Review of Gwen & Art Are Not in Love, by Lex Croucher, read by Sarah Ovens and Alex Singh

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Gwen and Art Are Not in Love

by Lex Croucher
read by Sarah Ovens and Alex Singh

Macmillan Young Listeners, 2023. 10 hours, 48 minutes.
Review written October 26, 2024, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

Okay, this one is just lots of fun. It’s set in England a few hundred years after Arthur Pendragon. Gwen’s father, a descendant of Arthur Pendragon, has moved the capital to Camelot to try to hold onto the kingdom. He’s also made an alliance when Gwen was a baby to win over the cultists, and betrothed her to Arthur, now 19 years old and also a descendant of Arthur Pendragon.

Gwen and Art have despised each other since they were children and Gwen broke Art’s arm and Art put a toad in her bed. Now? Well, as it happens, Gwen spots Art kissing a boy, but then Art discovers Gwen’s diary and learns she’s in love with Lady Bridget, the only female knight in the kingdom, who is currently competing in the big tournament in Camelot.

And then Art starts falling for Gabriel, Gwen’s brother and the heir to the throne. But both Gwen and Gabriel thought that someone in their position wasn’t allowed to be happy. But maybe Gwen and Art should go through with their engagement, because who could understand them better?

I’m calling this Fantasy because it’s a fantasy England where Arthur was real, and many in the story believe in magic, but no actual magic happens in the book (that we can be sure is magic, anyway).

The story has lots of hijinks and laughs and scrapes, but there’s a serious side because there is unrest in the kingdom. The narrators are lovely (I always like British accents!) and this is one I’m sure I enjoyed all the more from listening to it. Just plain fun.

lexcroucher.co.uk

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Review of Death at Morning House, by Maureen Johnson, read by Katherine Littrell

Contemporary, Mystery, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Death at Morning House

by Maureen Johnson
read by Katherine Littrell

HarperTeen, 2024. 9 hours, 23 minutes.
Review written October 28, 2024, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

I believe that in reading this book, I’ve caught up on all the Maureen-Johnson-authored murder mysteries. And they’re good! As you can tell from her guidebook for adults, Your Guide to Not Getting Murdered in a Quaint English Village, she knows the conventions of the great mystery novels and how to use them to create something modern and new.

Death at Morning House is a stand-alone murder mystery, not part of the Stevie Bell Truly Devious series, but like those books, there’s a place where mysterious deaths happened almost a hundred years ago – and there’s a more recent death – and then someone goes missing in the novel’s present day. We do get the story of the old deaths slowly revealed, and our teen protagonist Marlowe Wexler discovers clues to the modern-day deaths. And yes, finding those clues puts Marlowe in great danger – in this book, before she even knows who’s responsible.

As the book opens, it’s the start of summer, and Marlowe is taking the girl she’s long had a crush on to her aunt and uncle’s cabin – a place Marlowe is paid to watch over in their absence. Marlowe had gotten a special scented candle in a scent her crush likes – and while they are kissing, the candle explodes and the house sustains serious fire damage.

Marlowe does not respond well. She’s afraid to talk to her crush. She becomes famous in her small town as a pyromaniac (even though the police confirm it was an accident), and she decides the only way to cope is to mope around in bed.

But then her history teacher tells Marlowe about an opportunity to spend the summer on an island in the St. Lawrence River, part of a team of teens offering tours of a historic home there. It sounds like a great way to get out of town, but the teacher doesn’t tell Marlowe that the reason there’s an opening is that one of the local teens who was planning to be there recently died at a party after prom. And part of the history of the house is the two children who died there from the original family that owned the house.

It all adds up to a great story with interesting characters and a strong sense of place. And of course, a big storm comes in not long after someone new goes missing, so there’s no way to get off the island for help if anything bad should happen.

