Review of The Stolen Heir, by Holly Black

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Stolen Heir

by Holly Black
read by Saskia Maarleveld

Hachette Audio, 2023. 10 hours, 10 minutes.
Review written February 24, 2023, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

Oh my goodness, Holly Black has done it again! The Stolen Heir begins a new duology set in Elfhame. (Yay! We only have to wait for one more book!) These events happen eight years after the trilogy The Cruel Prince, The Wicked King, and The Queen of Nothing. So those who were children in the earlier books have grown. You don’t have to have read the trilogy to enjoy this book, but why not? It made me want to go back and reread them.

This book features Suren, who was once the child queen of The Court of Teeth, but bridled and manipulated by Lady Nore of the Court of Teeth. She was then betrothed to Oak, the young heir to Elfhame, as Lady Nore planned to use her to take over Elfhame.

Now Suren is in exile in the human world. She scrounges a life in the forest and spies on the human family with whom she spent the first seven years of her life, before Lady Nore stole her back and tormented and abused her. Without glamour, she’s a thing of horror to humans, with the teeth of a predator.

Oak, on the other hand, has been living a life of luxury at court. He’s beautiful, smooth and well-spoken, makes everyone at ease. Although like all the Fae, he can’t lie, he does know how to deceive and manipulate.

Suren thinks she’s at least safe in her lair in the woods. But then one day a storm hag comes hunting for her. She’s rescued by Oak and his knight and their prisoner — someone who wears the very bridle that once controlled Suren.

They tell Suren that they are going to the Court of Teeth to recover Mab’s Bones, which Lady Nore has acquired and is using to create deadly creatures and wield power. Suren is Lady Nore’s one vulnerability, having been given the power to command her. But because of that, Suren is now in danger. Lady Nore’s simplest way to stop the vulnerability is to kill Suren.

Suren agrees to go on the quest. The storm witch coming after her has convinced her that Oak is right and her life is in danger unless she commands Lady Nore to stop. But she quickly realizes that Oak isn’t telling her everything.

What follows is another story from Holly Black full of twists and turns that keep you guessing. What is Oak not telling Suren? And what is she keeping back herself? And how, exactly, do they feel about each other? As they travel on the journey, Suren must also confront the trauma of her past and think about how she wants to go forward.

The book is full of danger, schemes and counterschemes, and unexpected actions that weren’t part of the schemes but are consistent with the complex characters. Suren has been told all her life that she’s worthless and useless, so we’re pulling for her as she tries to come into her own — and figure out what that means.

The book ends in a satisfying place — and yet an infuriating one, because the story is by no means complete, and we’re dying to know what happens next.

blackholly.com

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Review of So This Is Ever After, by F. T. Lukens, read by Kevin R. Free

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

So This Is Ever After

by F. T. Lukens
read by Kevin R. Free

Simon & Schuster Audio, 2022. 9 hours, 33 minutes.
Review written December 27, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

So This Is Ever After is simply a whole lot of fun. The book begins when there’s supposed to be a Happily Ever After — after Arek defeated the Vile One by fulfilling the prophecy, assembling a band of allies, infiltrating the castle, and chopping off the evil king’s head.

What Arek hoped would happen after that was that things would slow down and he’d get a chance to confess his love to Matt, his best friend and the mage who fought beside him on the quest.

But they don’t want to leave the throne empty for just anyone to take over, and Matt urges Arek to put the crown on his head and take the kingship for a few hours while they go rescue the rightful ruler — the last princess of the royal line, who’s locked in a tower.

Well, they do find the princess in a tower — but she’s so dead, she’s become a skeleton. And Arek discovers, much to his discomfort, that he’s magically bound to the throne. He can’t abdicate, or it will kill him. And then he learns that he has to bond with a soulmate by his eighteenth birthday only four months away. He doesn’t want to tie Matt to him unless Matt is willing, but when he awkwardly tries to find out, the door gets totally shut. So instead, Arek asks Matt to help him find a soulmate in four months.

What follows is a comedy of errors. Yes, it does feel contrived for Arek to do everything exactly wrong. Arek isn’t particular about whether his soulmate is male, female, or neither, so he tries to woo each one of his friends in turn — with comical results that always seem to throw him toward Matt.

