The Wild Swans, by Jackie Morris

I was pleased as all get out last fall when The Wild Swans, by Jackie Morris (Frances Lincoln Children's Books, October 2015) , a beautifully illustrated retelling of one of my favorite fairy tales, was nominated for the Cybils in Elementary/Middle Grade Speculative Fiction, the category for which I was reading.  (NB- It ended up in the MG section of the Cybils, but more because it wasn't a book "for teens" than because it is really a book for 9-12 year olds.  It is really an all ages older than 7 book).  I very much appreciated her 2013 retelling of East of the Sun, West of the Moon (my review), and I was not disappointed by this one.

(And of course I meant to write about last fall when I read it for the first time, but didn't...and it surfaced yesterday when I was tiding up Book Pile #34 (the books on top of the DVD/CD shelf) and so here it is now....)

So this is the story of the princess (named Eliza) whose bothers (11 of them in this case) get turned into swans by their evil stepmother, and she has to spin shirts of nettles for them, all the while not saying a word, to turn them back.  And a prince falls in love with her, and takes her back to his castle, where she ends up being accused of witchcraft, but can't defend herself (because of the no talking rule) and just as she's about to be burned alive her swan brothers come and she throws the shirts over them.  And one is unfinished, leaving a brother still with a swan wing...

All this is here in Morris' retelling, but with a lovely detailed richness that a good-lengthed book (173 pages) and lovely pictures can afford that an anthologized 10 page version can't.  Morris adds two things of her own to the story, that I appreciated very much. The stepmother does a Bad Thing, but she has reasons that make sense and are emotionally convincing--not just greed or ambition for her own kids but reasons that come from her relationship with the king, and her past before she became queen.  And it's not just the prince falling in love with Eliza, but her falling in love with him too, not just because he's a pretty face but because he gives her space to do what she needs to do. 

It's a lovely book, beautifully produced, with exquisite illustrations, and if you like fairy tale retellings, go for it!  And now I get to go upstairs and put it neatly on the shelf of fairy tales where I will look fondly on it and Book Pile #34 has one less book in it yay me!

edited to add--Thwarted! The fairy tale shelves are full with books sidewise on top and so I will have to expand fairy tales onto the shelf above them which means lot of rearranging.  Nothing is as easy as it seems it should be...

The Girl from Everywhere, by Heidi Heilig, for Timeslip Tuesday

The Girl from Everywhere, by Heidi Heilig (Greenwillow, February 2016) is a young woman named Nix Song, who travels on her father's ship from one time to the next as they sail from map to map.  Her father is able to navigate into any place accurately mapped, even if the place is imaginary or mythological (though there's only one shot per map) but the one place he hasn't been able to visit is the year in mid-19th century Hawaii when Nix's mother died while he was off sailing (to get money for their future together that didn't happen).   Nix is not at all sure she wants her father to find a map back to that particular time, because it might well change the whole course of her existence to be raised by both mother and father....But Nix doesn't really have any plans of her own, so she goes along with it.

A map that promises it is off Hawaii at the right time takes them there...but several years too late for Nix's mother.   What follows is a lot of Nix appreciating Hawaii, intermingled with wondering what  the point of her life is (I too wondered) and just getting started wondering if she likes Kashmir (a shipmate from the Persia of the Arabian Nights) more than just as a friend (I wondered about this too--it seemed a lot more like a case of proximity than romance).  Alongside this is a heist plot (Nix's father makes a deal to steal all the money from the royal treasury, undermining the monarchy, in exchange for another map that really does seem to be the one that will reunite him with his lost love).

None of this is really all that interesting, primarily because I did not find Nix to be an interesting, thoughtful, person.  And not much was actually Happening either in terms of plot development or character development.  For instance, another possible love interest for Nix is thrown into the mix, but it is more a convinent happenstance than a gripping drama.  On the other hand,  the book showcases Hawaii's natural beauty, with bonus bits of mythology and history; on the other other hand, that isn't really what I wanted from a ship bearing mythological treasures sailing through time from map to map. 

