Fans of magic-school tales and Norse mythology will adore this exceptionally detailed YA series opener.
A teen discovers her magical lineage and possible doomed future in this YA fantasy.
Thirteen-year-old Minerva Pearlstar lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her widowed mother, who barely makes ends meet working at Serenity Gardens Mortuary. The pair moves often to avoid discovery of the fact that Minerva can wield electricity with her hands. The girl believes that she’s a freak, but then an old man, accompanied by two ravens, invites her to the Asgard School for the Exceptionally Gifted in Midgard, Maine. He’s none other than Odin, the Allfather from Norse myth; Minerva is actually a heksen (or witch) demigod who’s been in hiding from a dark fate foreseen by the dangerous Nornir people. In Maine, Minerva is greeted by future roommate Alice Cleverly and “bear-mage” Markas Nightshade. Midgard is a tourist destination on the surface, designed like an old Viking village; secretly, its school trains heksen in spellcasting and gives them animal familiars. Minerva also gets a job at the You Only Die Once Funerarium, run by Baynard Nightshade. Just as Minerva begins to enjoy her new life, she learns that the complexities of her lineage lead to a scary place—the apocalypse known as Ragnarok. Riddle brings Harry Potter devotees a comforting magic-school tale based around Norse folklore and fairy tales. Minerva has plenty of odd quirks that make her easy to root for, including homemade clothing reworked from Halloween costumes. The plot’s most intriguing mystery is the whereabouts of the main character’s older sister, whom she’s never met. An extra touch of intrigue comes in the novel’s exploration of the funeral industry: You Only Die Once is a green business, and Baynard uses natural elements like cloves and vanilla, rather than toxic formaldehyde, to freshen corpses. This series starter spends a lot of time on worldbuilding, introducing such lore as an elf-mage war and a Blood Pact. Minerva also has a complicated relationship with nemesis Prince Thorn, and the two share a devastating kiss that foreshadows a deeper emotional struggle in the future.
Fans of magic-school tales and Norse mythology will adore this exceptionally detailed YA series opener.Pub Date: Jan. 16, 2022
ISBN: 979-8-4030-6006-6
Page Count: 308
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: April 3, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.
Are we not men? We are—well, ask Bigfoot, as Brooks does in this delightful yarn, following on his bestseller World War Z(2006).
A zombie apocalypse is one thing. A volcanic eruption is quite another, for, as the journalist who does a framing voice-over narration for Brooks’ latest puts it, when Mount Rainier popped its cork, “it was the psychological aspect, the hyperbole-fueled hysteria that had ended up killing the most people.” Maybe, but the sasquatches whom the volcano displaced contributed to the statistics, too, if only out of self-defense. Brooks places the epicenter of the Bigfoot war in a high-tech hideaway populated by the kind of people you might find in a Jurassic Park franchise: the schmo who doesn’t know how to do much of anything but tries anyway, the well-intentioned bleeding heart, the know-it-all intellectual who turns out to know the wrong things, the immigrant with a tough backstory and an instinct for survival. Indeed, the novel does double duty as a survival manual, packed full of good advice—for instance, try not to get wounded, for “injury turns you from a giver to a taker. Taking up our resources, our time to care for you.” Brooks presents a case for making room for Bigfoot in the world while peppering his narrative with timely social criticism about bad behavior on the human side of the conflict: The explosion of Rainier might have been better forecast had the president not slashed the budget of the U.S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows. Brooks is a pro at building suspense even if it plays out in some rather spectacularly yucky episodes, one involving a short spear that takes its name from “the sucking sound of pulling it out of the dead man’s heart and lungs.” Grossness aside, it puts you right there on the scene.
A tasty, if not always tasteful, tale of supernatural mayhem that fans of King and Crichton alike will enjoy.Pub Date: June 16, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-9848-2678-7
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Feb. 9, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2020
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK TO SCREEN
An enjoyable visit with an old character, but not one of Ware’s strongest.
Travel writer Lo Blacklock is back. Ten years after the events of The Woman in Cabin 10 (2016), she's attending the opening of a lavish Swiss hotel when, once again, a mystery intervenes.
A decade after she almost died on a luxury cruise and ended up exposing a murder plot, travel journalist Laura “Lo” Blacklock is trying to get back into the business post-Covid-19 and post–maternity leave. When she's invited to an exclusive hotel launch by the Leidmann Group on the shores of Switzerland’s gorgeous Lake Geneva, her supportive husband, Judah, insists that she should go, and her old boss, Rowan, says that if Lo can score an interview with the reclusive Marcus Leidmann, she’ll publish it in the Financial Times. Leaving Judah and the kids at home in New York, Lo is surprised by a last-minute upgrade to first class, which kicks off her trip in style. The hotel is appropriately awe-inspiring in both scenic location and effortless luxury, and Lo starts to put the memories of last trip’s trauma behind her, thinking that maybe she can just enjoy the experience this time. But then, at dinner, she's surprised to see at least three guests who were also on that original cruise, and when she finds a mysterious note in her room saying "Please come to suite 11 as soon as possible," she gets another shock. To quote William Faulkner, she realizes that “the past is never dead,” and soon Lo is careening across Europe on her way to England, only to find herself embroiled in another murder. The back half of the novel offers her the opportunity to continue her amateur sleuthing, and while she avoids much of the physical danger that plagued her on the cruise a decade ago, she is in very real legal trouble. This is the prolific Ware’s first sequel, and it's fun to spend time with Lo again, as she's both savvy and kindhearted. Unfortunately, the mystery is not as atmospheric and gripping as usual for Ware, though even a lesser Ruth Ware thriller is still worth reading.
An enjoyable visit with an old character, but not one of Ware’s strongest.Pub Date: July 8, 2025
ISBN: 9781668025628
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Scout Press/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: April 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2025
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