This is a totally fun, light-hearted story about what happens after the quest is done and you’re stuck ruling a kingdom. It helps if you have tried-and-true friends by your side.

ft-lukens.com

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Review of The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester, by Maya MacGregor

Contemporary, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Many Half-Lived Lives of Sam Sylvester

by Maya MacGregor

Astra Young Readers, 2022. 350 pages.
Review written December 9, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

Sam is an eighteen-year-old nonbinary kid who’s moving with their dad from Minnesota to small-town Oregon after an episode of bullying that almost killed them. They’re comforted that in their new school, they find other queer kids and even start making friends.

But there are bullies everywhere. For years, Sam has been obsessed with the stories of kids who didn’t live to age nineteen. They’ve got a book about those half-lived lives. And as it happens, the house their family bought used to belong to one of those kids, named Billy. And Sam is now sleeping in the bedroom where Billy died thirty years ago.

The adults in town all seem to say the same words about Billy, “It was a tragic accident.” But was it? Sam starts thinking they sense Billy’s presence, and what’s up with that persistent smell of popcorn?

What really happened to Billy? Sam’s new friend Shep thinks they can learn the truth.

But someone doesn’t want them to mess around with the past. Or is it just another case of Sam being bullied for who they are? Sam can’t help but wonder if they will ever reach the age of nineteen or end up as another half-lived life.

This book tells a compelling mystery in a warm and loving story about a queer teen recovering from trauma and finding their people. There is danger as they come close to the solution of the mystery, and the book certainly touches on serious topics, but I was left uplifted and encouraged by a group of people trying their best and landing on the side of caring.

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Review of All That’s Left in the World, by Erik J. Brown

Audiobooks, Science Fiction, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

All That’s Left in the World

by Erik J. Brown
read by Barrett Leddy and Andrew Gibson

HarperAudio, 2022. 10 hours, 6 minutes.
Review written October 21, 2022, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review
2022 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #6 General Teen Fiction

All That’s Left in the World is about two teenage boys trying to figure out how to go on in a post-apocalyptic world after everyone they loved died in a superflu epidemic.

The author’s note says that he signed the contract for this book in March 2020 — so he had no idea how realistic it would feel. But the illness in this book is much, much worse than Covid-19, and civilization in America has completely broken down.

At the start of the book, Jamison is in a mountain cabin that has its own electricity and well water. Andrew is in the woods in big trouble because he stepped into a bear trap. He needs help. When he sees the cabin, he tries the door, expecting anyone who lived there to be dead. Jamie almost shoots him, but instead ends up giving him antibiotics and helping him recover.

But after they’re settling into life in the cabin and getting used to each other and Andrew’s leg is much better, a group comes and steals their food, trying to get them to join their settlement. Andrew takes off to where he was going before — following rumors that the European Union is going to bring help to Reagan National Airport. He tries to sneak away so Jamie won’t stop him — and Jamie ends up coming after him.

What follows is a road trip novel with lots of danger. Some of the people they meet along the way are helpful and kind, but most are the opposite. (I wish I didn’t believe there’d be so many guns in post-apocalyptic America!) Just when I’d think they had things in a good place, some new danger would find them.

So there’s lots of tension, and there’s also romance. It’s the kind I like best, very slow and gradual, and you can understand why they like each other. Andrew knows he’s gay from the start, but Jamie has had only girlfriends in the past, and is confused by his developing feelings for Andrew. But it’s all handled really well, and the reader just hopes against hope they’ll be able to make it to somewhere safe.

I read a novel in late 2020 where the whole population caught a bug, and knowing so much about pandemics by then, I thought it was completely unrealistic. (Viruses don’t spread instantly, for example.) With this one, which took place after most people had died, I wish I didn’t feel like it was believable, but unfortunately it very much seems like it could happen like that.

Of course, there are things I would have done differently if I were writing a post-apocalyptic novel, but this author had me believing the story all along, and worrying about how the boys would survive and figure out they loved each other.

For something as disturbing as this scenario, this was an awfully satisfying novel.

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Review of Bad Witch Burning, by Jessica Lewis

Paranormal, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Bad Witch Burning

by Jessica Lewis

Delacorte Press, 2021. 340 pages.
Review written January 17, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review
2021 Cybils Finalist, Young Adult Speculative Fiction
2022 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #6 Paranormal Teen Fiction

This book is so, so creepy!

