An optimistic, colorful novel that delivers pixies, potions, and fanciful creatures.
An alchemist and his teenage apprentice hide precious stones from their scientific academy rivals in this debut YA fantasy.
In the land of Terra Copia lies the town of Abylant. There, first-class alchemist Sir H.U. Duffy runs an apothecary called A Pot He Carries. For the last two years he’s overseen the education of 12-year-old Mendel MacKeenie, a boy frequently abused by his father. When Mendel reaches 13, he’ll be eligible to attend the Living Arts Academy, where Duffy once taught. One morning, Don Horus Clapstone, from the Academy of Advanced Disciplines, visits the apothecary, searching for the dangerous and valuable Putrid’s Heart—a rare stone capable of summoning great evil. Duffy sends Capstone and his agents on a wild goose chase; later, the alchemist removes two Putrid’s Hearts from a hidden location, along with the journal of Sir Charles Mostly, the alchemist who mistakenly unleashed evil during the Old Regime. Duffy plans to place the Putrid’s Hearts where Clapstone can’t find them. He depends on Mendel, his carnivorous horse Gooder, a wily gusselsnuff pup named Esther, and others to complete a perilous journey across Terra Copia. Mendel, while venturing through Truegone Valley battling vicious pixies and more, begins seeing silver equations dance in his vision. Could they relate to the Alchemist’s Theorem, a universal equation that would result in an understanding of all living things? Chiavetta employs a gale-force imagination in conjuring her alchemical realm, central to which is Mendel’s battle against self-doubt. Throughout the narrative, “the thought” repeatedly creeps up his leg, telling him things like “his existence made other people unhappy.” While this element grounds the tale, the author creates endlessly whimsical potions—one includes “soggy butterfig” and “powdered pixie’s blood”—and creatures, like the shape-shifting “cappamorph” caterpillar. The presentation of gay characters Sir Brandiheart and Master Peatree is charming. While immersed in this crowd-pleasing adventure, young readers should marvel at Chiavetta’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland vibe, and adults should appreciate the sweeping mythos.
An optimistic, colorful novel that delivers pixies, potions, and fanciful creatures.Pub Date: Nov. 6, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-9966418-0-7
Page Count: 224
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Jan. 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
An action-stuffed chronicle of one boy’s journey to self-enlightenment and martial arts mastery with heavy existential and...
Set presumably in 12th-century China, an action-packed YA read about a young Shaolin monk named Zi who embarks on a harrowing journey of self-discovery after his temple and everything he ever knew are destroyed.
With the Gathering of the Ways quickly approaching, the entire population of the famed Shaolin Temple is frenetically preparing for the annual gathering of elite warriors from distant kingdoms who come together to test their abilities against the temple’s best kung fu practitioners. But when a cunning, morally bankrupt fighter known as the Red Dragon defeats the temple’s champion (who happens to be Zi’s older brother, Hu Yuan) and razes the temple in search of its mystical secrets, young Zi is forced to begin the Great Journey—essentially a treacherous quest of enlightenment that may ultimately reveal the greatest secret of the temple. On the quest, Zi meets and befriends a diversity of characters (like Bok Choi the grasshopper and a mysterious lady of the river named Auntie) who not only help the young Buddhist monk survive, but offer him wise advice as well. While the character of Zi is undeniably endearing, as is his insect sidekick, the story isn’t without minor flaws. The text is littered with grammatical errors (“Well stand down soldier. Watch how a ladies mantis goes about getting the goods son”), some of the fight scenes drag and become monotonous, and at points, the metaphysical nature of kung fu arguably goes too deep for the average reader (the sequence where the author connects chakras with the digestion of various foods, for example).
An action-stuffed chronicle of one boy’s journey to self-enlightenment and martial arts mastery with heavy existential and spiritual philosophical undertones.Pub Date: July 17, 2014
ISBN: 978-0-9929738-0-3
Page Count: 170
Publisher: Kory Juul Enterprises Corp
Review Posted Online: Nov. 23, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A well-crafted coming-of-age novel that skillfully chronicles the trials of a lonely orphan who joins a street gang.
Forster tells the story of a girl’s tumultuous life in London in this YA debut.
When a boy at the children’s home offers to take Kathy to meet his friends, she’s just happy to have something to do. Following the deaths of her parents, she was shipped from her village in northern England to London, where the people are icy, and she’s had a difficult time fitting in. She quickly realizes that her new friends constitute a street gang, but she is too lonely to reject their invitation to join them. Their leader, the magnetic, ambitious Gary, holds a particular allure for Kathy: she thinks that he’s like a character out of a novel. Kathy sees herself as a modern-day Becky Sharp, from Thackeray’s Vanity Fair, ingratiating herself with her new social circle: “Her old self was slipping away, but another one, altogether leaner, sharper and more efficient was slowly developing.” Gary sees himself as an underworld CEO, overseeing his many business interests while remaining one step ahead of the law. But his management style becomes brutal, and an atmosphere of fear soon replaces Kathy’s excitement. She thinks increasingly of her past: of the Romany woman who told her of old legends and the Northumberland landscape. She decides she must seek out her grandfather, from whom she was separated after the deaths of her parents. Perhaps she can rebuild something of her old life—if only she’s able to extricate herself from the new one. Forster’s narrative voice is pitched to Kathy’s anxiousness, resulting in a world that is equal parts menacing and romantic. The narrative intersperses the crowded, anonymous language of London with Kathy’s vivid recollections of the Northumberland moors of her previous life: “The heather too burned, but in a different way. It filled the landscape, as far as she could see, with a blazing purple, set off here and there by green bracken.” The tale’s conclusion is predictably Dickensian, and a bit of unexpected religiosity begins to slip in toward the end, but the book keeps the reader invested, curious to see just where Kathy lands.
A well-crafted coming-of-age novel that skillfully chronicles the trials of a lonely orphan who joins a street gang.Pub Date: Oct. 12, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-5043-3850-9
Page Count: 374
Publisher: BalboaPress
Review Posted Online: Dec. 10, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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