Review of Drown Me with Dreams, by Gabi Burton

Audiobooks, Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Drown Me with Dreams

by Gabi Burton
read by Dami Olukoya

Bloomsbury YA, 2024. 12 hours, 52 minutes.
Review written August 17, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

Let me say again that I love the new trend in fantasy books of publishing duologies instead of trilogies. Drown Me with Dreams completes the duology begun in Sing Me to Sleep (a 2023 Sonderbooks Stand-out), following the siren Saoirse, who’s the only one of her kind in the kingdom of Keirdre, after the king slaughtered them all as monsters. (An advantage to listening to the book is now I know how to pronounce that.)

Things have changed for Saoirse in this book – I don’t want to give too many details and give away the first book, but now Saoirse is living openly as a siren, and she finds a way to cross the barrier to leave Keirdre. But she won’t be able to come back if Hayes doesn’t bring the barrier down – and that could have terrible consequences.

In this book, besides doing some sleuthing and plotting for the good of the kingdom, Saoirse also learns not to be afraid of her power – and that she doesn’t have to use it to kill.

In the first book, I got a little bogged down with the world-building – a kingdom enclosed by a barrier that not even birds can get through? I have trouble believing it. But in this book, I was used to the idea, and the focus was more on how could they bring it down without starting multiple wars. There was also speculation about what makes a good ruler. Can a good man be a good ruler to a kingdom that was founded to reward ruthlessness?

I’m also a little skeptical of Saoirse’s ability to taste other people’s emotions. Because how does it get in her mouth instantly? I mean, if it were a smell, it could waft in the air, but these were described even as tastes in the back of her throat. Again by this time, I was used to the idea, and the descriptions were so creative, never mind details like that. The emotions weren’t described as simply salty or spicy or sweet, but through a wide range from cinnamon to orange to old stew going rancid. It turns out that with this power, Saoirse can tell when someone is lying, which did make sense.

For most of the book, Saoirse is across the barrier from the one she loves – but she can dream walk to see him. There’s another world-building detail that was a little hard for me – they can touch and feel each other, but it’s only a dream. So when Saoirse talks to Hayes in the dream walk – what is her actual body doing? Apparently nothing. It’s all a little murky – but the romance is beautifully done, and questions of trust are explored. And then the beads she uses to dream walk stop working exactly when it causes the most possible misunderstanding. (Which is precisely how coincidences should work in fiction – cause problems, and we’ll believe it. Solve problems, and it feels way too convenient.)

So – without giving details, this second book made me love the whole duology more. The first book was a debut novel I read when on the Morris Award Committee – and this second book is even stronger – full of tension and intrigue, and finishes off the story in a satisfying, but not predictable way. The author has already grown in her writing in just one book. I look forward to seeing what she will do next.

gabiburton.com

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Review of Graciela in the Abyss, by Meg Medina

Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

Graciela in the Abyss

by Meg Medina
illustrated by Anna and Elena Balbusso

Candlewick Press, 2025. 236 pages.
Review written July 22, 2025, from my own copy, given to me at ALA Annual Conference and signed to me by the author.
Starred Review

First, I am a huge Meg Medina fan – and am privileged to think of her as a friend. When she saw me in line to get the book signed, she greeted me by name and gave me a big hug! How did this happen? Meg was the winner the year I was on the Newbery Selection Committee, and I was privileged to be part of the group that changed her life – and it couldn’t have happened to a nicer and more deserving person!

So of course there is no surprise that I love this book. Let me tell you what I love about it.

First, it’s in a stunningly beautiful package. It’s a middle-grade novel, but it’s illustrated. There are full-page illustrations periodically throughout the book as well as chapter heading decorations. And underneath the beautiful paper cover is a gorgeous illustration on the case of the book.

The story itself is a unique fantasy tale about water spirits. The book begins in the Prologue with Graciela’s death! (This is a surprise in a children’s book.) She fell into the sea when she ignored her older sister’s cautions. But in chapter one, she wakes up a hundred years later as a sea spirit. And she has a loving guide named Amina who helps her learn the ways of the sea. She becomes a glazier who polishes sea glass, so people find wonderful treasures on the shore.

