A refreshing new take on an old idea, with a strong, intelligent and independent protagonist: a highly promising debut.
A New York lady lawyer battles sexism and arrogance in a world ruled—gently, invisibly, but insistently—by vampires, werewolves and elves, who collectively emerged from the shadows less than half a century ago.
Linnet Ellery, the daughter of an old-money Colonial family and fresh out of law school, finds a job at a powerful New York “White-Fang” law firm—all the partners are vampires, along with most of the senior associates. Despite her credentials, she only got the job thanks to her connections with a high-ranking vampire family. Office politics, Linnet finds, are exceptionally vicious in a world where humans can succeed only by becoming allies or slaves of the powerful near-immortals. Her first assignment seems to be a hopeless case, a wretched affair that’s been dragging on for years and involves the disputed inheritance of a billion-dollar security firm currently owned by werewolves. And, ominously, the first words uttered by Chip Westin, the well-meaning lawyer who’s been struggling ineffectually with the case single-handedly, are those of the title. Then one evening, when she’s working late with Chip, a werewolf shows up and kills Chip; only by a series of apparent lucky breaks does Linnet survive and kill the brute. Evidently, her diligent research has turned up something that the werewolf parties to the case would rather not have revealed. And there are other venues in which Linnet uses her brains and subtlety to achieve victory. Is she just fortunate—or extremely talented in ways she doesn’t herself fully understand?
A refreshing new take on an old idea, with a strong, intelligent and independent protagonist: a highly promising debut.Pub Date: Sept. 4, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-7653-2682-9
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Aug. 1, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2012
BOOK REVIEW
An adventurous fantasy romp only for the die-hard fan.
A mysterious woodsman joins forces with an earnest princess to stop a plot that could ruin both of their kingdoms in this fantasy romance.
Princess Sorcha keeps a close eye on her loved ones, constantly living in fear that her brother and adopted sisters will be taken away from her. When she uncovers a plan to murder her brother and steal his queen, Sorcha throws herself (quite literally) into ruining the enemy’s coldhearted scheme. In the fray, she is taken prisoner to be used as leverage. Her freedom comes at the hands of a man known only as the Woodsman. A Robin Hood–esque hero, he leads a secret rebellion to overthrow the corrupt family in power in his woodland country. With Sorcha’s ability to harness fire and the Woodsman’s talent for communing with nature, they realize their combined magical strength is the key to protecting those they love. Sorcha’s close circle of friends and family rely heavily on previously established relationships from prior books, and the setup is a direct relation to past events. Newcomers to Sparks’ (Eight Simple Rules for Dating a Dragon, 2018, etc.) Embraced by Magic series will undoubtedly be lost when attempting to understand character connections and references to previous skirmishes and battles. The relationship between the hero and heroine is background noise to the tangled web of political machinations by cartoonish villains, but the inventive setting and depth of worldbuilding prevent this from feeling too much like a paint-by-numbers, cookie-cutter fantasy romance. But while Sparks’ crafting of distinct kingdoms and fantasy races is the strongest part of the series, this installment carries on the earlier tradition of middling, glacially slow romances.
An adventurous fantasy romp only for the die-hard fan.Pub Date: March 1, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4967-3004-6
Page Count: 416
Publisher: Kensington
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
The multitalented author of The Sandman graphic novels and last year’s Neverwhere charms again, with a deftly written fantasy adventure tale set in early Victorian England and enriched by familiar folk materials. In a rural town called Wall (so named for the stone bulwark that separates it from a mysterious meadow through which strange shapes are often seen moving), on “Market Day,” when the citizens of “Faerie” (land) mingle with humans, young Dunstan Thorn makes love to a bewitching maiden and is presented nine months afterward with an infant son (delivered from beyond the Wall). The latter, Tristran, grows up to fall in love himself and rashly promise his beloved that he’ll bring her the star they both observe falling from the sky. Tristran’s ensuing quest takes him deep into Faerie, and, unbeknownst to him, competition with the star’s other pursuers: three weird sisters (the Lilim), gifted with magical powers though still susceptible to “the snares of age and time”; and the surviving sons of the late Lord of Stormhold, accompanied everywhere by their several dead brothers (whom they happen to have murdered). Tristran finds his star (in human form, no less); survives outrageous tests and mishaps, including passage on a “sky-ship” and transformation into a dormouse; and, safely returned to Wall, acquires through a gracious act of renunciation his (long promised) “heart’s desire.” Gaiman blends these beguiling particulars skillfully in a comic romance, reminiscent of James Thurber’s fables, in which even throwaway minutiae radiate good-natured inventiveness (e.g., its hero’s narrow escape from a “goblin press-gang” seeking human mercenaries to fight “the goblins’ endless wars beneath the earth”). There are dozens of fantasy writers around reshaping traditional stories, but none with anything like Gaiman’s distinctive wit, warmth, and narrative energy. Wonderful stuff, for kids of all ages.
Pub Date: Jan. 6, 1999
ISBN: 0-380-97728-1
Page Count: 256
Publisher: Avon/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 1, 1998
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