A heartwarming tale of a superpowered high schooler with well-developed characters.
A teenage girl discovers the truth about her heritage in a YA SF story about the next stage in the evolution of humankind.
Sixteen-year-old Alexis Allerton is a teen with a passion for science; a crush on Everett Evans, a lab assistant at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where she’s an intern; a loving family; and close friends in fellow high schoolers Hannah and Josh. Alexis has always been told that she has hemophilia, and has lived all her life with restrictions on physical activities. Alexis undergoes treatment every two days; a trio of doctors—Sam, Ira, and Kan Roman—visit her at home to treat her with injections of a clotting factor. But then, one day, she has a small accident at the lab, cuts her hand and sees her own blood for the first time. The first thing she discovers is that it’s silver, and she later finds out that its chemical composition is impossible in nature. It turns out that her doctors have been lying to her family; she doesn’t have hemophilia, but does have superhuman abilities, revealed over the course of the story. She also finds out that she’s adopted, and to find out her true origins, she embarks on a life-changing journey across the world with Everett and her sister, Amanda. Mir delivers a fun, engaging novel that offers an original take on genetic mutation and human evolution with elements of comedy, adventure, and romance. It even includes lots of cool, fictional scientific explanations of things such as “liquid crystal blood.” Alexis’ coming-of-age takes her from the United States to Mexico and Kazakhstan alongside supportive, fleshed-out secondary characters who enrich this story of self-discovery, identity, agency, and ultimately, hope. The novel is reminiscent of Becky Chambers’ brand of optimistic, warm SF that will appeal to teens and adults alike.
A heartwarming tale of a superpowered high schooler with well-developed characters.Pub Date: Oct. 9, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-953887-01-6
Page Count: 309
Publisher: Mir House
Review Posted Online: July 13, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
A lackluster and sometimes disturbing mishmash of overused tropes.
The Plague has left a population divided between Elites and Ordinaries—those who have powers and those who don’t; now, an Ordinary teen fights for her life.
Paedyn Gray witnessed the king kill her father five years ago, and she’s been thieving and sleeping rough ever since, all while faking Psychic abilities. When she inadvertently saves the life of Prince Kai, she becomes embroiled in the Purging Trials, a competition to commemorate the sickness that killed most of the kingdom’s Ordinaries. Kai’s duties as the future Enforcer include eradicating any remaining Ordinaries, and these Trials are his chance to prove that he’s internalized his brutal training. But Kai can’t help but find Pae’s blue eyes, silver hair, and unabashed attitude enchanting. She likewise struggles to resist his stormy gray eyes, dark hair, and rakish behavior, even as they’re pitted against each other in the Trials and by the king himself. Scenes and concepts that are strongly reminiscent of the Hunger Games fall flat: They aren’t bolstered by the original’s heart or worldbuilding logic that would have justified a few extreme story elements. Illogical leaps and inconsistent characterizations abound, with lighthearted romantic interludes juxtaposed against genocide, child abuse, and sadism. These elements, which are not sufficiently addressed, combined with the use of ableist language, cannot be erased by any amount of romantic banter. Main characters are cued white; the supporting cast has some brown-skinned characters.
A lackluster and sometimes disturbing mishmash of overused tropes. (map) (Fantasy. 14-18)Pub Date: Nov. 7, 2023
ISBN: 9798987380406
Page Count: 538
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 9, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2023
An epic fantasy with timeless themes and unforgettable characters.
Two young people save the world and all the magic in it in this series opener.
When tall, dark-haired, white-skinned Christopher Forrester goes to stay with his grandfather in Scotland, he ventures to the top of a forbidden hill and discovers astonishing magical creatures. His grandfather explains that Christopher’s family are guardians of the “way through” to the Archipelago, where the Glimourie Tree grows—the source of glimourie, or the world’s magic. Black-haired, olive-skinned Mal Arvorian, a girl from the Archipelago, is being pursued by a murderer, and she asks Christopher for help, launching them both on a wild, dangerous journey to discover why the glimourie is disappearing and how to stop it. Together with a part-nereid woman, a ratatoska, a dragon, and a Berserker, they face an odyssey of dangerous tasks to find the Immortal, the only one who can reverse the draining of magic. Like Lyra and Will from Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials, Mal and Christopher sacrifice their innocence for experience, meeting every challenge with depthless courage until they finally reach the maze at the heart of it all. Rundell throws myriad obstacles in her characters’ way, but she gives them tools both tangible (a casapasaran, which always points the way home, and the glamry blade, which cuts through anything) and intangible (the desire “to protect something worth protecting” and an “insistence that the world is worth loving”). Final art not seen.
An epic fantasy with timeless themes and unforgettable characters. (map, bestiary) (Fantasy. 10-16)Pub Date: Sept. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9780593809860
Page Count: 368
Publisher: Knopf
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2024
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