Things pick up dramatically toward the end, with a visit to the Emperor Qin's tomb (the little pearl eating sea dragon who seemed just a random add on gets to be part of  the action).  There are twisty revelations revealed that make the whole story more interesting, and the heist goes very wrong in interesting ways.  The last fifty pages or so were very good reading! But they came too late to redeem the book as a whole for me. 

Small thoughts-- I thought it was great that the crew included lesbian cattle herders from Africa, and I enjoyed the brief bits of page time they got.  Kashmir, the Persian love interest and handy thief, got on my nerves because he was pretty one note (or two--love interest + thief).  He was clearly suffering from the hots for Nix pretty badly but never demonstrated any depth of personality. (Also I had trouble buying "Kashmir" as a Persian name, but maybe it's more plausible than I found it to be). 

Final thought--although I myself was not engaged by this one, lots of people were.  Kirkus, for instance, said "it’s a skillful mashup of science fiction and eclectic mythology, enlivened by vivid sensory detail and moments of emotional and philosophical depth that briefly resonate before dissolving into the next swashbuckling adventure.

A nonstop time-travel romp."

Kirkus clearly got more romping out of it than I did.   Oh well. At least I romped in the last action filled part of the book (I really did like the visit to Emperor Qin's necropolis).

Here's another review, at the Book Smugglers.

This week's round-up of middle grade fantasy and science fiction from around the blogs (3/27/16)

Welcome to this week's round-up, and happy Easter to all who are celebrating. 

Clearly eggs were bigger back in the 19th century; perhaps there were a few Gastornises still kicking around England, which would explain a lot (?)

The Reviews

The 39-Storey Treehouse by Andy Griffiths, at Sharon the Librarian

The After-Room by Maile Meloy, at Read Till Dawn

Audie the Angel & The Afterworld (The Angel Archives Volume Three), by Erika Kathryn, at This Kid Reviews Books

Beyond the Kingdoms, by Chris Colfer, at Reading Violet

The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle, by Janet Fox, at books4yourkids and Charlotte's Library

Confessions of an Imaginary Friend, by Michelle Cuevas, at The Children's Book Review

The Copper Gauntlet, by Holly Black and Cassandra Clare, at Leaf's Reviews

A Curious Tale of the In-Between, by Lauren DeStefano, at The Children's Book Review

Disney Lands by Ridley Pearson, at Carstairs Considers

Eden's Wish, by M. Tara Crowl, at Word Spelunking

The Girl in the Tower, by Lisa Schroeder, at Fantasy of the Silver Dragon

Golden Mane by SJB Gilmour, at The Write Path

Hour of the Bees, by Linday Eagar, at So Many Books, So Little Time, Becky's Book Reviews, Book Nut, and Charlotte's Library

How to Catch an Invisible Cat, by Paul Tobin, at This Kid Reviews Books

The Inn Between, by Marina Cohen, at Me On Books and Great Imaginations

The Key to Extraordinary, by Natalie Lloyd, at Next Best Book

The Last Kids on Earth, by Max Braillier, at Ms. Yingling Reads

Masterminds, by Gordon Korman, at That's Another Story

Neverseen, by Shannon Messenger, at A Reader of Fictions

Of Mice and Magic (Harriet Hamster Princess book 2), by Ursula Vernon, at Ms. Yingling Reads

Once Was a Time, by Leila Sales, at The Reading Nook Reviews

The Screaming Staircase, by Jonathan Stroud, at Kitty Cat at the Library

Secrets of Bearhaven, by K.E. Rocha, at Ms.Yingling Reads

Secrets of the Dragon Tomb, by Patrick Samphire, at Geo Librarian

The Secrets of Solace by Jaleigh Johnson, at books4yourkids

Twice Upon a Time, by James Riley, at Akossiwa Ketoglo

The Unlikely Adventures of Mabel Jones (Mabel Jones #1), by Will Mabbitt, at Word Spelunking

Witherwood Reform School, by Obert Skye, at Buxton's Fantasy and Science Fiction Novels

Two at Ms. Yingling Reads:  Fortune Falls, by Jenny Goebel, and The Inn Between, by Marina Cohen