I have to say that I am completely on board with Maureen Johnson’s recent trend of writing mysteries. She’s good! The situations and characters are varied, but there’s always an intriguing puzzle and characters you enjoy spending time with – and hope will stay alive.

maureenjohnsonbooks.com

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Review of A Drop of Venom, by Sajni Patel

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

A Drop of Venom

by Sajni Patel

Rick Riordan Presents (Disney/Hyperion), 2024. 393 pages.
Review written October 26, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

Here’s the idea behind this book: What if Medusa’s wrath was justified? The story is told by the victors, after all. A Drop of Venom combines the idea of Medusa with Indian mythology to give us one of the Nagin people with an affinity for snakes.

We’ve got two protagonists throughout the book. One is Manisha, a girl who when she was small was sent away from her family for her own protection when her family’s home was attacked. Manisha was sent to the temple, to hide her origins and become a temple priestess. There she meets our other protagonist, the king’s slayer, Pratyush.

Pratyush is the last in a line of supernatural monster slayers. His father and mother lived in hiding from the king, but when the king’s soldiers found them, a monster killed him. They took Pratyush to the king, and he had to slay monsters in order for his sister to be cared for. But after his sister got married off to a noble who abused her, and she eventually died, Pratyush has lost enthusiasm for killing for the king. He wants to settle down and marry that beautiful priestess he’s been flirting with at the temple. The king agrees, if he brings back the head of one last monster, the Serpent Queen who’s been turning men into stone.

What Pratyush doesn’t know was that while he was gone, Manisha was raped by a powerful man and kicked off the temple mountain in the clouds. But she didn’t die. In fact, a pit of vipers cushioned her fall, and the snakes gave her magical powers. She has a golden snake familiar that keeps growing bigger and bigger, and she’s traveling south to find her family. But she encounters people along the way, and some of them are very bad, and Manisha now has power to fight back.

There is violence in this book, and some horrible deaths. But for the most part, it’s a book about the powerless fighting back against injustice.

The book is atmospheric and pulls you along with each character. Unfortunately or fortunately (there will be more!), the story is not finished with this book, though we do have a face-off between the supposed monster and the slayer.

This is a fantasy story with many overtones about justice and power. It felt good to watch Manisha coming into her power.

sajnipatel.com
RickRiordan.com
HyperionTeens.com

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Review of Unbecoming, by Seema Yasmin

Contemporary, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Unbecoming

by Seema Yasmin

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2024. 352 pages.
Review written October 21, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

Unbecoming is just barely speculative fiction – may it continue to be speculative! It’s about a near-future United States where abortion is illegal, and so is any and all type of hormonal pill. So birth control pills are illegal, as is hormone replacement therapy and IVF.

Our two teen protagonists, Laylah and Noor, are seniors in high school living in Texas in a Muslim community. Laylah is active with the mosque youth group, but Noor has been staying away for a couple years. They are working together to write an online website called “A Texas Teen’s Guide to Safe Abortion.”

But as the book opens, Laylah is in a sketchy mobile clinic disguised as a taco truck – and learns that she is pregnant.

This does not fit with her plans to go to medical school and become a doctor. She would like to take the abortion pill within 70 days since her last period – the time when it’s effective – but that clinic is out of them and says they’re impossible to find in Texas.

So the book is about Laylah trying to pretend nothing is wrong and that she’s researching for the Guide – but trying to find a way to get the abortion pill before she runs out of time. Her adventures include a couple of dangerous scenarios, and the clock is ticking the whole time. (If she has to get a surgical abortion, she’s told she’ll have to go to Mexico.)

Meanwhile, Noor is working to become an investigative journalist, and she’s convinced the wife of the iman and leader of the mosque’s youth group is up to something shady with mosque funds. But she doesn’t want to tell Laylah, because Laylah trusts the woman. And on top of this there are family expectations, not to mention the expectations of all the ladies in their community. So both Laylah and Noor have secrets from each other and feel guilty about it.

This is a good book to read before the election – may it never come true!

