Watery fun right up to the cliffhanger for readers willing to go with the flow.
After the aquatic Rusalka’s initial invasion in Undertow (2015), Alpha-human hybrid Lyric is a wanted terrorist looking for her family.
Sometimes-enemy, sometimes-ally Doyle has revealed that the secret facility experimenting on captive Alphas and their families is in Texas. Lyric evades both a national manhunt (she’s been publically declared the terrorist behind the attack on Coney Island) and roadblocks (designed to stifle the flow of refugee Coasters, those from the East Coast running for safety) with the help of human best friend Bex and Alpha warrior Arcade. Arcade trains Lyric for war, while Bex worries that Lyric’s enjoying violence far too much. Complicating everything is the fact that Arcade is the fiancee of Lyric’s love interest. The girls almost succeed in getting to the facility before the ruthless government contractors running it find them. (Since the operation is too dirty for the military, and corporations are so good at avoiding responsibility for egregious atrocities, torture has been privatized.) The sequence that follows is marked by a variety of betrayals and leads to a plan in which half-Alpha children like Lyric are sent to fight the Rusalka. Some plot elements may fail to hold water under close scrutiny, but frequent action scenes do much to distract readers. The characters’ self-awareness and the importance given to friendships keep the romantic plots out of cliché territory.
Watery fun right up to the cliffhanger for readers willing to go with the flow. (Fantasy. 13 & up)Pub Date: Feb. 2, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-544-34844-8
Page Count: 368
Publisher: HMH Books
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2015
BOOK REVIEW
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BOOK REVIEW
Somberly beautiful.
A girl goes in search of her missing sister and discovers a strange hidden world of dreams.
Corin, who’s 18 and dark-skinned, strives to protect her 12-year-old sister, Elly. But life as a thief is full of struggle, poverty, and loss, even without Corin’s avoidance of other relationships. Elly clings to the promise of fairy tales, like the one that says a princess lies sleeping in an underground castle after pricking her finger on a spindle. After the sisters fight and Elly runs off, Corin searches for her in Gyldan’s old network of tunnels—and finds the tale is true: Cursed Princess Amelia, golden-haired, with eyes like “sea glass” and porcelain skin, lies asleep, surrounded by flowers. Corin enters the princess’ dreamworld—the place “where your subconscious desires come to life.” She meets Briar Rose, Amelia’s alter ego, who experienced her share of sadness and wanted to fall asleep. Also in the dreamworld is green-skinned Malicine, the nonbinary demon who, despite having placed the curse of eternal slumber on Amelia, is mostly friendly. All three are running from things they can’t face, though the dreamworld may not give them a choice. Pham’s debut, a Sapphic reimagining of “Sleeping Beauty,” explores mental health and asks a lot of readers as it seesaws between emotional confrontations, time jumps, and scenes where one character inhabits the memories of another, all of which demand intense engagement. Still, the ending is earned as well as positive.
Somberly beautiful. (content note) (Fantasy. 14-18)Pub Date: June 2, 2026
ISBN: 9798217113026
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Kokila
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
SEEN & HEARD
An entertaining and atmospheric, though sometimes clumsy, exploration of the true cost of beauty.
In this retelling of a classic, a drama student’s obsession with beauty leads her down a dark—and possibly deadly—path.
Eighteen-year-old Penny Paxton is beginning her first year at Dorian Drama Academy in Edinburgh, Scotland, where she hopes to follow in her starlet mother’s footsteps—and earn the love that her mother has never seemed to offer. At Dorian, Penny is mentored by Royal Shakespeare Company legend Orlagh Camran, who makes her the compelling offer of a portrait by the Masked Painter, a mysterious artist with the ability to gift his subjects everlasting youth and beauty. But shortly after Penny’s portrait is complete, several of the Masked Painter’s subjects are found murdered. Fearing that she’s made a terrible mistake and may become the next victim, Penny, who’s gay, begins to investigate the murders with the help of an unlikely ally. As she attempts to uncover the truth surrounding the Masked Painter and the murders, she’s forced to reckon with her own toxic obsession with beauty. This chilling, atmospheric novel, inspired by The Picture of Dorian Gray, is entertaining and full of twists, though some of the reveals feel contrived and some questions are left unanswered. The plot unravels at a leisurely pace but eventually builds to an action-packed (if somewhat convoluted) conclusion. Most characters are cued white.
An entertaining and atmospheric, though sometimes clumsy, exploration of the true cost of beauty. (content note, author’s note, bonus scene) (Fantasy thriller. 14-18)Pub Date: May 26, 2026
ISBN: 9781250346797
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Wednesday Books
Review Posted Online: March 9, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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