An effective King Arthur retelling that focuses on an often neglected female character.
The great sorceress Morgana takes center stage in Morgan’s retelling of the legend of King Arthur.
When Morgana’s mother, the queen of Lloegyr, remarries after the death of the king, Morgana is sent away to be raised on the Isle of Apples with the mysterious priestesses called “the Nine.” Morgana is one of many acolytes, young girls who are sent as tribute to live with the Nine and taught to make medicinal products and magical charms to help the people who come to the temple for help. Few of them have any real magical ability, but Morgana is different. Objects move at her demand; her potions and charms are potent; her ability to scry into the future is more impressive than any of the Nine. The Blackbird, a powerful sorcerer and the only man who works with the Nine, and Braithe, a young acolyte with no magical talent of her own but a fierce loyalty to Morgana, are Morgana’s only friends, as everyone else fears her for her prodigious magical talent. Morgana’s greatest ambition is to help her half brother, the kind and benevolent Arthur, reign as true king of Lloegyr. But when Arthur brings home his bride, the beautiful Gwenvere, Morgana knows something about the new queen is very, very wrong. Gwenvere seems to have some kind of dark magical ability to confound the men around her, and when it becomes clear that there is more to Gwenvere’s violent temper than just human cruelty, Morgana will have to stop her before she destroys Arthur’s reign. Morgan’s atmospheric writing is well suited to retelling this ancient legend. The long novel sets a clear character arc for Morgana as she learns the value of working with her allies and trusting the wisdom of others instead of relying on her own power. Morgan sticks to Arthurian legend and European mythology, but both those wells are so deep and varied that readers have no way of knowing how Morgana’s mission to save Arthur will turn out.
An effective King Arthur retelling that focuses on an often neglected female character.Pub Date: Sept. 16, 2025
ISBN: 9780316585118
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Redhook/Orbit
Review Posted Online: June 7, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.
Cormac McCarthy's The Road meets Chaucer's Canterbury Tales in this frightful medieval epic about an orphan girl with visionary powers in plague-devastated France.
The year is 1348. The conflict between France and England is nothing compared to the all-out war building between good angels and fallen ones for control of heaven (though a scene in which soldiers are massacred by a rainbow of arrows is pretty horrific). Among mortals, only the girl, Delphine, knows of the cataclysm to come. Angels speak to her, issuing warnings—and a command to run. A pack of thieves is about to carry her off and rape her when she is saved by a disgraced knight, Thomas, with whom she teams on a march across the parched landscape. Survivors desperate for food have made donkey a delicacy and don't mind eating human flesh. The few healthy people left lock themselves in, not wanting to risk contact with strangers, no matter how dire the strangers' needs. To venture out at night is suicidal: Horrific forces swirl about, ravaging living forms. Lethal black clouds, tentacled water creatures and assorted monsters are comfortable in the daylight hours as well. The knight and a third fellow journeyer, a priest, have difficulty believing Delphine's visions are real, but with oblivion lurking in every shadow, they don't have any choice but to trust her. The question becomes, can she trust herself? Buehlman, who drew upon his love of Fitzgerald and Hemingway in his acclaimed Southern horror novel, Those Across the River (2011), slips effortlessly into a different kind of literary sensibility, one that doesn't scrimp on earthy humor and lyrical writing in the face of unspeakable horrors. The power of suggestion is the author's strong suit, along with first-rate storytelling talent.
An author to watch, Buehlman is now two for two in delivering eerie, offbeat novels with admirable literary skill.Pub Date: Oct. 2, 2012
ISBN: 978-1-937007-86-7
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Ace/Berkley
Review Posted Online: Sept. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2012
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