A fast, ferocious thriller in which water wars, virtual violence, and murky morals collide.
In a near-future Toronto where clean water is tightly controlled, survival depends on who controls the tap.
Drinking water is managed by Hydrexo, whose head engineers are 14-year-old Wyatt Docherty’s parents. While Wyatt never worries about going thirsty, he’s bullied for being a Water Baby. So he climbs the leaderboard of Fathom Fall, a virtual reality game that involves hunting down Bluddites—slimy, bloodthirsty monsters with gills. Armed with VR goggles and a controller, Wyatt is an elite Bluddite-killer—until a real one appears in his apartment, changing everything. Wyatt’s notoriety earns him a spot in a live, nationally televised Fathom Fall competition with nine other teens under 16, but he soon begins to suspect that there’s more to the contest than video game glory. Using cutting-edge augmented reality, the players enter a brutally gory, hyper-realistic version of the game, where rivalries, alliances, and bloodshed determine who survives. As Wyatt fights to prove he’s more than a Water Baby, he realizes that the game—and the organizer’s motives—aren’t as clean as they seem. Attentive readers may regard some elements of the story as illogical, but the breakneck pace, eerie future setting of environmental devastation, and surprise twist at the end make this a compulsive read with room for a sequel. Wyatt is cued white, and his competitors (only one of whom is a girl) are racially diverse.
A fast, ferocious thriller in which water wars, virtual violence, and murky morals collide. (Dystopian. 12-17)Pub Date: March 3, 2026
ISBN: 9781547616527
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
An engaging read for sports fans and romance lovers alike.
Elite competition and family legacy take center stage in this ice-rink romance.
To 16-year-old ice skater Adriana Russo, daughter of Olympic gold medalist parents, the spotlight is simply part of life at Boston’s prestigious, family-owned Kellynch Rink. Her older sister, Elisa, stars in a reality TV show with their dad and is on her way to compete in the Beijing Olympics. Maria, her younger sister, is embroiled in relationship drama with her figure skating partner, Charlie Monroe. Meanwhile, Adriana and her ice dancing partner, Brayden Elliott, are preparing for the Junior World Championships in Paris. Enter Freddie O’Connell, former crush, ice dance partner, and best friend, and Adriana has a lot more on her mind than perfecting her routine. Complicating things further is her fictitious romance with Brayden that is vaulting them to social media fame. Behind the glamour, though, is the overwhelming debt created by her father’s lavish spending since the death of her mother four years earlier and the pressure Adriana feels to help keep the family afloat financially. Strained family dynamics and setbacks on the ice add to the obstacles that threaten to distract Adriana from her goals. Woven throughout the story are behind-the-scenes looks into the world of competitive skating and the all-encompassing commitment required and physical demands the athletes face daily. Adriana and most other central characters read as White; Charlie and his family are Black.
An engaging read for sports fans and romance lovers alike. (Romance. 12-17)Pub Date: Feb. 8, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-593-35036-2
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Razorbill/Penguin
Review Posted Online: Nov. 15, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A glossy repackaging of a jejune tale.
A reissue of the 2016 novel published as Consider.
Alexandra Lucas and her boyfriend, Dominick, are about to start their senior year of high school when 500 vertexes—each one a doorway-shaped “hole into the fabric of the universe”—appear across the world, accompanied by holographic messages communicating news of Earth’s impending doom. The only escape is a one-way trip through the portals to a parallel future Earth. As people leave through the vertexes and the extinction event draws nearer, the world becomes increasingly unfamiliar. A lot has changed in the past several years, including expectations of mental health depictions in young adult literature; Alex’s struggle with anxiety and reliance on Ativan, which she calls her “little white savior” while initially discounting therapy as an intervention, make for a trite after-school special–level treatment of a complex situation; a short stint of effective therapy does finally occur but is so limited in duration that it contributes to the oversimplification of the topic. Alex also has unresolved issues with her Gulf War veteran father (who possibly grapples with PTSD). The slow pace of the plot as it depicts a crumbling society, along with stilted writing and insubstantial secondary characterization, limits the appeal of such a small-scale, personal story. Characters are minimally described and largely racially ambiguous; Alex has golden skin and curly brown hair.
A glossy repackaging of a jejune tale. (Science fiction. 13-16)Pub Date: June 6, 2023
ISBN: 978-1-72826-839-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: March 13, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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