Now, if you believe abortion is murder (as I once did), this might be hard to read. Laylah doesn’t give a thought to the beginning life inside her and can be taken as an example of someone who forgot to use birth control and now is paying the price. (It didn’t help that the birth control pill is illegal, but her partner didn’t use a condom, either, and she’s kicking herself.)

But hold on. Even if you believe that, this book illustrates the exact thing that made me stop being a one-issue voter about abortion. Why would banning abortion work any better than Prohibition did? If you pass a law that the majority do not feel is right – it’s going to become a matter of pride and virtue to help people get around that law. All the mobile clinics, including the sketchy ones, the teen guide – you’d better believe a whole network would rise up to subvert the law. It would end up being only the people with the most resources and connections who could find safe treatment, but definitely a movement would rise up.

Either way, you’re going to have sympathy for a teen who made one bad decision, knows she did, and now must deal with the consequences. Seema Yasmin tells a good story about interesting characters. Oh, and there’s a historical story in this book about her grandmother in India who almost got involuntarily sterilized by her government in the 1970s. (I had no idea that happened.) Controlling people’s reproductivity has a long history.

This book gives you a good story, but it also makes you think.

seemayasmin.com

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Review of The Invocations, by Krystal Sutherland, read by Kit Griffiths

Paranormal, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Invocations

by Krystal Sutherland
read by Kit Griffiths

Listening Library, 2024. 13 hours, 7 minutes.
Review written October 20, 2024, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

First, fair warning: This book is much darker than the books I usually review, closer to horror than the cozy kind of fantasy I usually enjoy. But even I have to admit that this book is skillfully written, building suspense throughout and tying multiple threads together in a satisfying way.

This is a world like ours, but where women can do magic by tattooing an invocation on their skin that gives a demon a small piece of their soul in exchange for power, and tethering that demon to the person for the rest of her life.

This book has three main characters: Zara is in high school and is trying to find reliable books on necromancy. Because she’s determined to bring her sister back to life. Her sister was killed almost one year ago, and the books all say that after a year, there’s not enough of the person left to reliably bring them back. If Zara can’t do it, she’d like to find a witch who can.

Jude is the daughter of a billionaire, but she’s been sequestered away from the family ever since she messed up her life by accidentally cursing herself. She found a spell book and thought she’d mess with it – and did a terrible job of tethering a demon to herself. The wound is rancid – and so is Jude’s soul. She tried two more invocations to try to help deal with the consequences, but they didn’t work as hoped for, and Jude is looking for a witch with real power.

How does Jude look for a witch? She throws money at things, and she pays a detective to see the crime scenes of a serial killer who’s killing women with spells on their bodies – and removing the skin where the curse was tattooed. It turns out that Zara’s also visiting crime scenes, since her sister was the first victim of the serial killer. Well, they find a business card at a crime scene, which leads them to Emer.

Emer is hiding out at Oxford, pretending to be a student so she has access to the library and ways to get food. Ten years ago, her entire family of nineteen other witches was slaughtered by witch hunters, when she was only seven years old. It turns out that all of the serial killer’s victims had shortly before their deaths gotten a spell from Emer.

So now they have a new agenda – to find the serial killer. Emer feels a responsibility to the women who turned to her for help. And is there a connection between the serial killer and the witch hunters who killed her family? She tells Jude that she can’t break the tether with the demon who’s tormenting her, but Jude is persistent, and she has money and connections to help Emer find the killer. Zara, too, is told that Emer wants nothing to do with necromancy – but let’s just say that Zara is a very determined girl. (And this is yet another book where I’m screaming at the character who wants to raise the dead: “That’s a really bad idea!” But I do believe that she would do it.)

And yes, it all comes together in a truly horrifying way. And yet it’s satisfying. How is that possible? Well, you’ll have to read it to find out. We’ve got a mystery – figuring out the serial killer. We’ve got light romance – attraction between two of the girls. We’ve got misogyny against women with power, and we’ve got a terrifying final showdown where we’re not sure anyone’s going to survive.

