Engrossing, moving, and intricately detailed.
This duology closer following 2024’s The Last Bloodcarver explores how far you would go to save what you loved most.
As powerful a healing art as heartsoothing can be, it all boils down to the transfer of energy. Even a heartsooth can’t bring a dead body back to life without taking another, equivalent, life in exchange. Nhika gave her life and the gift of her heartsoothing to save Kochin, the unlikely ally she grew to love. But six months later, she wakes up with no knowledge of how she lived before or why—and Kochin, whom she does remember, is nowhere to be found. Past and present converge as war descends on the land of Theumas, and Nhika works to piece together the truth of what happened. Meanwhile, Kochin finds himself at the very end of his strength and morals, torn between defiling his art—Nhika’s parting gift to him—and reclaiming it. Le picks up where the previous installment left off without slacking the pace, and she immediately draws readers back into her Vietnamese-inspired fantasy world where there are neither heroes nor villains, saviors nor monsters, but only flawed and fragile people fueled by desperation and love. The characters are richly and sensitively portrayed, and Nhika and Kochin’s slow-burn romance is well integrated into the plot even as they fight for the “peace, freedom, [and] love” they’ve never known.
Engrossing, moving, and intricately detailed. (map) (Fantasy. 12-18)Pub Date: March 18, 2025
ISBN: 9781250881540
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Roaring Brook Press
Review Posted Online: Dec. 14, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2025
BOOK REVIEW
A light and entertaining plot-driven romance.
A Connecticut girl and her best friend devise a series of plans in order to achieve their goals: following a dream and winning back an ex.
Eighteen-year-old Audrey Barbour has a Master Plan: attend Blue Ridge Glass School in North Carolina and someday turn her Etsy shop, Golightly Glass, into a thriving business. But her uber-wealthy parents insist that she instead follow in their footsteps and go to business school. So Audrey decides to go find the tuition money she needs with help from her best friend, Henry Chen. Henry needs a favor, too: He hopes that fake dating Audrey will help him win back his ex-girlfriend, and he points out to a reluctant Audrey that this could make her crush, Griffin, notice her. While Audrey’s parents vacation in France for three weeks, the pair rent out the Barbour mansion on the Long Island Sound. Soon romantic chemistry grows alongside their business partnership. Despite the pair’s great preparation and an abundance of secondary characters with connections and talents to help pull off their increasingly ambitious ideas, plans go awry, leaving Audrey and Henry scrambling and second-guessing their choices. The pacing is even, but the characters often take a back seat to the whirlwind of activity that drives the plot, with the emphasis falling on each person’s practical skills and their role in keeping the action moving over their emotional bonds. Audrey is white, and Henry’s surname cues him as Chinese American.
A light and entertaining plot-driven romance. (Romance. 14-18)Pub Date: March 31, 2026
ISBN: 9780593904794
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Delacorte Romance
Review Posted Online: Dec. 12, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2026
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head.
The finely drawn characters capture readers’ attention in this debut.
Autumn and Phineas, nicknamed Finny, were born a week apart; their mothers are still best friends. Growing up, Autumn and Finny were like peas in a pod despite their differences: Autumn is “quirky and odd,” while Finny is “sweet and shy and everyone like[s] him.” But in eighth grade, Autumn and Finny stop being friends due to an unexpected kiss. They drift apart and find new friends, but their friendship keeps asserting itself at parties, shared holiday gatherings and random encounters. In the summer after graduation, Autumn and Finny reconnect and are finally ready to be more than friends. But on August 8, everything changes, and Autumn has to rely on all her strength to move on. Autumn’s coming-of-age is sensitively chronicled, with a wide range of experiences and events shaping her character. Even secondary characters are well-rounded, with their own histories and motivations.
There’s not much plot here, but readers will relish the opportunity to climb inside Autumn’s head. (Fiction. 14 & up)Pub Date: April 1, 2013
ISBN: 978-1-4022-7782-5
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 1, 2013
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
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