Emotionally rich and gloriously queer.
Love, loss, and identity form the core of this sparse, free-verse vampire story from Ireland.
Immy narrates a small slice of her eternal life, a time when she experiences a love like never before. In this interesting take on vampires, Immy lives numerous consecutive lives as different people: Although she mostly doesn’t remember her past selves, she feels them all inside herself, leading to constant internal turmoil. In the present day, Immy meets human mortal Claudia at a flower shop, and the two begin a relationship. Immy believes this love is stronger than anything she’s ever felt, but as her love turns more and more into a desire for blood, she questions the kinds of relationships she’s capable of having. The main consistent thread through all Immy’s lives is her found family. Freddie and Henry are vampires like her, and the three of them have managed to find one another in each of their lives, always caring for and loving each other. This poetic tale captures so much emotion through meaningful word choices, repetition, and line breaks. It’s incredible how deep characterization comes through in so few words: Immy’s longing and grief are potent, the Sapphic love is consuming and heartbreaking, and the unconditional support among Immy, Freddie, and Henry feels pure and comforting. Readers who feel seen in these pages will pore over the feeling-laden verses again and again. Characters are assumed White.
Emotionally rich and gloriously queer. (author interview) (Verse fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: May 31, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-915071-01-9
Page Count: 192
Publisher: Little Island
Review Posted Online: March 1, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
PERSPECTIVES
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter.
After a Nigerian British girl goes off to an exclusive boarding school that seems to prey on less-privileged students, she discovers there might be some truth behind an urban legend.
Ife Adebola joins the Urban Achievers scholarship program at pricey, high-pressure Nithercott School, arriving shortly after a student called Leon mysteriously disappeared. Gossip says he’s a victim of the glowing-eyed Changing Man who targets the lonely, leaving them changed. Ife doesn’t believe in the myth, but amid the stresses of Nithercott’s competitive, privileged, majority-white environment, where she is constantly reminded of her state school background, she does miss her friends and family. When Malika, a fellow Black scholarship student, disappears and then returns, acting strangely devoid of personality, Ife worries the Changing Man is real—and that she’s next. Ife joins forces with classmate Bijal and Benny, Leon’s younger brother, to uncover the truth about who the Changing Man is and what he wants. Culminating in a detailed, gory, and extended climactic battle, this verbose thriller tempts readers with a nefarious mystery involving racial and class-based violence but never quite lives up to its potential and peters out thematically by its explosive finale. However, this debut offers highly visually evocative and eerie descriptions of characters and events and will appeal to fans of creature horror, social commentary, and dark academia.
A descriptive and atmospheric paranormal social thriller that could be a bit tighter. (Thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: Sept. 26, 2023
ISBN: 9781250868138
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Review Posted Online: June 8, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2023
BOOK REVIEW
Poignant and real, beautiful and intense, this story of a girl struggling to define herself is as powerful as Xiomara’s...
Poetry helps first-generation Dominican-American teen Xiomara Batista come into her own.
Fifteen-year old Xiomara (“See-oh-MAH-ruh,” as she constantly instructs teachers on the first day of school) is used to standing out: she’s tall with “a little too much body for a young girl.” Street harassed by both boys and grown men and just plain harassed by girls, she copes with her fists. In this novel in verse, Acevedo examines the toxicity of the “strong black woman” trope, highlighting the ways Xiomara’s seeming unbreakability doesn’t allow space for her humanity. The only place Xiomara feels like herself and heard is in her poetry—and later with her love interest, Aman (a Trinidadian immigrant who, refreshingly, is a couple inches shorter than her). At church and at home, she’s stifled by her intensely Catholic mother’s rules and fear of sexuality. Her present-but-absent father and even her brother, Twin (yes, her actual twin), are both emotionally unavailable. Though she finds support in a dedicated teacher, in Aman, and in a poetry club and spoken-word competition, it’s Xiomara herself who finally gathers the resources she needs to solve her problems. The happy ending is not a neat one, making it both realistic and satisfying. Themes as diverse as growing up first-generation American, Latinx culture, sizeism, music, burgeoning sexuality, and the power of the written and spoken word are all explored with nuance.
Poignant and real, beautiful and intense, this story of a girl struggling to define herself is as powerful as Xiomara’s name: “one who is ready for war.” (Verse fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: March 6, 2018
ISBN: 978-0-06-266280-4
Page Count: 368
Publisher: HarperTeen
Review Posted Online: Dec. 20, 2017
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2018
PERSPECTIVES
SEEN & HEARD
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