No, that doesn’t sound like something I’d normally pick up. It happened to be the first YA Speculative Fiction book nominated for the Cybils where my audiobook hold came in. But it had me riveted all the way. Before long, I was rooting even for the rich girl with the festering soul, so that shows you Krystal Sutherland is a skillful writer indeed.

krystalsutherland.com

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Review of Our Divine Mischief, by Hanna C. Howard

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Our Divine Mischief

by Hanna C. Howard

Blink, 2023. 371 pages.
Reviewed October 16, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

Here’s a sweet young adult fantasy with a touch of romance set on an island where every young person makes a trip to Yslet’s Island to meet the goddess and learn what apprenticeship they will get. Áila is almost eighteen, and it’s time for her to make her pilgrimage. But when she goes, the goddess is not there – instead she finds a dog, a dog named Orail.

The village elders don’t know how to respond when Áila has nothing to show for her trip to the island but a dog. So they have her live in isolation and prepare for five Ordeals. If she passes the Ordeals, she will be allowed to try again to voyage to Yslet’s isle. The only human she’s allowed to talk to is Hew, a young man who is considered Unblessed because Yslet gave him a blank pendant. His work cutting peat is so unimportant, he can be spared to run errands for Áila.

But while Áila is preparing for the Ordeals, it becomes obvious that Orail is no ordinary dog. She can grant wishes, especially Áila’s wishes. And Hew is observant enough to find out something is going on. Best of all, Orail’s thoughts are given to the reader in poetry form.

But there’s another man who’s interested in helping Áila, and he has the approval of the priests – a handsome visiting scribe and his sister. Is there a reason Orail doesn’t trust him? It’s probably just that he doesn’t like dogs.

As events start taking place that affect far more than their island, Áila and Hew face huge obstacles to try to make it right.

A big part of the charm of this book is the wonderful dog character, and the love between Orail and Áila. I won’t give anything away, but I also love what we learn at the end about those who are thought to be “Unblessed.” A feel-good story with a whole lot of charm.

hannachoward.com
BlinkYABooks.com

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Review of There Is a Door in This Darkness, by Kristin Cashore

Paranormal, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

There Is a Door in This Darkness

by Kristin Cashore

Dutton Books, 2024. 372 pages.
Review written October 8, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

It was a bit surreal to read this book a month before the 2024 election with Donald Trump running against Kamala Harris, because the events of the book mainly take place in the week of the 2020 election with Joe Biden running against Donald Trump. And they flashback at times to the 2016 election, very much with the sense of “Not again!” So let’s just say that the “Not again!” feeling was heightened for me, reading it now.

And let me stop right there and say that there’s absolutely no effort made to present a politically “balanced” perspective in this book. The book mostly calls Trump “the monster,” but at one point, if I remember correctly, he’s called “the pouting pustule.” (There was another colorful one that I don’t remember and couldn’t find after the fact. Wish I’d marked them!) I personally enjoyed reading about characters whose perspective pretty much matches mine. But if you’re a Trump fan, read this book only if you want an alternate perspective, not presented gently. Hey, you’ve been warned.

Beyond that, this book had a lot of nuance and warmth, exploring grief and friendship during the pandemic.

The book takes place in Boston during the pandemic, before and after the 2020 presidential election, featuring Wilhelmina, who graduated from high school the past June and now is taking a year off to help out her family during the pandemic. Her two younger siblings need monitoring for online school, and two elderly aunts are staying with their family. Her father has asthma, so they’re strictly wearing masks and being careful about where they go, and Wilhelmina feels a little overwhelmed by so many people in their small apartment.

On top of that, her two best friends, Judy and Bee, get to do things together, because their families are in the same pandemic bubble so their younger siblings in the same grade can do school together. Wilhelmina feels left out, but feels guilty for feeling left out.

And on top of that, Wilhelmina is still deeply grieving her third and favorite aunt, Aunt Frankie, who died a couple years ago and left her lots of wisdom – plus a great big hole in her heart.

