A wordy but inventive mashup of mythology and chess.
The princess of Chess Mountain must hide on Earth to avoid a war between the gods.
Kassie, an athletic, intelligent princess, lives on Chess Mountain among living wooden chess pieces who animate the chessboards of gods. She’s the daughter of Mars, the Roman god of war and king of Chess Mountain, and Caïssa, a powerful dryad and queen. Kassie is eager to celebrate her twelfth birthday and embark on her mythic quest, which will elevate her to god status. Unfortunately, when Dimitri, son of neighboring god of sports, Euphron, disappears, Euphron declares war on Chess Mountain, and Mars sends Kassie through a chess-puzzle portal to Earth with a knight chess piece named Maurice and an important book of chess solutions. After landing, Kassie, who on her home world glows and has inhumanly bronze skin, becomes a white-presenting brown-haired girl, and Maurice turns from a horse to a fedora-wearing clotheshorse. Kassie must integrate into an inexplicably chess-focused classroom in a culturally diverse elementary school in Queens. Light comedy centered on Kassie’s inexperience with snow, pizza, and cars abounds, as do lesser plots about a villainous classmate, Hunter, and suspiciously named teacher, Mr. Mercury, who seems intent on disrespecting the planet Mars, which makes Kassie think she’s been discovered. When the identity of the missing god Dimitri is revealed, Kassie must rely on her diplomacy to resolve the political crisis caused by his absence. In Winifred’s middle-grade novel, the prose can be stiff and protracted, and the book seems long for its reading level. The use of Roman mythology, however, is entertainingly original, and the chess-themed and idiosyncratic worldbuilding will excite young readers’ imaginations. In fact, even more can be done to capitalize on the chess setting of Chess Mountain. Despite humor and a happy ending, the story has a solemn bent, with the cast fulfilling preordained mythical roles. Galstyan’s occasional lighthearted, simple pen-and-ink cartoon illustrations don’t flesh out the fantasy visuals much; a map of Chess Mountain appears at the front of the book. There is a short chess vocabulary page, but most of the narrative’s descriptions of play expect readers to already understand the game.
A wordy but inventive mashup of mythology and chess.Pub Date: Sept. 27, 2022
ISBN: 9798986967509
Page Count: 216
Publisher: The Enrichment Connection
Review Posted Online: Sept. 8, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
A worthy combination of athletic action, the virtues of inner strength, and the importance of friendship.
A young tennis champion becomes the target of revenge.
In this sequel to Legacy and the Queen (2019), Legacy Petrin and her friends Javi and Pippa have returned to Legacy’s home province and the orphanage run by her father. With her friends’ help, she is in training to defend her championship when they discover that another player, operating under the protection of High Consul Silla, is presenting herself as Legacy. She is so convincing that the real Legacy is accused of being an imitation. False Legacy has become a hero to the masses, further strengthening Silla’s hold, and it becomes imperative to uncover and defeat her. If Legacy is to win again, she must play her imposter while disguised as someone else. Winning at tennis is not just about money and fame, but resisting Silla’s plans to send more young people into brutal mines with little hope of better lives. Legacy will have to overcome her fears and find the magic that allowed her to claim victory in the past. This story, with its elements of sports, fantasy, and social consciousness that highlight tensions between the powerful and those they prey upon, successfully continues the series conceived by late basketball superstar Bryant. As before, the tennis matches are depicted with pace and spirit. Legacy and Javi have brown skin; most other characters default to White.
A worthy combination of athletic action, the virtues of inner strength, and the importance of friendship. (Fantasy. 9-12)Pub Date: Aug. 24, 2021
ISBN: 978-1-949520-19-4
Page Count: 224
Publisher: Granity Studios
Review Posted Online: July 27, 2021
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
An enthralling fantasy debut exploring exploitation by those in power.
Will 12-year-old Nura be able to outsmart the trickster jinn and save herself and her friends?
Nura lives in the fictional Pakistani town of Meerabagh, where she has worked mining mica to help support her family of five—her mother, herself, and her three younger siblings—since her father’s death. In the mines she has the company of her best friend, Faisal, who is teased by other kids for his stutter, and she enjoys small pleasures like splurging on gulab jamun. Although Maa wants Nura to stop working and attend school, she has no interest in classroom learning and hopes to save up to send her younger siblings to school instead so they can break the family’s cycle of poverty. Following a mining accident in which Faisal and others are lost in the rubble, Nura goes to the rescue. In her quest, she is plunged into the magical, glittering jinn realm, where nothing is as it seems. The author seamlessly weaves into the worldbuilding of the story commentary on real-life problems such as the ravages of child labor and systems that perpetuate inequities. An informative author’s note further explores present-day global cycles of oppression as well as the life-changing power of education. This action-packed story set in a Muslim community moves at a fast pace, with evocative writing that brings the fantasy world to life and lyrical imagery to describe emotions.
An enthralling fantasy debut exploring exploitation by those in power. (Fantasy. 8-12)Pub Date: July 5, 2022
ISBN: 978-0-7595-5795-6
Page Count: 272
Publisher: Jimmy Patterson/Little, Brown
Review Posted Online: April 26, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 2022
BOOK REVIEW
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