A STAGE SET FOR VILLAINS

In order to save her own life, an 18-year-old must strike a bargain with a notoriously violent leader in Spann’s YA fantasy novel.

The land of Theatron is divided in half. People living north of the Cut live in complete truth: no fictional stories, no music, no lying, and certainly no theater. All are measures to help protect them from the Players in the southern region and their worshippers, called Revelers. The Players are immortal performers with fearsome, godlike powers whose narcissism often leads to gruesome violence. Northerners are advised to never look a Player in the eye and to pay them three compliments to appease their vanity and enable escape. The Northerners are also marked with Eleutheraen gold—the one material that can harm and kill a Player—to ensure immunity to the Players’ allure. Thanks to a 500-year treaty, the Players stay south of the Cut, but that treaty is reaching its expiration date. Ten years ago, Riven Hesper had a run-in with a rogue Player and escaped by stabbing her with an Eleutheraen gold knife; the Player’s blood infected the child with a curse that, in the present, still causes her body to deteriorate. Now, 18-year-old Riven doesn’t have much time left. The Playhouse announces it will have a casting call for a grueling competition which will end with a mortal taking the place of an immortal Player—or dying themselves. Riven, desperate for a cure, goes to the Playhouse where she’s forced to strike a deal with the enigmatic Lead Player Jude Stepharros, who’s determined to make Riven the winner. Spann’s debut novel is a dark and dizzying fantasy that will keep readers enthralled to the end. Protagonist narrator Riven is resilient, flawed, and engaging throughout, and the supporting characters are equally intriguing. Most noteworthy is the complex and well-developed worldbuilding and the storytelling style, which often combines prose with scriptlike dialogue. While this novel will appeal to many fantasy-genre fans, readers with a theater background will especially appreciate the inclusion of universal stagecraft rules, such as “do not touch other’s props” and “never anger the stage manager.”

A richly detailed dark fantasy with an engaging lead player.