However, not all sea spirits are good. There are Needlers in the deep who make trouble for everyone. And there are places that are dangerous for a sea spirit who hasn’t mastered her new powers yet. When she died, Graciela didn’t lose her tendency to go where she wants to go despite the warnings of others.

Our other main character is Jorge, a boy who lives in the village on the shore with his family of blacksmiths. He wants to make toys, but his parents say that’s a waste of time. When he finds an eerie harpoon his ancestor fashioned to slay sea spirits and steal the pearls of their teeth – Jorge wants to destroy it, but that’s not easily done, and his parents want to use it as designed.

The two threads end up coming together, and Graciela and Jorge need to work together to protect the sea and make things right.

The undersea world Meg Medina has created is beautiful and mysterious. I love how different this book is from the many other children’s fantasy novels I’ve read. Though there is some death, and Jorge has horrible parents, this is a gentle fantasy that would make a wonderful read-aloud for an upper elementary school classroom.

megmedina.com
candlewick.com

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Review of Wooing the Witch Queen, by Stephanie Burgis

Fantasy, Fiction Review, Romance, Starred Review 0

Wooing the Witch Queen

by Stephanie Burgis
read by Amanda Leigh Cobb

Macmillan Audio, 2025. 8 hours, 33 minutes.
Review written June 12, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

I’ve long enjoyed Stephanie Burgis’s books for kids – fun fantasy stories with imagination and heart. They always make me smile. So it was something of an adjustment to listen to a sexy romantasy for adults from her – but in the end, it, too, has imagination and heart and made me smile.

The set-up is that Archduke Felix from the ever-expanding Empire has been controlled and abused for most of his life by his father-in-law. He’s not even allowed to study governance, but kept busy with literature and poetry. But now that his beloved wife has died, he knows that his father-in-law is laying plans to kill him. So he has nothing to lose. He’s going to go to the neighboring country where the Witch Queen Saskia has overcome her evil uncle and taken control – because she is the one person who’s successfully stood up to the Empire’s forces so far.

He grabs a dark cloak and is surprised when no one stops him, and he’s apparently welcomed to an audience with Saskia. What he doesn’t know is that she recently placed an ad for a dark wizard to put her magic library in order – her uncle left it in disarray. And as Felix is waiting at the door, he hears her telling her allies how happy she would be to execute Archduke Felix – because of all his father-in-law has done in his name. So when she mistakes him for a librarian, he takes the job.

And it turns out that studying literature and poetry is perfect training for being a magical librarian. And Saskia finds him surprisingly kind and careful – unlike any other dark wizard she’s ever met.

But of course he can’t just settle down and stay a librarian. He’s going to have to tell Saskia the truth at some point, and hopefully before the Empire finds a way to take down Saskia’s magical wall and annex her kingdom.

This book starts a trilogy that includes Saskia’s allies, the other two “Queens of Villainy.” I’m going to want to read them all.

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Review of Beauty Reborn, by Elizabeth Lowham

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

Beauty Reborn

by Elizabeth Lowham

Shadow Mountain Publishing, 2023. 200 pages.
Review written June 27, 2023, from a library book.
Starred Review

This is a sweet retelling of Beauty and the Beast. It reminded me a little more of the Disney version than of the original fairy tale, since there’s a library in the castle and a Gaston-like villain and a scene with wolves in the forest. But I always love retellings of this story, and this was no exception.

In this version, the villain raped Beauty before she went to the castle. She feels like it was her own fault because she’d been in love with him. But when she said No, he got angry, and ended up taking what he wanted. Beauty took her father’s place at the castle, almost hoping the Beast would finish her.

But then… I like the way the relationship between Beauty and Beast develops, with him at first afraid to let her see him, and Beauty at first getting triggered by any touch. I love the way the others in the story, beginning with Beast, do not turn from her in disgust (as she expects) when they find out what happened to her.

I’m still a bigger fan of Robin McKinley’s two retellings, Beauty and Rose Daughter, but you simply can’t have too many retellings! I loved what this one brought to the story as to why the hero became a Beast – and I like the resolution at the end. This was a love story I could believe in and got completely behind.

