This lengthy, measured, and character-driven tale of magic kicks off what promises to be an engrossing saga.
In Lejeune’s debut fantasy novel and series launch, a teen mage hides in a bustling city to safeguard a parchment that holds potentially deadly secrets.
Summer Fontenay, who has just graduated from the Imperial College of Magic, contemplates her future. Her life takes an unexpected detour when she finds the Master Reader, whom she’s been assisting, on the verge of death; he hands her a parchment he’s been translating and, with his final words, tells her to take it to the city of Torrick. She’s to deliver it to the only scholar the Master Reader trusts, but he’s not an easy man to track down. The enigmatic manuscript now in Summer’s possession contains “terrible knowledge” that many people crave, and it’s not long before some interested parties are hunting her to get their hands on the parchment (she also happens to be a murder suspect in the Master reader’s death). Around the same time, 17-year-old mage-to-be Cole Culhane is studying in Torrick. When he surmises that a skilled thief has stolen his books, which he can’t afford to replace, Cole winds up entangled with a group of criminals who are, unsurprisingly, not very trustworthy. His path ultimately crosses with Summer’s, along with those of several others determined to secure the parchment. All the while, Summer struggles to keep her head down, whether among the temples and towers of Torrick’s Upper City or navigating the crowded marketplace in the Lower City.
Lejeune’s impressive worldbuilding introduces myriad characters in an expansive Empire, although the story predominantly sticks to a few cities. The cast includes several standouts who garner the spotlight, like Summer’s fellow graduate Fenya, who’s looking for Summer at the behest of the Wizarding Guild, and Deputy Marshal Arlen, who investigates a fatal drowning and probable murder. All of these plot strands, like Summer’s and Cole’s, intersect in some capacity before this opening series installment is over. Throughout, magic is sublimely incorporated into the narrative without overwhelming it: Some try persuading others through enchantments or hide things with charms; there are “linked” mirrors for instant transportation; and Fenya uses a hex to bully Summer back at school. The author jam-packs the novel with subplots—many spin off into additional subplots. While these secondary stories are absorbing in their own right (such as Cole’s curious encounter with “the River Lady”), they also have the tendency to, at least temporarily, sideline the more essential elements, like Summer finding the scholar or Cole recovering his books. All of the colorful individuals gathered prompt dialogue-laden scenes, but it’s Lejeune’s sharp details that shine brightest: “Men in robes stood about talking in low voices… The large table had been cleared and a great map of the city laid out. [Chief clerk] Olmo, old and stout, was busy explaining it to a gaggle of mages.” By the novel’s end, readers will have no trouble guessing the direction that the planned sequel will likely take.
This lengthy, measured, and character-driven tale of magic kicks off what promises to be an engrossing saga.Pub Date: Nov. 20, 2023
ISBN: 9781739556402
Page Count: 728
Publisher: Self
Review Posted Online: July 18, 2024
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
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