significant turmoil in the main plot, some side elements feel underdeveloped. Aleman’s narrative joins the ranks of heart-wrenching stories of migrant families who have been separated.

An ode to the children of migrants who have been taken away. (Fiction. 14-18)

Pub Date: May 4, 2021

ISBN: 978-0-7595-5605-8

Page Count: 400

Publisher: Little, Brown

Review Posted Online: Feb. 22, 2021

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2021

Close Quickview