This book has no sex scenes, despite Beauty having triggers because of the previous rape. This is refreshing – I’m starting to feel like sex scenes are obligatory in YA novels – and makes the book extra nice for younger teens or for older teens who don’t actually want sex scenes in everything they read. I hope I don’t sound judgmental! I mostly enjoy the sexy YA novels. But it was nice to read a solid YA romance set in medieval times that realistically had them waiting for the wedding (as they most likely would have done in medieval times). This is one that I could believe the two fell in love with each other and that they will indeed live happily ever after.

elizabethlowham.com

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Review of The Gate, the Girl, and the Dragon, by Grace Lin

Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

The Gate, the Girl, and the Dragon

by Grace Lin

Little, Brown and Company, 2025. 340 pages.
Review written July 4, 2025, from my own copy, purchased at ALA Annual Conference and signed by the author.
Starred Review

Grace Lin’s new book has the hallmarks of her other award-winning works: Beautifully illustrated by the author (one of the few people to win both Caldecott Honor and Newbery Honor) and woven through with Chinese mythology. This one, rather than being set in a mythical land, is set in a modern city’s Chinatown.

I got to hear Grace Lin speak about this book, and the reason she likes to make beautiful books is that when she was a child, she loved lavish, beautifully illustrated editions of Grimms’ and other European fairy tales. But she had one book of Chinese fairy tales, and it was ugly with sparse black-and-white pictures and stilted translations, giving her as a child the impression that Chinese fairy tales weren’t as good. No child will ever get that impression from Grace Lin’s books!

And the special edition of the book I got at ALA is a stunningly beautiful book with sprayed edges showing a dragon and a lantern. Inside the book, there’s a picture for each chapter and frequent full-color images. When a tale within the story is told (and there are several), the tale is set off with a colored border.

But besides the beautiful look of the book, the story is a perfect tale for younger readers ready to listen to a chapter book – I hope this book is featured in many, many classroom read-alouds for years to come.

The main characters of the book are Gongshi – spirits of stone.

It is impossible to tell just by looking at a stone if it is a Gongshi. But, eventually, the right kind of human will feel the spirit’s dream like one feels the sun after it rains. And that human will take the sleeping stone and carve it. And the stone becomes a statue.

That is when the Gongshi awakens.

It turns out that the elaborate City Gate leading to Chinatown is a portal to the magical home of the Gongshi. They go out into the world and protect and help humans. But when they take a break, they go home through the gate. Those gates normally feature two lions, the Lion and the Lioness. The Lion holds a ball – the Sacred Sphere – and the Lioness holds a Lion Cub. In the spirit world, that lion cub is named Jin, and he becomes the hero of this story.

Though he doesn’t start out as the hero. In anger, he kicks his zuqiu ball in the house, and it knocked over the pedestal holding the Sacred Sphere, which rolled away. Jin was not able to stop it, and it rolled right out the gate. Then a man took it from him. And when Jin tried to go back through the gate to his mother, the gate was closed!

On the other side, all the Gongshi are trapped as well by the closed gate. So they can’t come out to help. Jin must somehow find the Sacred Sphere and open the gate. And yes, that quest involves a girl he meets – a girl who can see and speak with him – and a dragon – a dragon who currently has the form of a worm.

The story weaves together several tales and perspectives from both sides of the closed gate. Every tale has a part in the eventual resolution, and it’s a wonderfully woven story of young ones rising to the occasion and making the world better, against enormous odds.

gracelin.com
lbyr.com

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Review of A Bright Heart, by Kate Chenli

Fantasy, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

A Bright Heart

by Kate Chenli

Union Square & Co., October 17, 2023. 331 pages.
Review written May 29, 2023, from an advance reader copy sent by the publisher.
Starred Review

As this book opens, Mingshin is being tortured and killed by her betrothed, Prince Ren, the man she funded and strategized with so he would become king. He tells her that he will marry her cousin, the one he always loved anyway, and no king would marry a commoner like her.

