Serviceable, undistinguished fantasy fare.
In Centeno’s (Dark Sanity, 2014, etc.) latest novel, a “humyn” prince hopes a marriage of necessity to a high elf will end a terrible war. Demons plan otherwise.
Prince Aarian of Vlydyn casts aside hishumyn love, Belisa, in favor of wedding a high elf princess of Lar’a’dos, but an evil plan threatens to destroy the prince’s humbling sacrifice. The dark elves’ ruler, Saldovin, makes a pact with demons, who call down their chaos upon Prince Aarian’s land to prevent the wedding. Yet the dark elf’s bargain proves only too effective: rather than merely shatter the peace of humyns and high elves, the demon hordes destroy the humyn kingdom and continue on to threaten the entire world (known as Yunedar). With only a handful of humyns remaining in all the realm, Prince Aarian is forced to look for help among horrifying allies: gargoyles, vampires, werewolves, dark elves, orcs, trolls, ogres and their overlord, a powerful dragon known as Earmathras. Taming his own doubts and the loss of Belisa—and taking up the role of the monsters’ chosen one, as foretold by prophecy—Aarian takes the fight to the demon legions in a final battle to save the ruins of Vlydyn and all of Yunedar. Unfortunately, characters are thin and familiar: the protagonist is impressively heroic, dragons are crafty and old, counselors are hidebound and stuffy, and so forth. There are no real surprises in the cast, beyond the mildly novel inclusion of creatures such as orcs and werewolves in speaking roles, while language is standard to most medieval-esque fantasies (think “accursed” and “slay”). Tonally, the book has much more in common with Dragonlance novels than with A Song of Ice and Fire: sex is kept offstage, violence is restrained and cinematic, and swearing is nonexistent. It’s an adventure for any age group.
Serviceable, undistinguished fantasy fare.Pub Date: May 28, 2015
ISBN: N/A
Page Count: -
Publisher: CreateSpace
Review Posted Online: Aug. 24, 2015
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.
In this YA graphic novel, an alienated Métis girl learns about her people’s Canadian history.
Métis teenager Echo Desjardins finds herself living in a home away from her mother, attending a new school, and feeling completely lonely as a result. She daydreams in class and wanders the halls listening to a playlist of her mother’s old CDs. At home, she shuts herself up in her room. But when her history teacher begins to lecture about the Pemmican Wars of early 1800s Saskatchewan, Echo finds herself swept back to that time. She sees the Métis people following the bison with their mobile hunting camp, turning the animals’ meat into pemmican, which they sell to the Northwest Company in order to buy supplies for the winter. Echo meets a young girl named Marie, who introduces Echo to the rhythms of Métis life. She finally understands what her Métis heritage actually means. But the joys are short-lived, as conflicts between the Métis and their rivals in the Hudson Bay Company come to a bloody head. The tragic history of her people will help explain the difficulties of the Métis in Echo’s own time, including those of her mother and the teen herself. Accompanied by dazzling art by Henderson (A Blanket of Butterflies, 2017, etc.) and colorist Yaciuk (Fire Starters, 2016, etc.), this tale is a brilliant bit of time travel. Readers are swept back to 19th-century Saskatchewan as fully as Echo herself. Vermette’s (The Break, 2017, etc.) dialogue is sparse, offering a mostly visual, deeply contemplative juxtaposition of the present and the past. Echo’s eventual encounter with her mother (whose fate has been kept from readers up to that point) offers a powerful moment of connection that is both unexpected and affecting. “Are you…proud to be Métis?” Echo asks her, forcing her mother to admit, sheepishly: “I don’t really know much about it.” With this series opener, the author provides a bit more insight into what that means.
A sparse, beautifully drawn story about a teen discovering her heritage.Pub Date: March 15, 2018
ISBN: 978-1-55379-678-7
Page Count: 48
Publisher: HighWater Press
Review Posted Online: Feb. 28, 2018
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2018
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
A troubling depiction of an unhealthy relationship.
A battered girl and an injured rugby star spark up an ill-advised romance at an Irish secondary school.
Beautiful, waiflike, 15-year-old Shannon has lived her entire life in Ballylaggin. Alternately bullied at school and beaten by her ne’er-do-well father, she’s hopeful for a fresh start at Tommen, a private school. Seventeen-year-old Johnny, who has a hair-trigger temper and a severe groin injury, is used to Dublin’s elite-level rugby but, since his family’s move to County Cork, is now stuck captaining Tommen’s middling team. When Johnny angrily kicks a ball and knocks Shannon unconscious (“a soft female groan came from her lips”), a tentative relationship is born. As the two grow closer, Johnny’s past and Shannon’s present become serious obstacles to their budding love, threatening Shannon’s safety. Shannon’s portrayal feels infantilized (“I looked down at the tiny little female under my arm”), while Johnny comes across as borderline obsessive (“I knew I shouldn’t be touching her, but how the hell could I not?”). Uneven pacing and choppy sentences lead to a sudden climax and an unsatisfyingly abrupt ending. Repetitive descriptions, abundant and misogynistic dialogue (Johnny, to his best friend: “who’s the bitch with a vagina now?”), and graphic violence also weigh down this lengthy tome (considerably trimmed down from its original, self-published length). The cast of lively, well-developed supporting characters, especially Johnny’s best friend and Shannon’s protective older brother, is a bright spot. Major characters read white.
A troubling depiction of an unhealthy relationship. (author’s note, pronunciations, glossary, song moments, playlists) (Romance. 16-18)Pub Date: Nov. 28, 2023
ISBN: 9781728299945
Page Count: 626
Publisher: Bloom Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 21, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Nov. 15, 2023
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