Authors and Interviews

Cressida Cowell (How to Train Your Dragon et al.) at The Guardian

Janet Fox at Middle Grade Mafioso and Pop Goes the Reader

Other Good Stuff

Here's a lovely post on House Spirits at Seven Miles of Steel Thistles

The Aurealis Awards have been announced; here's the Children's list:

Best Children’s Fiction

• Winner: A Single Stone, Meg McKinlay (Walker Books Australia)
• A Week Without Tuesday, Angelica Banks (Allen & Unwin)
• The Cut-Out, Jack Heath (Allen & Unwin)
• Bella and the Wandering House, Meg McKinlay (Fremantle Press)
• The Mapmaker Chronicles: Prisoner of the Black Hawk, A.L. Tait (Hachette Australia)

The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle, by Janet Fox

The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle, by Janet Fox (Viking Books for Young Readers, March 15, 2016, middle grade), went on my tbr list the moment I laid eyes on its description--siblings evacuated from WW II London to a castle in Scotland where there is sinister magic afoot.  It sounded perfect for me! Alas, although there were things I appreciated, and I am happy to recommend it to middle grade readers who like slow burn horror, and although lots of other people really like and it's gotten lots of stars and rave reviews, it fell short for me.

The sinister magic was plenty sinister.  It is clear from the get go, both to the reader and to the central protagonist, Kat, the oldest of the London siblings, that all is not wholesome sunshine and light at Rookskill Castle, and that the lady of the castle is clearly not a Good Thing.  In a series of flashbacks taking us back into the past of the lady of the castle, the reader is told of the horrible bargains that Lady Eleanor has made over the years.  And it is indeed darkly horrible, and really creepy and fascinating.  But the result is that the reader knows many things long before the characters do, and as the pages turned and the number of child victims of dark magic rose, I became frustrated there was nothing actually being done about it.  It's not until around 280 pages into the book that Kat begins to actively confront Lady Eleanor, and instead of being as tense as I could have been, I was mostly just relieved that Kat was finally using her own magical talismans and actually doing something for crying out loud.

I also really did not feel as though the whole German spy subplot was necessary (I rarely feel German spy subplots add all that much), and indeed, frustrated as I was that it was taking Kat so long to stop thinking that she should "keep calm and carry on" (as her father had told her to do), the fact that she was dragged into decoding cyphers didn't seem to be to the point.  Nor did it seem at all necessary for the anti-German-spy folks to actually be trying to use magic to counter the Germans.  I'm not against using magic against the Nazis, but I think it has to be worked into a story more naturally than it is here, where it is basically just stated.  Although it's not an uninteresting story in its own right, it detracts and distracts from the specialness of Kat's magic, and Lady Eleanor's magic, and does not do much to further the plot.

So in short I didn't like this book as much as I'd hoped I would--it took too long for the main character to become an active protagonist, and the insertion of German spy magic subplot was pretty much a WTF for me instead of a positive addition.  Oh well.  You can go read the Kirkus review now, for a different opinion!

Hour of the Bees, by Lindsay Eagar

Hour of the Bees, by Lindsay Eagar (Candlewick, March 2016), is the story of a magic-infused summer in which a young girl works through family tensions, past and present. And yes, the magic is real, but yet still this is one I'd give to a fan of realist fiction before I'd give it to a fan of fantasy (because the fantasy fan might be disappointed that there isn't More magic, and be all blasé, but the reader of realistic fiction might actually be stunned when the magic comes to fruition!).  NB--I tried to figure out before reading this one whether it was "magical realism" of a sort where the magic isn't actually real, and couldn't, so I'll say flat out that I was sure at the end that real magic had happened.

Carol does not want to be spending the summer on a dry as bone and hot as heck dingy, rundown ranch in the middle of southwestern no-where.  She doesn't particularly want to get to know Serge, the Mexican grandfather she's never met (her dad took off from the ranch as soon as he could and never looked back) and she doesn't like him calling her by her Spanish name,  Carolina.  She wants pool parties and sleepovers, not rail-thin sheep and rattlesnakes.  But she and her family (Dad, Mom, big half-sister, little brother) are stuck there for the summer, because Serge is suffering from dementia, and the ranch house must be cleaned out and sold.

