Sensational characters brighten this ongoing fantasy series.
Fourteen-year-old AnnaGrey England returns in Flanagan’s YA sequel and faces threats in her magical birthplace.
It’s been just a matter of months since AnnaGrey learned that she can transform herself into a red fox. She was born in the Laéth Realm of human-animal shifters but has lived nearly all her life in the human world. Because she’s heir to a throne, she knows her future lies in that other realm, even if the human one has always been her home. One day, her friends from the Laéth Realm, Cross and Coyote, show up with troubling news: Someone is abducting red fox girls. AnnaGrey is sure a villain whose plan she once thwarted is hunting her. As if that weren’t enough incentive to return to the Laéth Realm, her father, who’s growing progressively sicker, needs a healer there. AnnaGrey, her Laéthian parents, and her two friends leave the human world via a magical gate and quickly run into pirates, diabolical “crowes,” and a host of potentially untrustworthy people. Flanagan deftly depicts a teen who’s conflicted; AnnaGrey longs for the place where she was born but doesn’t want to say goodbye to her best friend or her home. The cast is sublime, from AnnaGrey’s buddies Cross and Coyote (one’s like a brother) to a pirate who claims she’s also looking for the missing red fox girls. This sophomore series installment relies heavily on knowledge of the preceding book; most of the characters and their predicaments originated in the earlier narrative, including a couple of essential characters who are repeatedly referenced but never make an appearance in this volume. Still, there’s much fun to be had as AnnaGrey’s breezy narration invigorates scenes of peril: “Something blows out of the sea—huge, green-scaled, and roaring, with two twisted horns on either side of its head.” Lingering questions at the end practically guarantee another sequel.
Sensational characters brighten this ongoing fantasy series.Pub Date: N/A
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Feb. 15, 2026
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
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
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This grittily provocative debut explores the horrors of self-harm and the healing power of artistic expression.
After surviving a suicide attempt, a fragile teen isn't sure she can endure without cutting herself.
Seventeen-year-old Charlie Davis, a white girl living on the margins, thinks she has little reason to live: her father drowned himself; her bereft and abusive mother kicked her out; her best friend, Ellis, is nearly brain dead after cutting too deeply; and she's gone through unspeakable experiences living on the street. After spending time in treatment with other young women like her—who cut, burn, poke, and otherwise hurt themselves—Charlie is released and takes a bus from the Twin Cities to Tucson to be closer to Mikey, a boy she "like-likes" but who had pined for Ellis instead. But things don't go as planned in the Arizona desert, because sweet Mikey just wants to be friends. Feeling rejected, Charlie, an artist, is drawn into a destructive new relationship with her sexy older co-worker, a "semifamous" local musician who's obviously a junkie alcoholic. Through intense, diarylike chapters chronicling Charlie's journey, the author captures the brutal and heartbreaking way "girls who write their pain on their bodies" scar and mar themselves, either succumbing or surviving. Like most issue books, this is not an easy read, but it's poignant and transcendent as Charlie breaks more and more before piecing herself back together.
This grittily provocative debut explores the horrors of self-harm and the healing power of artistic expression. (author’s note) (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: Aug. 30, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-101-93471-5
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Delacorte
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2016
© Copyright 2026 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.