But as she lies dying, she begs heaven for a second chance – and something happens. She wakes up two years earlier, before she met Ren, soon after they moved to the capital city and the king announced that there would be a competition among his sons as to who would succeed him.

Now Mingshin knows that Prince Ren, as well as her uncle and cousin, cannot be trusted. Can she save her mother from her terrible death in the other timeline as well as their loyal servants and protectors? Can she keep the fortune they inherited from her father? And more importantly, can she keep the cruel Ren from winning the throne and stay alive?

But after being so horribly betrayed, when Prince Jieh shows an interest in Mingshin, she is afraid to trust him, either. After all, no royal would truly be interested in a commoner, would he? And when things start happening differently in this timeline, she’s not sure what course to take.

There’s magic involved in this story, and how it works is a bit murky at times, but we find out along with Mingshin, so that didn’t bother me too much. I like her cleverness and her determination to set things right.

Although this book comes to a resolution, there are many ongoing details, so I will look forward to the continuation of this story. A strong debut novel, with promise of more to come.

katechenli.com
unionsquareandco.com

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Review of The Goose Girl, by Shannon Hale

Audiobooks, Fairy Tale Variant, Fantasy, Stand-outs, Teen Fiction Review 0

The Goose Girl

by Shannon Hale
read by Cynthia Bishop and the Full Cast Family

Blackstone Audio, 2012. 10 hours, 16 minutes.
Review written June 3, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review
Original review written November 24, 2003.
2003 Sonderbooks Stand-out: My favorite book of the year

In honor of #Sonderbooks25, my 25th year of writing Sonderbooks, I’ve been revisiting my earlier reviews. My plan was to reread one book from each year’s Sonderbooks Stand-outs, and I’d decided to reread one for 2003 that I hadn’t read again in all that time – and then I did a search of the library’s eaudiobook collection – and found I simply had to give this favorite a listen. I’m also writing new reviews for the ones I reviewed before my “new” format in 2006 and when I added the blog.

And what a treat! This audiobook is a lavish production of a wonderful story. Every character who speaks gets their own voice actor, and there are musical cues throughout, reflecting the mood.

I’ve always loved fairy tale adaptations, and this is one of my all-time favorites. It makes sense of the original fairy tale and answers some questions. Why did the princess allow her lady-in-waiting to steal her identity? Why did they hang her horse’s head over the city gate? How did she make the wind drive the goose boy’s hat away so he wouldn’t bother her?

I love the way Shannon Hale shows growth in the princess Ani’s character. She starts out overawed by her mother and all too aware of her own inadequacies. Both Ani’s mother and her lady-in-waiting have a magical gift that helps them persuade people – a gift that Ani completely lacks. But over the course of the book, Ani learns the gifts she does have and the power she holds. When out of necessity she lives as a goose girl – she gets to know the working people of her new country – and gains a reason beyond herself to speak up and win back her crown.

This book began a whole series of the Books of Bayern, and so many reviews of Shannon Hale books that I gave them a webpage of their own. It still has a special place in my heart as the book that helped me discover the magic of Shannon Hale’s writing.

shannonhale.com
fullcastaudio.com

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Review of Bad Badger, by Maryrose Wood

Audiobooks, Beginning Chapter Books, Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

Bad Badger

by Maryrose Wood
read by Chris Devon

Dreamscape Media, 2025. 2 hours, 41 minutes.
Review written April 24, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Starred Review

Maryrose Wood is good at writing straight-faced stories that gradually get sillier and sillier. This one is perfect for kids ready for chapter books.

Bad Badger is about a badger named Septimus who is afraid that he’s not very good at being a badger. Instead of stripes, he has spots. Instead of living in the forest, he lives in a cottage by the sea. He loves listening to operas in Italian on his phonograph, collecting shells, making omelets, watching the sunset, and other activities not at all usual for badgers.

But then Septimus makes a friend. A seagull comes to his house every week on Wednesday. Gully doesn’t say much besides “Caw,” but Septimus feels their friendship grow and become tremendously important to him – so they share things they each enjoy most.

But when Gully goes missing, Septimus doesn’t know how he will find him, simply that it must be done.