But being stuck somewhere means you have a chance to get to know a place and its people, and that's what happens for Carolina.  Gradually she becomes drawn into her grandfather's stories of the magical tree that once grew in his village, that kept all the villagers from harm, and kept them there, all together, safe and long-lived.  And how her own grandmother couldn't stand being stuck, and left, with a bracelet of the tree's bark to keep her safe.  Off she went on wild adventures, coming home between times, and seeing her living life this way, the other villages decided to follow her lead, taking pieces of the tree away, until there was no tree left.  With no tree, the bees left too, taking with them all the water in the village's lake.

So Carolina's grandfather tells her the stories, and how the bees will one day come to bring the water back, and in the meantime her parents work to close down his life.  But the magic that fills Serge's stories spills over into reality, and Carolina sets in motion the return of the bees, and the water.   When Serge is at last installed (unwilling and sedated) in a nursing home, the drought breaks, and Carolina, wanting to hear from him the end of the story, and wanting to bring his life full circle, risks her life to take him home again (nb--she makes Bad Choices involving her sister's car.  But she really has no other choice....her parents aren't listening to her).

It's a very moving story, and one with lots of appeal for those who like intergenerational relationships.  Not much Happens (until the Bad Choice toward the end), but the pages are full of interest for those who like small things made vividly real.  Carolina is likeable, and is enough a normal middle school kid to be generally relatable, even as her circumstances stray further and further from the non-magical norm, and she starts to make independent choice towards being her own person.  Her decision to reclaim her roots, now that she has found where her roots lie, is heartwarming.

It's also nice to see a family that includes both a loving father and a loving mother, although the big sister is perhaps exaggeratedly unpleasant.

I don't think this will be every kid's cup of tea as a book to read for their own pleasure (it's not light reading, and I think the understated cover will do a good job fending off readers who really wouldn't like it), but I do think there will be readers (introspective, dreamy ones) who will like it lots. 

disclaimer: review copy received from the publisher

The Devil on the Road, by Robert Westall, for Timeslip Tuesday

Squeaking in just under the gun for Timeslip Tuesday with The Devil on the Road, by Robert Westall (1978)--a good one for fans of older UK books about teens caught in time travel predicaments involving 17th century witch trials, with a nice dose of motorcycles, a charming cat, and a vividly real English rural setting.   It's a good story, the sort that might well make a huge impression if you read it young, and it's certainly memorable even if you read it old!   I'm going to be spoiling it, so be warned!

John Webster sets of on spring break from university in London on his motorbike, happy to follow fate where she leads him.  He ends up sheltering from a storm in an old barn way off in the middle of nowhere, which is just what fate wanted.  The landowner finds him there, and offers him the use of the barn as long as he wants it, so he stays, and gradually the landowner works to make it more of a home.  John saves a little kitten, and enjoys puttering around...but things get weird.  The villagers are weird around him, calling him "Cunning."  The landowner is rather too anxious to make the barn a home, and indeed it was once a manor house.  John discovers a hidden room with old furnishings.  And then the kitten, grown into a cat strangy quickly, leads him back in time to the 17th century.

There he meets a girl his own age, Johanna, the daughter of the old manor's lord.  He follows the cat back and forth in time for a few visits, interesting but not terribly disturbing (except with regard to 17th century hygene).  But then things take a dark turn when the most notorious witchunter of all 17th century England arrives. 

Matthew Hopkins, the Witch Finder General, was real, and he was awful.  He was in the witch hunting business purely for the money-the more women he killed as witches, the more he made.  And now he is targeting the women of Johanna's village, and she is determined to save him, even at risk of being found guilty of witchcraft herself. Which is what happens, and it is very vivid and tense indeed.

But John steps in to save her, and comes back to the 17th century armed and dangerous, the Devil on the Road of the title.  And save her he does, and they travel together back to the old barn/restored manor house along with all the other accused women (who conveniently, and confusingly, vanish from the scene). 

If this were a modern YA book, John and Johanna would fall in love and it would be all nice and romantic.  But it isn't.  Johanna does want John to stay with her, but she turns out to actually be a witch, and 17th century witches, even if they are good witches, helping others, tend to try to get their own way.  John  doesn't love her, and doesn't want to spend the rest of his life buried in the green and verdant country healing villagers....and he barely escapes.