I’m not usually a fan of creepy books, and if I hadn’t been reading it as a Cybils Finalist, I might have quit. I’m so glad I finished – this book is amazing.

The set-up is that sixteen-year-old Katrell has discovered she can help people communicate with their dead loved ones. All she has to do is write them a letter. The letter will catch on fire, and the loved one will appear. Okay, it gives Trell a headache, but she can make money that way. And she needs money, because her mother lost her job and her mother’s boyfriend Gerald likes to eat, and it’s up to Trell to pay the rent.

But then Gerald shoots Trell’s beloved dog Conrad – and in her anguish, Trell writes Conrad a letter, asking him to come back – and he does! Will this same thing work on humans? There’s a whole lot more money in resurrection than there was in simple communication with the dead.

No surprise, though – there are awful consequences to bringing people back to life.

This book is full of suspense and tension and horror – in the best possible way. Normally, when my time reading a book is full of mentally screaming to the main character, “Don’t do that! Don’t do that!” – normally, I would think it was either unrealistic or the character is just stupid. In this case, although maybe Katrell didn’t exercise the best judgment, the author made me understand how strong her motivation was to continue. Never having had enough money makes money a pull, and being threatened by a powerful drug dealer is strong motivation, too.

I found myself completely caring for Katrell, and wanting her to get a break, to trust the people who care about her – and not be killed by the out-of-control Revenants she’d brought back from death.

Amazing that this is a debut novel. Can’t wait to read more from this author!

authorjessicalewis.com
GetUnderlined.com

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Review of Year of the Reaper, by Makiia Lucier

Fantasy, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Year of the Reaper

by Makiia Lucier

Clarion Books, 2021. 324 pages.
Review written November 9, 2022, from a library book.
Starred Review

When I was more than halfway through this book, I looked at some ads for other books in the back and realized that this author also wrote The Isle of Blood and Stone, which I had enjoyed very much during my Newbery reading, but ended up being more Young Adult than Children’s. There’s something about her writing that captivates me. I’m going to look for more of her books.

This book takes place after war and plague have ravaged a medieval world. A prologue shows us a delegation from Brisa, including Princess Jehan and her maid Lady Mari. She is going to Olveras to marry the king — and stop a war that’s been going on for fifty-two years. But on the way, they left behind guards who came down with the plague, until finally the ambassador himself, Lady Mari’s father, succumbed. He sent her on with a small party. Because nothing is more important than stopping the war.

The main book starts a year later, featuring Cas, a nobleman coming back after three years in a Brisan prison. He didn’t get out because of the new peace. He got out because everyone in the prison caught the plague, and Cas survived. On his way home, we learn that Cas can see ghosts. He tries to pretend he can’t, so they won’t try to talk with him, but sometimes he gives himself away.

He has some adventures along the way, including a woman stealing his horse and then him needing to save her from a lynx with the plague. But when he arrives in his home city, he learns the king and his new queen are there, and it is their son’s naming day. But when Cas sees an assassin in a tower shoot an arrow at the prince’s nurse, Cas is the one who is quick enough to save the baby from the lake. But the assassin escapes.

The story that follows includes Cas trying to get used to living among people again, as well as trying to keep the royal family safe from whatever the assassin has planned.

I’ll admit that I saw a major twist coming right from the start — because a very similar twist happened in a book I’d recently read. But that was merely coincidence. I thought it wasn’t obvious if you hadn’t just read a similar book.

The characters in this book won me over — they’re flawed, and they’re dealing with tremendously difficult things. But you watch them, for the most part, making good choices and caring about people. It’s a story that won my heart.

makiialucier.com

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Review of Lakelore, by Anna-Marie McLemore

Paranormal, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Lakelore

by Anna-Marie McLemore
read by Vico Ortiz and Avi Roque

Recorded Books, 2022. 6 hours, 29 minutes.
Review written October 25, 2022, from a library eaudiobook
Starred Review

In my years of reading speculative fiction for the Cybils, I’ve become a fan of Anna-Marie McLemore. I didn’t think of myself as a fan of magical realism until I started loving her books. They also often include wonderfully nuanced representation of transgender characters.

Lakelore features two transgender teens. Bastián is a transgender boy and Lore is transgender nonbinary. Both have brown skin, and both have encountered discrimination and bullying.