This sweet story is about true friendship and not letting others define who you are.

maryrosewood.com

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Review of East, by Edith Pattou

Audiobooks, Fairy Tale Variant, Fantasy, Sonderbooks25, Stand-outs, Starred Review, Teen Fiction Review 0

East

by Edith Pattou
read by a Full Cast

Listening Library, 2005. 10 hours, 48 minutes.
Review written May 21, 2025, from a library eaudiobook.
Original Review written December 6, 2003.
Starred Review
2003 Sonderbooks Stand-out: #2 Young Adult Fantasy

As part of #Sonderbooks25, celebrating my 25th year of writing Sonderbooks, my plan was to choose one book to read from each year’s Sonderbooks Stand-outs. But then reading all the reviews, I remembered how much I love these books… And then I discovered several of my favorites available or with a short wait as eaudiobooks with my library… And I’m rereading a lot more than one book per year.

And I love East as much as ever! It’s still a weird fairy tale – “East of the Sun, West of the Moon” – but I love the way the author fills the book with family and friends who help Rose along the way. It ends up being a book about relationships with family and friends and about not giving up despite impossible odds.

I’m also pleased that after I finished this, I’m able to start right into listening to the follow-up, West, for more about Rose and her White Bear. I read West the year I was on the Newbery committee, so I didn’t have the luxury of rereading East before I did. This time, I get to read them one after the other.

I’m not going to write new reviews for every book I reread during #Sonderbooks25. But I like having a pretty new review in place of the ones I wrote before 2006, before I made the new format and added the blog. So here’s a new review for East, but I’ll let the old one stand for West.

If you love fairy tale retellings, as I do, pick up this atmospheric tale about a girl who’s prone to wander, and who goes with a white bear to help her family. After her curiosity causes disaster to strike, she’s determined to make things right for the white bear – and ends up helping other people, too.

Oh, and this is a lovely Full Cast production audiobook, with separate voices for each character who gets viewpoint chapters – Rose, her brother Neddy, her father, the White Bear, and the Troll Queen.

edithpattou.com

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Review of Bird of a Thousand Stories, by Kiyash Monsef

Children's Fiction Review, Fantasy, Starred Review 0

Bird of a Thousand Stories

by Kiyash Monsef

Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers, 2025. 340 pages.
Review written March 20, 2025, from a library book.
Starred Review

Bird of a Thousand Stories is a sequel to Once There Was, which was a Morris Award Honor Book in 2024, the year I was on the committee, so of course I was delighted to hear about a sequel. The Morris Award is for best young adult debut books, and this book is shelved in our library’s juvenile section, but it walks the line between both. Our protagonist, Marjan, is in high school and lives on her own after her father’s death, but the plot and situations fit well with middle grade novels. There’s not even any romance in this book, more of an adventurous chase around the world to find and free the Bird of a Thousand Stories.

You don’t have to have read the first book to enjoy this one, but my advice is not to miss it! I do think that the author’s craft is a bit better in this, his second novel. It feels more unified, as the main story is about the same quest throughout the book.

As with the first book, folk stories are woven through the book, and this time there’s a continuing story about the Bird of a Thousand Stories – the bird Marjan feels compelled to find. An Author’s Note shows us that he seriously researched this story to include it.

Filling in a little bit, in the first book, Marjan’s father died, and she discovered he had a business helping magical creatures – which were very real. Marjan discovered she’d inherited the gift of being able to communicate with them mind-to-mind with just a touch. However, she also gained the attention of a powerful family who made a business of selling off magical creatures for money. As this book begins, she has an uneasy alliance with them.

Also in the first book, Marjan acquired a roommate who’s a cheerful runaway and a witch – a witch who’s spells are hit-or-miss. In this book this friend has some kind of powerful spirit helping her – but is it really help? Something new in this book is that Marjan discovers an uncle who kept himself separate from the family is an heir to the same magic, but gave it up to trust it to her father. So Marjan isn’t alone in her quest, but there are questions throughout about trusting the right people to help and not trusting the wrong people. And who is which?

It all adds up to a magical adventure traveling to many different parts of the world, trying to do right by magical creatures.

kiyash.com

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