An inventive and briskly paced addition to a fantasy saga.
A tireless hero must contend with a sorceress to ensure the gates to a magical world don’t close permanently in this fifth entry of a YA series.
Dan Hillman is once again in the magical realm of Inland. He and his changeling girlfriend, Maggie, have finally located the First Changing Beast, a mysterious being stuck in the Shadowlands lying somewhere between Inland and Outland (the normal world). If Dan can free the beast, the slowly closing gates between the two realms will likely stay open. This is harder than it sounds: Inland sorceress Sister, the mortal who had been swapped years ago for fairy Maggie, is controlling the beast. Dan and Maggie have learned Sister’s “truename,” which can reverse her power over the creature. But Dan first has to decipher the name’s twofold meaning. Recent information indicates Sister and her army are plotting an attack against the Gatekeepers in Gatemoodle. Dan’s worries are compounded when he and a handful of friends hear the wail of the enigmatic Skriker, which means one of them will die. Sadly, following a grim battle, Dan indeed loses a loved one. He consequently makes a decision he knows will entail sacrificing one of his freedoms, but he can’t foresee the devastating loss he will ultimately endure. From the opening pages, there’s a sense of trepidation in Rosegrant’s (Marrowland, 2017, etc.) novel. As the fantasy series has already established Sister and the need to find the beast, Dan and allies are immediately discussing strategy and the impending battle, generating a wealth of suspense. The author likewise aptly describes action involving mythical creatures: “The two ugly giants charged, scything their trees above their heads…kobolds and goblins swarmed behind them in a landslide.” Dan is a sympathetic protagonist; his genuine connection to so many individuals, including pals in Outland, should have readers sharing his fear for the Skriker’s destined victim. The ending packs a punch, and though a few more installments are feasible, this book shows signs of the series’ forthcoming conclusion.
An inventive and briskly paced addition to a fantasy saga.Pub Date: June 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-73233-940-8
Page Count: 294
Publisher: Mithril House
Review Posted Online: Aug. 7, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A first novel, this is also a first person account of Scout's (Jean Louise) recall of the years that led to the ending of a mystery, the breaking of her brother Jem's elbow, the death of her father's enemy — and the close of childhood years. A widower, Atticus raises his children with legal dispassion and paternal intelligence, and is ably abetted by Calpurnia, the colored cook, while the Alabama town of Maycomb, in the 1930's, remains aloof to their divergence from its tribal patterns. Scout and Jem, with their summer-time companion, Dill, find their paths free from interference — but not from dangers; their curiosity about the imprisoned Boo, whose miserable past is incorporated in their play, results in a tentative friendliness; their fears of Atticus' lack of distinction is dissipated when he shoots a mad dog; his defense of a Negro accused of raping a white girl, Mayella Ewell, is followed with avid interest and turns the rabble whites against him. Scout is the means of averting an attack on Atticus but when he loses the case it is Boo who saves Jem and Scout by killing Mayella's father when he attempts to murder them. The shadows of a beginning for black-white understanding, the persistent fight that Scout carries on against school, Jem's emergence into adulthood, Calpurnia's quiet power, and all the incidents touching on the children's "growing outward" have an attractive starchiness that keeps this southern picture pert and provocative. There is much advance interest in this book; it has been selected by the Literary Guild and Reader's Digest; it should win many friends.
Pub Date: July 11, 1960
ISBN: 0060935464
Page Count: 323
Publisher: Lippincott
Review Posted Online: Oct. 7, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 1960
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her...
Another middle-aged mom in a muddle.
After years of false starts and big hopes, Elizabeth’s ruggedly handsome husband Jack, a former football star, just landed a spot as a sportscaster on national news. He still loves her, even though much younger women are giving him come-hither looks. Heck, he doesn’t want to betray the love of his life after she helped him kick drugs and stuck by him even when he was a struggling has-been. And won’t it seem hypocritical if he fools around with his sexy assistant while he does in-depth reporting on a rape case involving a famous basketball center? Well, he fools around anyway. Elizabeth, nicknamed Birdie, knows nothing of this, but she withdraws from Jack when her hard-drinking, salt-of-the-earth father has a stroke and dies. Now no one will call her “sugar beet” ever again. Time to return home to Tennessee and contend with Anita, the sort-of-evil stepmother so trashy she wears pink puffy slippers all day long. Naturally, it turns out that Anita actually has a heart of gold and knows a few things about Birdie’s dead mother that were hushed up for years. Mom was an artist, just like Birdie, and an old scandal comes to light as Anita unrolls a vibrant canvas that portrays her secret lover. Perhaps, Birdie muses, her mother died of heartbreak, never having followed her true love or developed her talent. Has she, too, compromised everything she holds dear? Hoping to find out, Birdie joins a support group that promises to reconnect confused women with their passion. She and Jack separate, prompting a how-dare-you fit from their grown daughters. Will Birdie fly her empty nest? Will she go back to college for a degree in art? Will her brooding watercolors ever sell?
Soft-focus story moves right along with few surprises. This time around, Hannah avoids the soap-opera complications of her previous tales (Summer Island, 2001, etc.).Pub Date: July 1, 2002
ISBN: 0-345-45071-X
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2002
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