Here's what frustrated me--Johanna doesn't make any effort at meaningful communication, relying instead on her magic to try to get John to stay with her.  It makes her rather two dimensional and unsympathetic.  There she is in the 20th century, and she wants to keep playing by her own rules. John, on the other hand, is a very sympathetic character--kind to kittens. 

If you are at all interested in fiction about the 17th century, it's well worth a read--a truly memorable story.  It's one of the few time travel books in which the time travel is aided and abetted by locals who might or might not know what is happening, who manipulate the protagonist so that he cooperates, which makes it interesting. 

This is the first Robert Westall book I've read, but he does seem to be on of the great UK children's writers of the last three decades of the 20th century, winner of two Carnegie Medals, the Smarties Prize, and the Guardian Prize.  I'll be on the look out for more of his books.

This week's round-up of middle grade sci fi and fantasy from around the blogs (3/20/16)

Here's this week's round-up of middle grade sci fi and fantasy from around the blogs; please let me know if I missed your post!

The Reviews

Charmed by Jen Calonita, at The Write Path and The Reading Nook Reviews

Chase Tinker and the House of Magic, by Malia Ann Haberman, at Always in the Middle

The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle, by Janet Fox, at The Book Wars, Word Spelunking, Fantasy Literature, and Waking Brain Cells

Dealing with Dragons, by Patricia C. Wrede, at Leaf's Reviews

A Dragon's Guide to Making Your Human Smarter, by Laurence Yep and Joanne Ryder, at Word Spelunking

The Fairy-Tale Matchmaker by E.D. Baker at Read Till Dawn

Flunked, by Jen Calonita, at Cover2Cover

The Fog Diver, by Joel Ross, at Finding Wonderland and Challenging the Bookworm

Fortune Falls by Jenny Goebel, at Read Till Dawn

Hour of the Bees, by Linday Eager, at Ms. Yingling Reads and Scobberlotch

The Morrigan's Curse, by Dianne K. Salerni, at Middle Grade Mafioso

One Wish, by Michelle Harrison, at Great Imaginations

Red: The True Story of Red Riding Hood by Liesl Shurtliff, at Hidden in Pages and The Book Cellar

Rise of the Ragged Clover (Luck Uglies #3), by Paul Durham, at Kid Lit Reviews

Tuck Everlasting, by Natilie Babbitt, at Becky's Book Reviews

The Wild Robot, by Peter Brown, at The Book Nut

The Wild Swans, by Jackie Morris, at Leaf's Reviews

Four short ones at Random Musings of a Bibliophile--Bayou Magic, Fridays with the Wizards, The Hollow Boy, and The Jumbies

Authors and Interviews

Anna Staniszewski (Finders Reapers) at Teen Librarian Toolbox

Janet Fox (The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle) at Great Imaginations, Cynsations, My Brain on Books, and The Book Wars

Other Good Stuff

From The Guardian: My Brother is a Superhero, by David Solomons, "a debut novel about a comics-obsessed 11-year-old who is annoyed when his older brother is given powers by an alien to help save two universes has won the £5,000 Waterstones prize."

The Carnegie and Kate Greenaway shortlists have been announced, with a smattering of fantasy included

The movie of The Little Prince has been picked up by Netflix, via Tor

And from the department of truly odd creatures--a fossil monster has at last been identified (it's the "dorsal eye ridge" that really makes this one stand out, I think).

Anna and the Swallow Man, by Gavriel Savit

Anna and the Swallow Man, by Gavriel Savit, (Knopf Books for Young Readers, January 2016), is a story set in WW II Poland about a little girl who has lost her home and father to the Germans, and finds, in an enigmatic stranger who can call birds to his finger, a father who is in need of a child,  The two, little girl and Swallow Man, off to walk through the years of war, because to stay in one place is to risk being found, and the hints gradually build that the Swallow Man has very good reason for not wanting to be found and used to as a weapon.   Together they beg and pilfer and scavenge, keeping to themselves and slipping through the dangerous days and cold nights, until Anna meets a young Jewish Musician, who in his joy and zest for life shows her a way of being in the world that the Swallow Man cannot (nb--friends, not romance--Anna is still a child), and he joins them in their peregrinations of survival until he no longer can.