Both kids have also dealt with brains that don’t work like other people’s. Bastián has ADHD and has learned to manage his thought processes so he can function. As part of that management, his brother taught him to make alebrijos, fantastical creatures made of wire and papier-mâché. When something is bothering Bastián so much he can’t stop thinking about it, he makes an alebrijo and puts that energy into it. Then he releases the alebrijo into the world under the lake, the one no one else knows about, and it gets out of his mind.

Well, almost no one else knows about the world under the lake. One day when they were nine years old, Lore was visiting the lake on a field trip and ran from a bully. She ran past Bastián, and much to both of their surprise, the world under the lake opened up for Lore as well, and she was able to hide there until the bully had stopped looking for her.

Now they are sixteen, and after a disaster at school, Lore’s family has moved to the town by the lake. It’s summer, but when she encounters Bastián, they both remember. Lore has dyslexia, and that has added to the bullying she’s encountered.

But after Lore shows up in town, the world under the lake starts coming to them. The alebrijos come to life and swim through the air to find them. The walls in Lore’s new home echo with a ghostly laugh that only she can hear, and she sees water coming up from the lake.

What does it all mean? And what does it have to do with the parts of themselves they’re hiding from one another?

This book gives a wonderful portrayal of how it feels to be transgender, as well as how it feels to live with ADHD and dyslexia. The paranormal context make it much more interesting than a problem novel, though. Really beautiful writing and a wonderful story of friendship and learning to reach self-acceptance.

annamariemclemore.com
fiercereads.com

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Review of The Weight of Blood, by Tiffany D. Jackson

Contemporary, Paranormal, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Weight of Blood

by Tiffany D. Jackson

Katherine Tegen Books (HarperCollins), 2022. 406 pages.
Review written December 15, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review
2022 Cybils Finalist, Young Adult Speculative Fiction
2022 Sonderbooks Stand-out, #4 Teen Paranormal Fiction

I’m usually not a fan of horror novels, but I read this one for the Cybils, and had to admit it’s wonderfully executed.

The author warns you right from the start that there’s going to be carnage. Chapter 1 begins with an excerpt from a podcast called “Maddy Did It,” and that begins with sworn testimony from “The Springville Massacre Commission.” That testimony from a mother ends this way:

Only two kids survived Prom Night at that country club. Cole was one of them. They say when you go through something like that, your instincts kick in. So his mind must’ve told him to come on home. He walked over two miles through the mud with one shoe, covered in the blood of other children.

When I asked him what happened . . . he just kept mumbling, “Maddy did it.”

Then we go back in time to May 2014. Maddy Washington is horrified that in gym class she has to run in a sudden rainstorm that has come up, despite her checking the forecast three times, as her Papa demands. Sure enough, when her hair gets wet, her hair expands into an Afro, and the entire school learns that her mother was Black.

It’s a small southern town. They don’t think they’re racist, but they’ve always had two separate proms, one for white kids and one for Black kids. And when Maddy suddenly sprouts an Afro, kids laugh and throw pencils into her hair, marveling that she doesn’t even notice.

Maddy’s always been an outsider. She keeps to herself and doesn’t say much in class. She lives alone with her Papa who makes her pray for hours in a closet with pictures of beautiful white women on the walls that her sin will not come out. She wishes she could be like normal kids.

But when she’s humiliated in class, something strange happens. The chairs float, there’s some kind of earthquake, cellphones quit working, and all the kids get terrible headaches.

Before the cellphones quit working, someone filmed the taunting and posted it on the internet. Now everyone’s talking about the racist small town in Alabama.

Wendy is a senior who feels guilty about it all. She’s not the ringleader of the group bullying Maddy, but her best friend is, and Wendy went along with it. Wendy’s boyfriend is Kenny, the star of the football team. He’s Black, but doesn’t hang out with the other Black kids. Wendy doesn’t like how he’s sticking up for Maddy, and she doesn’t like how she comes out looking like a racist, too.

So Wendy gets the bright idea of combining the white prom and the Black prom. She wasn’t going to go anyway, but she’s organizing the whole thing. And what could be more noble than asking her boyfriend, the town all-star, to take Maddy to the prom?

Of course, we know from the podcast excerpts that open the chapters that this decision will lead to disaster. And meanwhile, Maddy is learning about the power of telekinesis. Could this power have come from her missing Mama?

