The barrage of names and places can be hard to follow, but the fluid prose and morally ambiguous characters are magically...
Hearn’s brand of Asian fantasy fiction is a genre unto itself; having completed her Tales of the Otori (Heaven’s Net Is Wide, 2007, etc.), the pseudonymous Hearn begins her new series, The Tale of Shikanoko, by introducing the primary characters while setting up conflicts and relationships that will evolve in the three volumes to follow, all to be published this year.
It is “a time of troubles and opportunities.” As the weak emperor nears death, his two sons jockey for power, each with his own followers. The title character, who threads through the book connecting disparate stories and dynasties, begins life as Kazumaru, son of a vassal to Lord Kiyoyori, whose allegiance lies with the emperor’s older son, the crown prince. Fatherless at 7, Kazumaru escapes a murderous uncle/guardian at 16 to land in a sorcerer’s lair, where he receives a magical mask and is renamed Shikanoko, “the deer’s child.” He finds work with a mountain bandit whose companion is beautiful Lady Tora, with whom Shikanoko believes he had carnal relations under the sorcerer’s spell. Meanwhile Lord Kiyoyori, a widower with one daughter, Hina, follows his father’s command to unite the Kuromori and Matsutani dynasties by taking his younger brother’s wife, Lady Tama, as his own, though neither he nor his brother desire the change. Although Tama bears Kiyoyori a son, he distrusts her loyalty, especially after foiling an assassination attempt by the mountain bandits thanks to his “wise man” Sesshin. Kiyoyori, who has fallen madly in love with Lady Tora, allows Shikanoko to study with Sesshin, but Tama banishes them in a fit of panicky anger when her son disappears. Shikanoko ends up under the control of the Prince-Abbot, the emperor’s brother-in-law. When war breaks out after the emperor’s death, the crown prince’s young son, Yoshi, goes into hiding with Aki, his foster father's daughter. As Kiyoyori sadly recognizes in his world, children are pawns in the quest for power.
The barrage of names and places can be hard to follow, but the fluid prose and morally ambiguous characters are magically seductive.Pub Date: April 26, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-374-53631-2
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux
Review Posted Online: Feb. 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Feb. 15, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
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
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