VOICES IN THE DARK

A generation after the events of The Eyes of a King (2008), baby Anselm has grown into a teenager. His country, the England-analogue Malonia, is still troubled, despite the successful counterrevolution his parents witnessed during their adolescence. The anti-royalist Imperial Order is terrorizing the capital city, and their thugs have more power than the police. Soon it will be illegal to have magical powers or to be homosexual—crimes of which, respectively, his baby sister and he are guilty. Anselm’s entire life falls apart around him, with his father Leo arrested, his dearest friend in flight and dangerous secrets about his parents’ past coming to light. As in Leo’s story, Anselm is an observer, not a player in wider political events. This dense and confusing narrative picks up a decade and a half after the previous dense and confusing narrative, without substantial recap; readers who weren’t drawn in by Book I will find this offering impenetrable. But loyal fans will be rewarded by the slowly building tension that collapses a family and a nation. (Fantasy. 13 & up)