This book is a hard one to put down. The author shines a light on racism that pretends it’s not racism and gets you firmly on Maddy’s side, despite knowing that something terrible is about to happen. That mild-mannered, socially backward recluse was the wrong person to bully!

A truly masterful story of a downtrodden girl coming into her power.

writeinbk.com
EpicReads.com

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Review of Moira’s Pen, by Megan Whalen Turner

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Moira’s Pen

A Queen’s Thief Collection

by Megan Whalen Turner
illustrations by Deena So’Oteh

Greenwillow Books, 2022. 203 pages.
Review written December 19, 2022, from my own copy pre-ordered from amazon.com
Starred Review

I’m so happy to enter the world of the Queen’s Thief again! Moira’s Pen is a collection of stories about the beloved characters from The Queen’s Thief series, giving a little more insight and backstory in some cases, in other cases letting us know what happened later or with side characters. The time range goes from Gen’s childhood to the life of one of his descendants.

Because it’s so wrapped up in the other six books, I don’t recommend this as a gateway to the series, but it’s a delightful dessert after you’ve read the books — and will make you want to reread the whole thing.

Megan Whalen Turner also includes some pictures of actual artifacts that inspired elements of the series. So you’ve got some insight into the stories behind the stories. This is a lovely volume, as besides those illustrations, there are full-page pictures for each story.

Here’s the explanation for the title from the front of the book:

Moira is the messenger of the gods. She carries a feather pen, sometimes in her hand, sometimes behind her ear. In the past, Moira loaned her pen to mortals. When the historian Eutritus succumbed to temptation and used it not just to record history, but to alter it, Moira promised the Great Goddess Hephestia never to do so again. After that, historians could only pray that she would guide their pens and be their muse.

Not only historians prayed to her, though. All wordwrights did. Every year a playwriting competition was held in Moira’s honor in the city of Attolia. The plays were performed during the Moirian Festival, and the winner of the competition would receive a feather pen crafted from solid gold.

Nearest of the gods to mortals, Moira sees them in all their folly and their wisdom and records what she sees. When people wished for something to come true they would say, “May it be written with Moira’s pen.”

I faced a dilemma when my preordered copy of this book arrived. I was reading for the Cybils, so I didn’t have time for this book (which was published after the deadline). But how could I resist? Well, the answer came when I realized that since it’s short stories, I could read a short story from this book as a reward for finishing another book. That ended up spreading out the book and making me happy each time I treated myself to another story.

Fans of Megan Whalen Turner will be delighted with this book.

meganwhalenturner.org

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Review of From Dust, a Flame, by Rebecca Podos

Paranormal, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

From Dust, a Flame

by Rebecca Podos

Balzer + Bray, 2022. 400 pages.
Review written November 12, 2022, from a library book
Starred Review

Wow. This is one of those books I can only describe as intricately woven.

The story begins simply enough. It’s the eve of Hannah’s seventeenth birthday, and what she wants is to get to go to summer school to improve that one B she got. But her mother insists they can’t afford it, even though she’s dragged them all around the country until Hannah got into Winthrop Academy. Then her big brother Gabe lets down their birthday tradition by not staying awake until her birthday hits. But those annoyances fade to insignificance when, on her birthday, Hannah wakes up with yellow eyes, slitted like a snake’s.

But before they can do anything, the next day she wakes up with a new deformity, ranging from fins to scales to claws. They always go away in the night, and she always wakes up with something new.

Hannah’s mother takes the problem to heart. She says she knows a specialist who can fix the problem, and Hannah and Gabe should stay in their apartment. She’ll be back in a few days.

Instead, their mother is gone for weeks. So when they get a mysterious note telling them about their grandmother’s death — a grandmother they didn’t know existed — they show up to sit shiva with a big Jewish family they knew nothing about.

After they get to the home of relatives, we start getting occasional chapters telling us about what happened when Hannah’s mother was seventeen and why she left her mother’s house, never to return. And that story has to do with her mother’s mother, the one who recently died, and her history in Prague before the war, as well as stories she brought with her, and maybe something more tangible.

There are stories within stories here, and ultimately deep danger to Hannah and everyone she loves. This book is wonderfully woven and involves golems and sheydim and amulets from Jewish folklore.

rebeccapodos.com
epicreads.com

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