Intriguing but lacking in impact.
Love blooms between two best friends in a magical town grieving a tragic loss.
Raf and Yas have been best friends since the former’s home was destroyed and his people fled to Moonlight Bay via the enchanted Golub tree in the Willow Forest. Despite warnings from his community elders, Raf decides to confess his romantic feelings to Yas—but he finds her with Moses, the Holler Candy empire heir. The golden leaf–shaped birthmark burns against Raf’s wrist, and he runs to the shoreline, where he discovers 5-year-old Sammy Holler dead. Now, a year later, Moonlight Bay is struggling—the Hollers have moved away, the once pink-and-lavender waters have turned dark gray, several local businesses have shut down, and tensions between the locals and the Golubs are rising. Yas, whose parents are struggling to make ends meet, faces the prospect of leaving her hometown. Raf, once excited about college, becomes resigned to staying home to support his family. When the wealthy Naismiths move into the Holler Mansion, the townspeople are desperate to make them stay, but Yas and Raf question what their true intentions are in Moonlight Bay. Saeed takes readers on a gentle exploration of losing faith, finding yourself, and grief’s impact on a community. Unfortunately, the slow-burn romance is sluggish, and the secondary characters feel underdeveloped. Readers who don’t mind light worldbuilding that allows them to imagine details for themselves may enjoy this lightly magical story. Characters are racially ambiguous.
Intriguing but lacking in impact. (Fabulism. 12-17)Pub Date: Aug. 22, 2023
ISBN: 9780593326466
Page Count: 304
Publisher: Kokila
Review Posted Online: May 24, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2023
Dark, seductive, but over-the-top: Characters and book alike will enthrall those who choose to play.
Garber returns to the world of bestseller Caraval (2017), this time with the focus on younger, more daring sister Donatella.
Valenda, capital of the empire, is host to the second of Legend’s magical games in a single year, and while Scarlett doesn’t want to play again, blonde Tella is eager for a chance to prove herself. She is haunted by the memory of her death in the last game and by the cursed Deck of Destiny she used as a child which foretold her loveless future. Garber has changed many of the rules of her expanding world, which now appears to be infused with magic and evil Fates. Despite a weak plot and ultraviolet prose (“He tasted like exquisite nightmares and stolen dreams, like the wings of fallen angels, and bottles of fresh moonlight.”), this is a tour de force of imagination. Themes of love, betrayal, and the price of magic (and desire) swirl like Caraval’s enchantments, and Dante’s sensuous kisses will thrill readers as much as they do Tella. The convoluted machinations of the Prince of Hearts (one of the Fates), Legend, and even the empress serve as the impetus for Tella’s story and set up future volumes which promise to go bigger. With descriptions focusing primarily on clothing, characters’ ethnicities are often indeterminate.
Dark, seductive, but over-the-top: Characters and book alike will enthrall those who choose to play. (glossary) (Fantasy. 12-16)Pub Date: May 29, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-250-09531-2
Page Count: 464
Publisher: Flatiron Books
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 2018
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel,...
Adventure drags our heroine all over the map of fantasyland while giving her the opportunity to use her smarts.
Elisa—Princess Lucero-Elisa de Riqueza of Orovalle—has been chosen for Service since the day she was born, when a beam of holy light put a Godstone in her navel. She's a devout reader of holy books and is well-versed in the military strategy text Belleza Guerra, but she has been kept in ignorance of world affairs. With no warning, this fat, self-loathing princess is married off to a distant king and is embroiled in political and spiritual intrigue. War is coming, and perhaps only Elisa's Godstone—and knowledge from the Belleza Guerra—can save them. Elisa uses her untried strategic knowledge to always-good effect. With a character so smart that she doesn't have much to learn, body size is stereotypically substituted for character development. Elisa’s "mountainous" body shrivels away when she spends a month on forced march eating rat, and thus she is a better person. Still, it's wonderfully refreshing to see a heroine using her brain to win a war rather than strapping on a sword and charging into battle.
Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel, reminiscent of Naomi Kritzer's Fires of the Faithful (2002), keeps this entry fresh. (Fantasy. 12-14)Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2011
ISBN: 978-0-06-202648-4
Page Count: 432
Publisher: Greenwillow Books
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011
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