And then Anna must turn into the caretaker of the Swallow Man when he runs out of the medicine that keeps him sane, leading to her being asked by a pharmacist to offer her naked body in exchange for more of the drug.  Anna is still naïve, and the horror of this incident is that it is a transaction that she doesn't, and cannot, question, if she wants her Swallow Man back.  

The ending, separating the two of them by the Swallow Man's choice, neither promises or denies the possibility of future happiness, and instead adds to the dream-like, surreal, quality of the whole book.  (the ending would have seemed less surreal to me if I had known more clearly what the heck was happening...but I didn't).  It's a dark story de facto, but the Swallow Man manages in his care of Anna to keep alive beauty and wonder; perhaps not hope, for she doesn't know, I think, what she might hope for.

It is very much a story that is like a picture seen from a distance, told neither from Anna's or the Swallow Man's point of view.  And so I never felt at any visceral level that I understood them; it is more an intellectual excursion, heart touching but not immersively emotional.  It seemed to me a story that relied on a combination of hints that one needed to use to deduce things on one's own, combined with narratorial pronouncements, as opposed to a story flowing naturally from inside the characters themselves.  It would be a fine book for teens or adults to read and discuss, but it's not a kid's book, despite Anna's age.  That is, I guess it would be a fine book for discussion, but if I were part of that chat, I'd mostly be asking sort of cynical questions of doubtfulness, as opposed to expressing great appreciation.  Like--was the Swallow Man selfish in not trying to find Anna a more stable home?

Short Answer:  not really my cup of tea, but lots of other people seem to love it, so it's probably a matter of personal taste.  Here's the NY Times book review, which I generally agree with (though that reviewer, Elizabeth Wein, liked the book more than me!).

disclaimer: review copy received from the publisher at BEA last summer.

The Keeper of the Mist, by Rachel Neumeier, for Timeslip Tuesday

The Keeper of the Mist, by Rachel Neumeier (Knopf, March 8 2016) isn't a time travel book, but there is an important part of the story that involves magical time tweaking that essential for making everything work out ok, and I decided that this time slippage is enough to count for my Timeslip Tuesday purposes.

The basic plot of The Keeper of the Mist is one that many fantasy readers will find familiar--a young person unexpectedly becoming the next ruler of their land, and having to cope with problems ranging from the internal ordering of household/court affairs to the dealing with dangerous external  threats of predatory neighboring kingdoms and the like.  In this case, Keri knew she was the bastard daughter of the lord of Nimmira, and she had let herself daydream from time to time about ending up the heir.   But in the meantime, she had her bakery to keep going after her mother's death, and lots of beautiful cakes to make (good cake descriptions!).

Then the Timekeeper of the old Lord comes to tell her that her father is dead, and that Nimmira has chosen her to be its Lady, and Keri isn't given a chance to say no.  Nimmira needs her to keep stable the curtain of magical mist that shields it from the sight, and the minds, the two neighboring kingdoms, both of whom would love to swallow it up.  The Timekeeper is one of three positions, imbued with magic, that support Nimmira's rulers, and the roles of Gatekeeper and Bookkeeper fall, through the magic of the land, to two of Keri's childhood friends, so at least she is not alone in figuring out the magic and responsibilities of her new position.

But the mist that protects Nimmira is becoming dangerously thin; thin enough so that men from each of the two neighboring countries has made their hungry way into its fertile, magic-filled valleys.  Keri isn't given much time to get used to her new position, and the various nasty legacies of her father, before she has to come up with a plan to restore the mist and get rid of the enemies, in the face of formidable enemy magic, and it is all very tense.

