THE DARKENING

A prince and a rebel’s daughter must find a way to stop a dangerous storm from consuming their city.

Years ago, Vesper’s parents led a failed revolt against their city’s ruler, the Regia. Her Ma was lost to the unceasing Storm that surrounds them all; her Pa, a talented ikonomancer, became a fugitive, hiding with Vesper in the city’s fifth ring among the poor and the outcast. When Pa is captured by Prince Dalca, the current Regia’s son and the leader of the Wardana, the city’s guardians, 17-year-old Vesper vows to rescue him. She finds an ally in Izamal, a revolution-minded Wardana from the fifth ring who helps her gain access to the ikonamancers’ headquarters—and to Dalca—as an apprentice. Vesper’s proximity to Dalca allows her to see an unexpectedly vulnerable side to the prince, complicating her animosity toward him, and when she learns about the true natures of the Regia and the Storm, Vesper realizes that she and Dalca may actually share a common goal. The book’s setting—a city trapped within a storm, ruled by a powerful deity in human form—is intriguing, as are the descriptions of its magic system, ikonomancy, which utilizes symbols to activate spells. The story moves briskly from start to dramatic finish, driven by the characters’ urgency and desperation to save their families and their city from destruction. Characters are diverse in appearance.

A dark and emotionally charged fantasy.