{"id":46654,"date":"2026-07-11T14:49:21","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T18:49:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=46654"},"modified":"2026-07-11T14:49:21","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T18:49:21","slug":"review-of-kiki-kallira-breaks-a-kingdom-by-sangu-mandanna","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/?p=46654","title":{"rendered":"Review of Kiki Kallira Breaks a Kingdom, by Sangu Mandanna"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Kiki Kallira Breaks a Kingdom<\/em><\/p>\n

by Sangu Mandanna
\nread by Zenia Starr<\/p>\n

Listening Library, 2021. 7 hours, 5 minutes.
\nReview written July 4, 2026, from a library eaudiobook.<\/p>\n

I checked out this audiobook because of how much I love the author’s cozy fantasy novels for adults<\/a>. It turned out to be a sweet fantasy for kids, in the mythology-is-actually-real genre.<\/p>\n

In this case, the mythology in question is Indian mythology, and there’s a twist. Kiki Kallira, a girl who’s recently started having symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder (Though it’s not named as such, and she hasn’t gotten a diagnosis yet, because she hasn’t told her mother how bad it is yet.), has been obsessively drawing a world in her sketch book where a heroic girl, based on her disreputable great-aunt, battles a major Indian demon, aided by a band of resourceful orphans. One day, this girl shows up in her bedroom battling a lesser demon.<\/p>\n

It turns out that the major demon is real, and had been exiled to The Nowhere Place. He schemed to get back to our world by using his magic to make Kiki’s sketchbook world real – and use that to get out of The Nowhere Place. Now he plans to go from Kiki’s world eventually back to our world.<\/p>\n

Now, the girl hero has escaped through a small tear between worlds, and takes Kiki back with her. Kiki needs to defeat the demon in her pocket universe in order to keep him from finding his way to our world. But how can a small, weak little girl with a brain that won’t behave defeat a demon?<\/p>\n

And once in her world, Kiki befriends the band of orphans, who were already dear to her. Now that they are real, can she really bear to do something that would make that world stop existing, even though it will defeat the evil demon?<\/p>\n

So there are nice undercurrents here, and some twists and turns in the quest. The author continues to display her fantasy-writing chops.<\/p>\n

sangumandanna.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Buy from Amazon.com<\/a><\/p>\n

Find this review on Sonderbooks<\/a> at: www.sonderbooks.com\/Childrens_Fiction\/kiki_kallira_breaks_a_kingdom.html<\/a><\/p>\n

Disclosure: I am an Amazon Affiliate, and will earn a small percentage if you order a book on Amazon after clicking through from my site.<\/p>\n

Disclaimer: I am a professional librarian, but the views expressed are solely my own, and in no way represent the official views of my employer or of any committee or group of which I am part.<\/p>\n

Subscribe<\/a> for more reviews and talk about books.<\/p>\n

Join the conversation: What did you think of this book?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kiki Kallira Breaks a Kingdom by Sangu Mandanna read by Zenia Starr Listening Library, 2021. 7 hours, 5 minutes. Review written July 4, 2026, from a library eaudiobook. I checked out this audiobook because of how much I love the author’s cozy fantasy novels for adults. It turned out to be a sweet fantasy for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46654","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-childrens-fiction-review","category-fantasy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46654","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46654"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46654\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46685,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46654\/revisions\/46685"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46654"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46654"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46654"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}