Intelligent, richly detailed fantasy featuring two young cousins battered by losses, personal passions and larger events. Shy, inarticulate, recently orphaned and newly arrived in the aptly named Floating Islands, Trei is transformed by the rare chance to strap on a pair of feathered wings and join the legendary corps of soaring kajuraihi. For his fiercely intense cousin Araenè, constraints on women are but annoying obstacles to be overcome in pursuing first the forbidden (to women) culinary arts and then the magical abilities that well up in her, all unbidden, in the wake of a family tragedy of her own. The arrival of an expanding empire's invasion fleet, augmented by a new, mechanically powered magic, propels Trei and Araenè into actions that test their courage, loyalties and cleverness to the utmost. The author delineates complex characters, geographies and societies alike with a dab hand, deftly weaves them all—along with dragons of several sorts, mouthwatering kitchen talk, flashes of humor and a late-blooming romance—into a suspenseful plot and delivers an outstanding tale that is self-contained but full of promise for sequels. (Fantasy. 12-14)
Pub Date: Feb. 8, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-375-84705-9
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: Dec. 22, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2010
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
This cracking good mixture of magic and place will leave readers eagerly awaiting the sequel
A mixed-race girl in Dust Bowl Kansas discovers her long-lost father isn't just a black man: He's a fairy.
Callie has been passing as white her whole life, helping her Mama in run-down Slow Run, Kan. But now it doesn't seem to matter that she keeps her "good skin" out of the sun and softens her "coarse" hair, because it seems everyone's left the dust-choked town. Even Mama is gone now, vanished in a preternatural dust storm that summoned a strange man who tells Callie secrets of her never-met father. Soon Callie's walking the dusty roads with Jack, a ragged white kid. If Callie's dad is a fairy, then the two young'uns will just have to go to fairyland to find him. Callie and Jack dodge fairy politics and dangers, from grasshopper people to enchanted food to magic movie theaters—but the conventional dangers are no less threatening. Plenty of run-of-the-mill humans in 1935 Kansas don't like black girls or beggars, hobos or outsiders. With a historical note and a Woody Guthrie soundtrack, this novel does a fine job of blending a splendidly grounded Dust Bowl setting with a paranormal adventure. It's really too bad that the cover art depicts a white girl with flyaway hair, rather than Callie as written, a mixed girl who stops passing as white halfway through the story. Callie learns to be open about herself but her own cover art doesn't.
This cracking good mixture of magic and place will leave readers eagerly awaiting the sequel . (Fantasy. 12-14)Pub Date: June 26, 2012
ISBN: 978-0-375-86938-9
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: March 27, 2012
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2012
You'd think life couldn't get more complicated than discovering your boyfriend is a werewolf, as Jess did in 13 to Life (2010). Pietr and his Russian-American family are all werewolves, a product of Cold War experimentation. Normal, middle-American Jess will do anything to protect her friends from the forces stalking them, which range from the CIA to the Russian mafia. Pietr's mother is a prisoner of the CIA, and, worse, Pietr is openly dating Jess' friend Sarah. His motivations for doing so (and Jess' motivations for dating football star Derek) are murky but tie into the general air of mystery. Is there anyone in this town who isn't secretly part of the semi-scientific paranormal conspiracy? Complications ensue, with plenty of threads left unresolved for the inevitable next volume. For passionate lovers of the genre only, but they'll appreciate the virginal sexual tension, the snarled das and nyets, the testosterone-fueled feuds and the titillating glimpses of tragic history. (Paranormal romance. 12-14)
Pub Date: Feb. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-312-60915-3
Page Count: 320
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Review Posted Online: Dec. 29, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 1, 2011
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