And then, after she’s driven Aunt Margaret to an eye appointment, strange things start happening. Like a message coming down from the sky. And an elevator opening to the wrong place. And more. And these strange things throw her together with a guy named James whose parents own the donut shop in the same building as Aunt Margaret’s eye doctor. He has strange things happen, too. Is it some kind of message? What are they supposed to do?

The story is told at a leisurely pace that at first made me impatient, but soon had me savoring it. There are alternating chapters with the present – during election week – and the past, especially time Wilhelmina had with her three aunts, spending most summers with them in Pennsylvania.

It’s all very lovely, mostly Wilhelmina dealing with Frankie’s death, but with more themes woven in, including finding hope and seeing good even in people who voted for the monster.

The romance is gently and beautifully done. Not only is there no sex in this teen romance, but since it’s during the pandemic, there’s no kissing, either.

Oh, and I forgot to mention that Wilhelmina has a condition that causes her a lot of pain in moving her body. So that’s one more thing she’s dealing with.

Here’s how the book begins:

Frankie used to make the world shine, or at least that’s how Wilhelmina Hart remembered it.

This book is about how Wilhelmina learns to shine.

kristincashore.com

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Review of Ash’s Cabin, by Jen Wang

Contemporary, Graphic Novel, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Ash’s Cabin

by Jen Wang

First Second, 2024. 320 pages.
Review written October 8, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

This is a gorgeous and thoughtful graphic novel about a nonbinary teen named Ash who doesn’t feel like their family gets them. They often use Ash’s former name (shown with a black bar over it in the speech bubble) and use the pronoun “her” to talk about them. Ash thinks about the environment and climate change more than the people around them. They still miss their Grandpa Edwin, who died a couple of years ago. Fortunately, Ash still has Chase, the dog Grandpa Edwin gave them.

Chase is my familiar. We don’t go anywhere without each other. He knows me better than anyone else in the universe.

Ash’s family used to go to Grandpa Edwin’s ranch every summer – now owned by Ash’s uncle and aunt. Grandpa Edwin had a hidden cabin somewhere in the nearby wilderness area where he’d go when he needed to get away from people. But he never told anyone where it is.

When Ash hears their parents planning to go to Disneyworld next summer instead of the ranch, they make it very clear they want no part of that. After some negotiation, the family makes plans to take Ash to the ranch, staying with their older cousin there, to say good-by before it gets sold.

What Ash’s parents don’t know is that Ash is planning to sneak away, find Grandpa Edwin’s cabin, and stay there, with only Chase for company.

And Ash’s plan works surprisingly well. They have a few months to go through Grandpa Edwin’s journals to pinpoint the location of the cabin, and look at wilderness survival sites to figure out what supplies they’ll need and what skills they need to learn. When they get to the ranch, Ash’s cousin actually has a secret trip first – asking Ash not to tell that she’s going to spend the weekend away with friends. Ash schedules emails to their parents, and sets off into the wilderness with Chase to find the cabin.

And yes! They find the cabin and live in the wilderness for weeks. The book shows realistic setbacks as well as unexpected help. And we can see Ash learning and growing during the experience.

I squelched all my feelings about how badly I’d freak out if my kid did this and was actually impressed with all the skills Ash had learned – of course with some things they hadn’t planned for, too.

This graphic novel is a treasure, telling about a teen who discovers how strong they truly are.

jenwang.net
firstsecondbooks.com

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Review of Dead Things Are Closer Than They Appear, by Robin Wasley

Paranormal, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Dead Things Are Closer Than They Appear

by Robin Wasley

Simon & Schuster, 2024. 405 pages.
Review written October 2, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

Given the title, I wasn’t surprised when this turned out to be a zombie book. I was, however, surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

Sid Spencer is an adopted American teen girl who lives in a town on a fault line – but not an earthquake fault line so much as a magical fault line. It’s not the only such town in the world by any means, but tourists come from all over the world to see the magic seeping up from the cracks like rainbow mist. Among the townsfolk, eight people are Guardians, but no one knows who they are. Each Guardian has a magical power, but also a Key made of bone that secures a segment of the fault line.

