Inventive and exciting, with strong hints of more to follow.
Potent, otherworldly, evil magic seeks domination, feeding on terror and upheaval in a time of war, while a Jewish refugee must find a way to counter it with some good magic of his own.
In 1942, Isaac’s parents send him from Nazi-occupied Prague to Rookskill Castle in Scotland, where he meets magical children and some strange creatures who are using their skills to help Britain win the war, first met in The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle (2016). On his journey he finds hints that his long-held feeling of being different is true. Amazingly, before arriving at Rookskill, he meets his parents in another century and is given two artifacts, an eternity knot and a time-travel watch, never to be relinquished, that will inform and guide him in the quest for reaching his as-yet-unknown destiny. He and the magically talented friends he meets at Rookskill also face unimaginable dangers as the evils close in on their castle, before all is resolved. Well, maybe not everything. The fantasy worldbuilding is generally well constructed and consistent. Gaelic largely inspires the evil creatures’ names, and Fox informs readers, though not Isaac, of their motivations in occasional interstitial chapters. Episodes are detailed and fast-paced, each one moving the tale forward, and there are lots of unexpected twists, turns, and revelations. Isaac and his magical teammates—all evidently white—are steadfast, brave, earnest, and altogether engaging.
Inventive and exciting, with strong hints of more to follow. (Fantasy. 10-14)Pub Date: Aug. 25, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-451-47869-6
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: May 2, 2020
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2020
A rich, enthralling historical mystery that engages and educates.
Siblings decode familial and wartime secrets in 1940 England.
Headstrong 14-year-old Lizzie Novis refuses to believe that her mother, a U.S. embassy clerk who was working in Poland, is dead. After fleeing from her grandmother—who’s attempting to bring her back to America—Lizzie locates her 19-year-old brother, Jakob, a Cambridge mathematician who’s stationed at the clandestine British intelligence site called Bletchley Park. Hiding from her grandmother’s estate steward, Lizzie becomes a messenger at Bletchley Park, ferrying letters across the grounds while Jakob attempts to both break the ciphers generated by the German Enigma machines and help his sister face the reality of their mother’s likely fate. With a suspicious MI5 agent inquiring about Mum and clues and codes piling up, the siblings, whose late father was “Polish Jewish British,” eventually decipher the truth. Shared narrative duties between the siblings effectively juxtapose the measured Jakob with the spirited Lizzie. Lizzie’s directness is repeatedly attributed to her being “half American,” which proves tiresome, but Jakob’s development from reserved to risk-tolerant provides welcome nuance. The authors introduce and carefully explain a variety of decoding methodologies, inspiring readers to attempt their own. A thoughtful and entertaining historical note identifies the key figures who appear in the book, such as Alan Turing, as well as the real-life bases for the fictional characters. Interspersed photos and images of ephemera help situate the narrative’s time period.
A rich, enthralling historical mystery that engages and educates. (Historical mystery. 10-14)Pub Date: Oct. 8, 2024
ISBN: 9780593527542
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Viking
Review Posted Online: July 19, 2024
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2024
PERSPECTIVES
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic.
Chainani works an elaborate sea change akin to Gregory Maguire’s Wicked (1995), though he leaves the waters muddied.
Every four years, two children, one regarded as particularly nice and the other particularly nasty, are snatched from the village of Gavaldon by the shadowy School Master to attend the divided titular school. Those who survive to graduate become major or minor characters in fairy tales. When it happens to sweet, Disney princess–like Sophie and her friend Agatha, plain of features, sour of disposition and low of self-esteem, they are both horrified to discover that they’ve been dropped not where they expect but at Evil and at Good respectively. Gradually—too gradually, as the author strings out hundreds of pages of Hogwarts-style pranks, classroom mishaps and competitions both academic and romantic—it becomes clear that the placement wasn’t a mistake at all. Growing into their true natures amid revelations and marked physical changes, the two spark escalating rivalry between the wings of the school. This leads up to a vicious climactic fight that sees Good and Evil repeatedly switching sides. At this point, readers are likely to feel suddenly left behind, as, thanks to summary deus ex machina resolutions, everything turns out swell(ish).
Rich and strange (and kitted out with an eye-catching cover), but stronger in the set pieces than the internal logic. (Fantasy. 11-13)Pub Date: May 14, 2013
ISBN: 978-0-06-210489-2
Page Count: 496
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Feb. 12, 2013
Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 15, 2013
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