Thoroughly entertaining.
Their mother’s death and their father’s struggle to find work have taken a toll on the four Breck sisters: Annagail, the eldest, has left school for a factory job; young Lilet and Mimmi endure day care; and would-be writer Isaveth, following a recipe in the Book of Common Magic, has begun baking spell-tablets to sell on the street.
In Tarreton, nobles live in luxury while the poor live in grinding, Dickensian poverty. As Moshites, a religious minority, the Brecks are isolated and burdened by discrimination. When Papa is arrested, unjustly accused of murdering the governor of Tarreton College, Isaveth vows to save him. Quiz, a mysterious boy who’s befriended her (like her, he’s a fan of the broadcast “talkie-play” Auradia Champion, Lady Justice of Listerbroke), offers much-needed help. Their investigations lead them first to the college, with its plethora of witnesses and possible suspects, then to the Workers’ Club, an illegal underground organization dedicated to improving the lives of Tarreton’s downtrodden. Isaveth and her sisters are an appealing bunch, and the plot’s twists and turns keep readers enjoyably perplexed. The setting, with its nostalgia-infused, late-Victorian vibe, is to fantasy what steampunk is to science fiction—and great fun. This alternate world’s infrastructure relies on magic-based technology. Powerful Sagery enables the nobility’s luxurious lifestyle, but for commoners, permission to use common magic is a hard-won right, by no means universal.
Thoroughly entertaining. (Fantasy.10-14)Pub Date: Sept. 8, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-4814-3771-4
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Atheneum
Review Posted Online: June 5, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2015
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
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BOOK TO SCREEN
Ponderous and protracted, with more work needed on both the world and the characters.
Two young teens with special powers face an ancient evil rising from the very heart of the Tinvali Empire in this doorstopping series opener.
Pursued by ruthless agents eager to exploit her mysterious ability to read peoples’ true feelings, Arden—eventually, after many chapters alternating between dual narrators—links up with foundling Mako, a budding music mage who’s carefully hiding the fact that he’s invited an invisible smooth-talking trickster spirit named Narrix to be his lifelong guardian. It seems that some of Narrix’s fellow spirits may be even nastier—and there are ominous hints that they might be sneaking back into the world. Several of Arden’s adventures do more to bulk up the page count than advance the plot in any meaningful way, and though (like many of Mull’s protagonists) she’s a dab hand at snarky banter, she otherwise comes off as a rather wooden character. Readers may find Mako’s journey and conflicts more absorbing, as he struggles to balance the joy of blossoming into an outstanding warrior under Narrix’s tutelage with the sneaking suspicion he’s made a bad choice of tutor. Whether his concerns are valid or not remains to be seen. The leads present white.
Ponderous and protracted, with more work needed on both the world and the characters. (Fantasy. 10-13)Pub Date: April 14, 2026
ISBN: 9780593712047
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Labyrinth Road
Review Posted Online: Jan. 19, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2026
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