LONG LIVE EVIL

A young woman with cancer is presented with a fantastical opportunity to save herself in this adult debut.

Rachel Parilla is sick. Very sick. She used to be a cheerleader. She used to take her younger sister, Alice, to conventions for Alice’s favorite book series, Time of Iron, a melodramatic epic fantasy in which characters like the Iron Maid and the Golden Cobra have bloody adventures and torrid love triangles in the magical land of Eyam. When Rae was getting her first cancer treatments, Alice kept her entertained by recounting the plot of the first book in the series. Soon Rae became a fan herself, but her aggressive cancer makes it hard for her to hold a book, let alone read it. One day she wakes in her hospital bed to see a strange woman who has an even stranger offer: She can stay in her own world and die of cancer, or she can embody a character in Time of Iron, find the magical Flower of Life and Death, and come back to a cancer-free body. Rae scoffs at the idea, but lo and behold, there is a door waiting for her—and when she opens it, she finds herself in the body of the books’ infamous villainess, Lady Rahela, the Beauty Dipped in Blood, immersed in the world of Eyam. Rae’s adventure begins with tremendous wonder, and there are many laugh-out-loud moments as she revels in the fun of being a fictional femme fatale. But as Rae gets closer to her goal, Brennan brings the people and the world of Eyam to vivid, often heartbreaking life with such incredible skill that readers will be even bigger fans of Time of Iron than Alice.

Absolutely wonderful.