The Keeper of the Mist is one I think I will enjoy more the second time around. This first time through, right inside of the thick of the tenseness along with Keri, it was awfully hard to be relaxed and happy and delight in the fascinating magic (the Bookkeeper's helpful magic is the best--whenever she needs a particular book she just happens to find it, and she never looses her pen, but the Gatekeeper's magic is awfully fascinating too, and the Timekeepers, and Keri's own connection with the land is rather nice as well).  So anyway, even though I peeked at the end, it still wasn't enough to keep me from being tense.  Because most of the time Keri is desperately trying to figure out what she should be doing in rather difficult, potentially life ending, situations, and she has to save not just herself, but her whole country.

And then the Timekeeper's magic comes into play, giving Keri and her companions the time they need...and there is a happy ending, although, much as I appreciate a good understated romance, I wouldn't have minded a bit more...

So if you don't have patience for books that are really close third person, when that person does not have a clear grasp of things, and is thinking about them rather frantically for much of the book, this might not be your cup of tea.  But it's one I'd unhesitatingly recommend to fans of Robin McKinley (at times I though  bit of The Blue Sword, at times a bit of Chalice).  And one I'd recommend to fans of strange magics that don't flash in pyrotechnics but are old and intricate and surprising.  And one I'd recommend to readers wanting strong friendships between young women that are truly supportive.

It's not my personal favorite of Rahcek Neumeier's books (that would be House of Shadows--which I reviewed here, more enthusiascially just about than I have ever reviewed any book ever) but it's one I liked lots and plan to keep on hand for the day when I read all 400 books on my tbr and can become a rereader again...

I'm not sure I've done a good job here, so here's Maureen's take on the book at By Singing Light.

Disclaimer: review copy received from the author

This week's round-up of middle grade sci fi and fantasy from around the blogs (3/13/16)

Here's what I found this week; please let me know if I missed your post!

The Reviews

Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians, by Brandon Sanderson, at Fantasy Literature

Beetle Boy, by M.G. Leonard, at Mom Read It

Charmed, by Jen Calonita, at Cracking the Cover

The Charmed Children of Rookskill Castle, by Janet Fox, at Great Imaginations and Book Nut

City of Thirst, by Carrie Ryan and John Parke Davis, at Charlotte's Library

The Clockwork Three by Matthew J. Kirby, at Read Till Dawn

Criminal Destiny, Gordon Korman, at Read Till Dawn

Forest of Wonders, by Linda Sue Park, at the NYT Book Review

Grounded: The Adventures of Rapunzel, by Megan Morrison, at Snuggly Oranges

The Island of Dr. Libris, by Chris Grabenstein, at Cindy Reads A Lot

Island of Graves, by Lisa McMann, at Buxton's Fantasy and Science Fiction Novels

The Letter for the King, by Tonke Dragt, at Semicolon

Miss Pickerell Goes to Mars, by Ellen MacGregor, at Views from the Tesseract

The Night Parade, by Kathryn Tanquary, at Word Spelunking

A Pocket Full of Murder, by R.J. Anderson, at Semicolon

Red, by Liesl Shurtiff, at The Reading Nook Reviews

Secrets of Valhalla, by Jasmine Richards, at Ms. Yingling Reads

Serafina and the Black Cloak, by Robert Beatty, at Kitty Cat at the Library

Story Thieves: The Stolen Chapters, by James Riley, at Buxton's Fantasy and Science Fiction Novels

The Thickety, by J.A White, at The Bookshelf Gargoyle (and scroll down for The Diary of Anna, the Girl Witch, by Max Candee)

A World Without Heroes, by Brandon Mull, at The Fictional Reader

Two at Ms. Yingling Reads--Lockdown (Urban Outlaws #3), by Peter Jay Black, and The Trouble with Fuzzwonker Fizz, by Patrick Carman


Authors and Interviews

Elise Stephens (Guardian of the Gold Breathers) at Word Spelunking

Keira Gillet (the Zaria Fierce Trilogy) at Mother Daughter Book Reviews

Other Good Stuff

At American Indians in Children's Literature there's a round up of Native People's response to J.K. Rowling's "History of Magic in North America" stories.

