THE LION HUNTER

A spellbinding story of great power fits into a series of intensely told tales. Wein has braided the Arthurian legend with ancient Aksum (Ethiopia). By decree of Goewin, daughter of Artos of Britain, Aksum is under quarantine to keep the plague at bay. Her nephew Telemakos, son of Medraut, has already been a spy at age 12. This part of the saga opens with a heart-pounding scene where, distracted by his new sister’s birth, Telemakos is not careful around the palace lions and is grievously injured. Two of the strands that Wein weaves so expertly concern Telemakos dealing with the loss of his arm and what he suffered in The Sunbird (2004) and his struggles with his small sister, a colicky and high-strung baby who will not be comforted by any but him. The third is the political situation in Aksum, in which, to keep them safe, both children are sent to the court of a former enemy in Himyar (Yemen). Readers are plunged deep in Telemakos’s heart and mind, and his fierce intelligence is set in Wein’s sensuous desert landscape of gold and bronze. This volume ends with Telemakos’s realization of the extent of the danger he is in and the information he lacks, and will leave readers desperate for The Empty Kingdom, which cannot come soon enough. (author’s note, glossary) (Historical fiction. YA)