A twisty tale with an otherworldly setting that readers will happily revisit.
In this launch of Chute’s (Expecting Sunshine, 2017) fantasy trilogy, a family travels to a bizarre and dangerous parallel world.
Fourteen-year-old Ella Wellsley was only 10 when doctors found a brain tumor at the base of her skull. Six months ago, the growing tumor rendered her incapable of speech. Now, her grandfather Archie has brought Ella and her mom, Tessa, on a vacation cruise through Spain’s Canary Islands. Tessa is still angry at Ella’s father, Arden, who packed some belongings and disappeared two years ago. It turns out that Archie has a hidden agenda with this trip: He hopes to find both his son and a cure for Ella by using information in Arden’s notebooks. Archie tries to make a deal with a yellow-eyed, untrustworthy being named Zeno, but it doesn’t go as expected, and the entire cruise ship is sent through a portal to the magical island of Jarr-Wya. The quest for Ella’s cure temporarily takes a back seat as the Wellsleys and others get mixed up in a conflict between the sandlike Millia; the red, sometimes-fiery Olearon; and the Bangols, who’d banished Zeno, one of their own, to Earth. When the Bangols take Ella captive, Tessa and Archie summon their strength—and a few allies—to bring her home. The characters in Chute’s story exhibit as many virtues as they do flaws; even Tessa and Archie are occasionally selfish despite their noble intentions. This precipitates numerous plot turns as characters surprise one another with a good deed or a sinister turn. Ella provides the voice of the novel with her periodic first-person perspective, and her varying forms of communication—miming, drawing in a sketchbook—make her the most memorable character. Chute details the beauty of Jarr-Wya as well as grotesque moments; at one point, film from Tessa’s eyes “wriggles on her fingers like hyper slugs.” The author’s literary proficiency is complemented by her illustrations. Although the images are supposed to be Ella’s crude ink paintings, their solid shading gives them vibrancy, even in black and white.
A twisty tale with an otherworldly setting that readers will happily revisit.Pub Date: June 5, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-943006-56-4
Page Count: 360
Publisher: Spark Press
Review Posted Online: March 19, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.
A tightly wound caseworker is pushed out of his comfort zone when he’s sent to observe a remote orphanage for magical children.
Linus Baker loves rules, which makes him perfectly suited for his job as a midlevel bureaucrat working for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, where he investigates orphanages for children who can do things like make objects float, who have tails or feathers, and even those who are young witches. Linus clings to the notion that his job is about saving children from cruel or dangerous homes, but really he’s a cog in a government machine that treats magical children as second-class citizens. When Extremely Upper Management sends for Linus, he learns that his next assignment is a mission to an island orphanage for especially dangerous kids. He is to stay on the island for a month and write reports for Extremely Upper Management, which warns him to be especially meticulous in his observations. When he reaches the island, he meets extraordinary kids like Talia the gnome, Theodore the wyvern, and Chauncey, an amorphous blob whose parentage is unknown. The proprietor of the orphanage is a strange but charming man named Arthur, who makes it clear to Linus that he will do anything in his power to give his charges a loving home on the island. As Linus spends more time with Arthur and the kids, he starts to question a world that would shun them for being different, and he even develops romantic feelings for Arthur. Lambda Literary Award–winning author Klune (The Art of Breathing, 2019, etc.) has a knack for creating endearing characters, and readers will grow to love Arthur and the orphans alongside Linus. Linus himself is a lovable protagonist despite his prickliness, and Klune aptly handles his evolving feelings and morals. The prose is a touch wooden in places, but fans of quirky fantasy will eat it up.
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21728-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
A charming and persuasive entry that will leave readers impatiently awaiting the concluding volume.
Book 2 of Hearne's latest fantasy trilogy, The Seven Kennings (A Plague of Giants, 2017), set in a multiracial world thrust into turmoil by an invasion of peculiar giants.
In this world, most races have their own particular magical endowment, or “kenning,” though there are downsides to trying to gain the magic (an excellent chance of being killed instead) and using it (rapid aging and death). Most recently discovered is the sixth kenning, whose beneficiaries can talk to and command animals. The story canters along, although with multiple first-person narrators, it's confusing at times. Some characters are familiar, others are new, most of them with their own problems to solve, all somehow caught up in the grand design. To escape her overbearing father and the unreasoning violence his kind represents, fire-giant Olet Kanek leads her followers into the far north, hoping to found a new city where the races and kennings can peacefully coexist. Joining Olet are young Abhinava Khose, discoverer of the sixth kenning, and, later, Koesha Gansu (kenning: air), captain of an all-female crew shipwrecked by deep-sea monsters. Elsewhere, Hanima, who commands hive insects, struggles to free her city from the iron grip of wealthy, callous merchant monarchists. Other threads focus on the Bone Giants, relentless invaders seeking the still-unknown seventh kenning, whose confidence that this can defeat the other six is deeply disturbing. Under Hearne's light touch, these elements mesh perfectly, presenting an inventive, eye-filling panorama; satisfying (and, where appropriate, well-resolved) plotlines; and tensions between the races and their kennings to supply much of the drama.
A charming and persuasive entry that will leave readers impatiently awaiting the concluding volume.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-345-54857-3
Page Count: 592
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
© Copyright 2025 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
Follow
Popular in this Genre
We can’t wait for you to join Kirkus!
It’s free and takes less than 10 seconds!
Already have an account? Log in.
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
Welcome Back!
OR
Sign in with GoogleTrouble signing in? Retrieve credentials.