And then, one segment of the fault line comes open – and besides earthquakes and a magical forest taking over, zombies come out of the fault, attracted to living people and able to kill them with their bare hands. When it hits, Sid is alone at home and manages to trap a zombie in the basement after she sees it kill a neighbor. When Brian, a friend of her brother’s, breaks into her house, Sid tasers him before she realizes who he is. He tells Sid that he’s a Guardian, and so is her brother Matty. And the reason the fault line came open was that one of the other Guardians is dead. The man who killed him stole that Guardian’s key, but he was able to pass his power to Matty before he died, so no one can use the key but Matty. Oh, and the dead Guardian also put a magical wall around the town, so everybody on the outside is safe (including the rest of Sid’s family), but no help is coming to save them.

So the mission is to somehow navigate the town full of zombies, get the key from the bad guy – who turns out to be invulnerable to magical or physical attacks – and get it to Matty, whom no one has seen since before the breach. This is not an easy mission, as besides his own magic powers, the bad guy has teams of thugs with guns doing his bidding. He knows who all the Guardians are, and he wants all their powers and all their keys.

Thus, a saga begins. The task is daunting. But along the way, magic is leaking out of the breach, and ordinary people are developing magical powers, with each one unique to them.

Sid’s magic power ends up involving connecting with people. And that’s also the power of the book. The magic for me was a little muddled and confusing in spots, and yes, there was plenty of death and gore, but the story of found family and connections and working together against all odds – was powerful and moving. There was also a theme about friendship and forgiveness – for the past months Sid had been estranged from her best friend and her boyfriend because of something that happened – but the disaster puts all that in perspective.

This isn’t a relaxing book to read. The zombies are scary and strong, but the human villains are even worse, and the task seems impossible at times. But joining in Sid’s adventure just felt so warm and human. She’s a flawed teenage girl trying to survive – but also to help the people she loves – and even new people she meets. It turns out that disaster makes her shine, and it felt like a privilege to witness that.

robinwasley.com

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Review of This Golden State, by Marit Weisenberg

Contemporary, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

This Golden State

by Marit Weisenberg

Flatiron Books, 2022. 384 pages.
Review written September 17, 2024, from a library book.
Starred Review

The prologue of this book shows Poppy, almost eighteen years old, putting a DNA test in the mail. Then Chapter One begins one month earlier and as the book unfolds, we find out why she’d want to find out about her own ancestry.

Because one month earlier, Poppy was called Katie. Her friends were urging her to complete her application for the science fair with the project they’d worked on together. But instead, after school, her family picked her up in a minivan and they destroyed her SIM card and drove away without saying goodbye.

They drive to California, as the title suggests. And things are different from all the other safe houses where they’ve lived during Poppy’s life. Poppy realizes her mother has lived in this neighborhood before. Her father is uptight. And her little sister is pouting about not getting to have real friends.

Poppy doesn’t know what her parents are running from, but she knows that they are hiding from someone. All her life, her priority has been her family, but will things change now that she’s coming up on her eighteenth birthday?

Because they want Poppy to have a normal life, her parents sign her up for a summer class in advanced math, taught by a Stanford professor. She sits near a guy who’s obviously a big deal, and later she sees him at the country club pool where she gets an under-the-table babysitting job. But doing well in the class puts some interest on her. Seeing more of this guy means she starts keeping secrets from her parents. And then she gets tired of all the secrets they’re keeping from her. So she submits that DNA test. And she’s not quite ready for what she finds out when she does.

This book had me reading avidly, wanting to find out what the big secret was, as well as what would happen next. I went out on my balcony to read it for a half-hour, and instead decided to spend my afternoon that way. A thoroughly enjoyable book!

maritweisenberg.com

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