Mulan with dragons for added fun: Be prepared to break out into “I’ll Make a Man out of You.” (Fantasy. 13-16)
War has come to the country of Ylanda.
The northern nomads have breached the border, and each family must send one male to fight. Seeking to protect her twin brother, Storm, disabled by a childhood illness, Rain adopts his identity—even though discovery would mean death for her and dishonor for her family. Having trained in the art of Neshu fighting with her father, Rain is confident about battle, but the practical matter of hiding her female body remains. She consults Madam S’dora for something to make her periods stop, even dragon magic. Like most, Rain believes dragons are the stuff of legend, but when she-king dragon Nuaga begins to visit her dreams, Rain recognizes not only that dragons are real, but that they offer hope for winning the war. While the premise is nothing new, solo debut author Boehme makes the story exciting: The world is well thought out, and the dragons are distinctive, with clear rules for magic that will draw readers in. The northern nomads and their leader, Tan Vey, are more a faceless evil than fully developed in their own rights, but the main characters are strong and well rounded, and readers will feel invested in their survival. Characters are described as having olive or golden skin and dark hair.
Mulan with dragons for added fun: Be prepared to break out into “I’ll Make a Man out of You.” (Fantasy. 13-16)Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2019
ISBN: 978-1-250-29888-1
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Tor Teen
Review Posted Online: June 17, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
The frequent shifts make it hard to keep track of who’s where in this dizzying debut, but Ephraim’s ability to see past the...
A spin through parallel universes schools a teenager in the hazards of making wishes.
Ephraim comes home one day to find his troubled mother in the midst of a suicide attempt—having just, she claims, viewed his body in the morgue. More puzzling still, among the corpse’s effects is a strange-looking quarter. When prompted by a mysterious note in his school locker, he tries making a wish on it, and, to his amazement, his mother is suddenly out of the hospital with no memory of the day before. Complications ensue as further wishes hook him up with classmate Jena but also ring in other, unexpected and increasingly disturbing changes. Horrified to learn at last that the coin is actually a mentally controlled part of a device for traveling among alternate realities, that each “quantum shift” he makes forcibly switches him with an analog of himself and that the rest of the device is in the hands of a casually violent version of (in his universe) his best friend Nathan, Ephraim sets out to make amends. Ephraim’s strategy of returning all of his displaced analogs to their original planes simply by retracing his travels doesn’t hold water (you can’t go home again when every change from quantum events up spawns a new reality), but by the end he’s earned the self-confidence to make fresh starts with both mother and girlfriend.
The frequent shifts make it hard to keep track of who’s where in this dizzying debut, but Ephraim’s ability to see past the temptations of power despite an active teen libido provides him with a sturdy moral base. (Science fiction. 13-16)Pub Date: March 1, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-61614-609-2
Page Count: 290
Publisher: Pyr/Prometheus Books
Review Posted Online: Jan. 17, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2012
Nasty Prince Henry of the Seelie Court has come to Avalon, the city caught between the human realm and Faerie, to invite...
At last, Dana meets a Fae boy who doesn't want to sleep with her in this third in the Faeriewalker series, which began with Glimmerglass (2010).
Nasty Prince Henry of the Seelie Court has come to Avalon, the city caught between the human realm and Faerie, to invite half-human Dana to be formally presented at Court. Dana and her father are sure there's a deeper game at play—don't both Fae queens want Dana dead because of her dangerous Faeriewalker powers?—but she has no choice but to obey the summons. The journey from the incongruously modern Avalon (why do Faeries celebrate Christmas?) to the Seelie Court is chock-full of all the necessary adventures, from monster attacks to opportunities for heroic self-sacrifice. Dana finally exercises both her magical powers and her intelligence in order to help herself and her friends. And of course, there's plenty of opportunity for chest thumping among her various suitors. Dana's youthful narrative style can be disconcertingly at odds with the steaminess she describes ("I was smushed up against him… [and] painfully aware that he, uh, enjoyed having me there"); this realistic teen heroine has an occasionally bumpy meeting with romance conventions. But Dana's grim-but-hopeful interactions with her alcoholic mother ground this urban fantasy in a welcome verisimilitude.Pub Date: July 5, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-312-57595-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2011
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
