A flawed but often enjoyable adventure.
A changeling among elves must solve a mystery and discover her past in this debut fantasy from Haskell.
Nuriel Lhethannien, or “Rie,” is an outsider. As a human in a dimension called the Upper Realm, she’s a second-class citizen to the ruling High Elves and she’s had to work hard to achieve the post of court messenger. Her foster parents, and a small swarm of pixies who accompany her on deliveries, are her only sources of affection. Her life changes abruptly when two blood sidhe from the Shadow Realm (beings who survive on human blood) assault her while she’s delivering a message to a powerful elf. Rie defeats her attackers with the help of her pixie pals and her foster father’s martial arts training, but then she faces another problem: any contact with Shadow Realm residents is punishable by execution in the Upper Realm. Rie must journey to the Shadow Realm in the hope of finding the assassins’ employers and somehow clearing her name. She finds a guide to the capital city in Braegan, a handsome blood sidhe with questionable intentions, and also meets Daenor, the illegitimate son of King Aradae and a deadly warrior. Daenor and Rie struggle with their growing, mutual attraction as her investigation draws her into a conflict between the realms. Her emerging magical abilities also force her to realize that she may not be as human as she thought. Many of the characters and tropes in this novel will be familiar to fantasy fans. However, Haskell also includes some unexpected touches, such as an inversion of usual dark-and-light imagery: Rie was taught that the Shadow Realm, with its vampiric residents and long nights, is evil incarnate, but she eventually comes to realize that it might be more functional and egalitarian than her own. Characterization is slight—Rie’s pluckiness, for example, is standard issue for the genre—and this results in wooden dialogue at times. But the plot is full of romantic and court intrigue, which results in a fun, light read overall.
A flawed but often enjoyable adventure.Pub Date: May 6, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-9864083-2-8
Page Count: 306
Publisher: Trabuco Ridge Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles...
Sisters in and out of love.
Meghann Dontess is a high-powered matrimonial lawyer in Seattle who prefers sex with strangers to emotional intimacy: a strategy bound to backfire sooner or later, warns her tough-talking shrink. It’s advice Meghann decides to ignore, along with the memories of her difficult childhood, neglectful mother, and younger sister. Though she managed to reunite Claire with Sam Cavenaugh (her father but not Meghann’s) when her mother abandoned both girls long ago, Meghann still feels guilty that her sister’s life doesn’t measure up, at least on her terms. Never married, Claire ekes out a living running a country campground with her dad and is raising her six-year-old daughter on her own. When she falls in love for the first time with an up-and-coming country musician, Meghann is appalled: Bobby Austin is a three-time loser at marriage—how on earth can Claire be so blind? Bobby’s blunt explanation doesn’t exactly satisfy the concerned big sister, who busies herself planning Claire’s dream wedding anyway. And, to relieve the stress, she beds various guys she picks up in bars, including Dr. Joe Wyatt, a neurosurgeon turned homeless drifter after the demise of his beloved wife Diane (whom he euthanized). When Claire’s awful headache turns out to be a kind of brain tumor known among neurologists as a “terminator,” Joe rallies. Turns out that Claire had befriended his wife on her deathbed, and now in turn he must try to save her. Is it too late? Will Meghann find true love at last?
Briskly written soap with down-to-earth types, mostly without the lachrymose contrivances of Hannah’s previous titles (Distant Shores, 2002, etc.). Kudos for skipping the snifflefest this time around.Pub Date: May 1, 2003
ISBN: 0-345-45073-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Ballantine
Review Posted Online: June 24, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2003
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.
Coelho is a Brazilian writer with four books to his credit. Following Diary of a Magus (1992—not reviewed) came this book, published in Brazil in 1988: it's an interdenominational, transcendental, inspirational fable—in other words, a bag of wind.
The story is about a youth empowered to follow his dream. Santiago is an Andalusian shepherd boy who learns through a dream of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids. An old man, the king of Salem, the first of various spiritual guides, tells the boy that he has discovered his destiny: "to realize one's destiny is a person's only real obligation." So Santiago sells his sheep, sails to Tangier, is tricked out of his money, regains it through hard work, crosses the desert with a caravan, stops at an oasis long enough to fall in love, escapes from warring tribesmen by performing a miracle, reaches the pyramids, and eventually gets both the gold and the girl. Along the way he meets an Englishman who describes the Soul of the World; the desert woman Fatima, who teaches him the Language of the World; and an alchemist who says, "Listen to your heart" A message clings like ivy to every encounter; everyone, but everyone, has to put in their two cents' worth, from the crystal merchant to the camel driver ("concentrate always on the present, you'll be a happy man"). The absence of characterization and overall blandness suggest authorship by a committee of self-improvement pundits—a far cry from Saint- Exupery's The Little Prince: that flagship of the genre was a genuine charmer because it clearly derived from a quirky, individual sensibility.
Coelho's placebo has racked up impressive sales in Brazil and Europe. Americans should flock to it like gulls.Pub Date: July 1, 1993
ISBN: 0-06-250217-4
Page Count: 192
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1993
SEEN & HEARD
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
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