Realistic, character-driven fantasy that manages to both sever limbs and warm the heart.
In this dark YA fantasy debut, teenage twins are swept up in a prince’s quest for a legendary blade.
Seventeen-year-old twins Noraya and Owen Smith, the adopted children of a blacksmith named Rannoch, have left their home at the Ridge to cross the Plains. Owen dreams of becoming a pilgrim—a scholarly nomad—while Nora simply wants to escape the path of marriage, children, and boredom. With three weeks of travel ahead and winter approaching, they venture forth and soon meet Master Telen Diaz, a half-wight pilgrim with all-black eyes, who’s escorting the exiled Prince Bashan, the seeker of the Living Blade. Bashan, by using a sword that can “meld with its wielder to unleash a power so great it can change the course of the world,” hopes to take the throne back from his half sister. The Kandarin Empire, meanwhile, is overrun by marauders, and the twins see from the road that the Ridge is burning. Owen continues on with the Hunted Company—which, aside from Diaz, is full of thieves and murderers—to the Temple of the Wind, and Nora returns home. She finds the Ridge a charred wasteland, with everyone she knows dead or enslaved. She always carries a knife that brings her a “Touch of iron” and a “Touch of home,” and, with it, she itches for vengeance. Author Whitecastle’s debut offers a rigorous critique of the mythic-quest fantasy trope, portraying Prince Bashan as a sleazy powermonger who’s willing to burn ancient libraries to get the knowledge he seeks. As the narrative gallops between blood-drenched battles and character-driven stretches, Whitecastle conservatively introduces magical elements, maintaining a grim realism throughout. The dialogue, particularly Nora’s, often seems to wink at modern readers, as when Diaz says that “Wights can endure extreme temperatures,” and Nora replies, “That explains why you’re always so hot.” The many genuinely romantic moments between Diaz and Nora are like breaks of blue sky amid the carnage, which aren’t easily found in this genre. The excellent pacing and organic plotting will bring audiences back for the sequel.
Realistic, character-driven fantasy that manages to both sever limbs and warm the heart.Pub Date: May 13, 2016
ISBN: 978-1-5330-8043-1
Page Count: 354
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: April 16, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.
On the orders of her mother, a woman goes to dragon-riding school.
Even though her mother is a general in Navarre’s army, 20-year-old Violet Sorrengail was raised by her father to follow his path as a scribe. After his death, though, Violet's mother shocks her by forcing her to enter the elite and deadly dragon rider academy at Basgiath War College. Most students die at the War College: during training sessions, at the hands of their classmates, or by the very dragons they hope to one day be paired with. From Day One, Violet is targeted by her classmates, some because they hate her mother, others because they think she’s too physically frail to succeed. She must survive a daily gauntlet of physical challenges and the deadly attacks of classmates, which she does with the help of secret knowledge handed down by her two older siblings, who'd been students there before her. Violet is at the mercy of the plot rather than being in charge of it, hurtling through one obstacle after another. As a result, the story is action-packed and fast-paced, but Violet is a strange mix of pure competence and total passivity, always managing to come out on the winning side. The book is categorized as romantasy, with Violet pulled between the comforting love she feels from her childhood best friend, Dain Aetos, and the incendiary attraction she feels for family enemy Xaden Riorson. However, the way Dain constantly undermines Violet's abilities and his lack of character development make this an unconvincing storyline. The plots and subplots aren’t well-integrated, with the first half purely focused on Violet’s training, followed by a brief detour for romance, and then a final focus on outside threats.
Read this for the action-packed plot, not character development or worldbuilding.Pub Date: May 2, 2023
ISBN: 9781649374042
Page Count: 528
Publisher: Red Tower
Review Posted Online: Jan. 12, 2024
SEEN & HEARD
BOOK TO SCREEN
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.
Using mystery and romance elements in a nonlinear narrative, SenLinYu’s debut is a doorstopper of a fantasy that follows a woman with missing memories as she navigates through a war-torn realm in search of herself.
Helena Marino is a talented young healer living in Paladia—the “Shining City”—who has been thrust into a brutal war against an all-powerful necromancer and his army of Undying, loyal henchmen with immortal bodies, and necrothralls, reanimated automatons. When Helena is awakened from stasis, a prisoner of the necromancer’s forces, she has no idea how long she has been incarcerated—or the status of the war. She soon finds herself a personal prisoner of Kaine Ferron, the High Necromancer’s “monster” psychopath who has sadistically killed hundreds for his master. Ordered to recover Helena’s buried memories by any means necessary, the two polar opposites—Helena and Kaine, healer and killer—end up discovering much more as they begin to understand each other through shared trauma. While necromancy is an oft-trod subject in fantasy novels, the author gives it a fresh feel—in large part because of their superb worldbuilding coupled with unforgettable imagery throughout: “[The necromancer] lay reclined upon a throne of bodies. Necrothralls, contorted and twisted together, their limbs transmuted and fused into a chair, moving in synchrony, rising and falling as they breathed in tandem, squeezing and releasing around him…[He] extended his decrepit right hand, overlarge with fingers jointed like spider legs.” Another noteworthy element is the complex dynamic between Helena and Kaine. To say that these two characters shared the gamut of intense emotions would be a vast understatement. Readers will come for the fantasy and stay for the romance.
Although the melodrama sometimes is a bit much, the superb worldbuilding and intricate plotline make this a must-read.Pub Date: Sept. 23, 2025
ISBN: 9780593972700
Page Count: 1040
Publisher: Del Rey
Review Posted Online: July 17, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2025
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