City of Thirst, by Carrie Ryan and John Parke Davis

City of Thirst, by Carrie Ryan and John Parke Davis (Little Brown October 2015), is the sequel to 2014's The Map to Everywhere (here's my review of that one).  At the end of that book, Marrill returned to the ordinary world after wild adventures on the Pirate Stream of magic with a group of ship-board comrades that included the best friend she's ever made, a boy named Fin who is cursed with being utterly forgettable (Marrill is the only person Fin's ever met who can remember him from minute to minute).  Back in our world, Marrill's been left in the care of an older girl, Remy, while her mother undergoes treatments for cancer.  Marrill doesn't expect any more magic in her life, but then the Pirate Stream touches her life again, and she and Remy are swept away into adventure back on board the same ship, the Enterprising Kraken.

Warnings have come of the imminent approach of the Iron Tide, an the Enterprising Kraken sets out to sail the Pirate Stream and find out what exactly the Iron Tide is, and how it can be stopped.  The journey takes them into old stories of the Sand Salt King and a truly fantastical city that exists in a bubble of its own time.  At the heart of the city is the long-lost wish machine; Marrill could wish for her mother's recovery, Fin, increasingly dispirited by never being remembered, could wish to be normal.  Or they could wish the Iron Tide away, saving not just the Pirate Stream and all the lands it touches but our own world as well.

Except there are problems; an old enemy is close to making the wish-machine his own, and the Sand Salt King, who set events in motion, is a terrible threat in his own right.  And even if the wish issue were resolved, there's the problem of escaping the un-escapable City of Thirst....

This is the sort of story where one (if one is me) comes up for air periodically to think "my goodness, this is wildly imaginative and incredibly invented" followed quickly by "I hope I am understanding what the heck is happening."  So if is fun reading, although of course the really great wildly inventive fantasies (one in thousand) are so great that one never thinks to come up for air at all.  But if "wildly inventive" is what you like in middle grade fantasy, with lots of adventure and fascinating magical happenings and characters, City of Thirst and its predecessor will be right up your alley.

Some thoughtful depth is given by the predicament of Fin, who is dealing more directly with the downside of his forgettable-ness than he was in the first book.  His friendship with Marrill is tested, and he evokes just tons of sympathy from the reader.  Marrill's own predicaments of saving her mother vs. saving the world, and going home vs being a loyal friend, pale in comparison although they are of course still valid concerns.

Short answer--not exactly to my taste at the moment, but a cracking good read that's lots of fun with a sprinkle of heart tugging. I liked it more than I did the first book, perhaps because this one is mostly on dry land, which I tend to prefer....things at sea tend to be more episodic, and I like settling down into a nice city of extraordinary oddness much more!  That being said, I am committed to the next journey of the Enterprising Kraken even if it does take place at sea (mostly for Fin's sake)!

disclaimer: review copy greatfully received from the publisher at Kidlitcon 2015.

No True Echo, by Gareth P. Jones, for Timeslip Tuesday

Sometimes time traveling (either doing it or reading about it) makes your head hurt, because of all the tricksy paradoxes and divergent timelines and multiple strands of reality, and (me waxing poetic) sometimes it makes your heart hurt too (if you are the time traveler), when you see your dead mother still alive (assuming you loved your mother, or at least wanted to love your mother) or say goodbye to a beloved in a timeline that isn't reality not knowing if you will meet again.  And then sometimes a week passes between reading a book in which all of the above happens (except for the run-on sentence structure) and sitting down to review it, and then one becomes really uncertain indeed about summarizing the plot....

No True Echo, by Gareth P. Jones (Harry N. Abrams, Oct. 2015 in the US), is the story of an ordinary English school boy, Eddie, living a boring life with his grandmother in a boring small town in the middle of nowhere and then Bang it all blowing up into a swirling vortex of time travel madness.  The catalyst that sets off the bang is the arrival of a new girl, vibrant and curious and charismatic.  A new girl who Eddie wants to be friends with.  A girl who is actually not a catalyst, but a reactant--there because of things done in other pasts and in possible futures. 

This is sci fi time travel of a fantastic sort--a machine that can send echoes of a person back into their past, allowing them to change things.  But the echo pasts live alongside the original pasts, and just what the original, real, meant to happen timeline is gets obscured.  This confusion hits Eddie's timeline hard, because the new girl hasn't come to his time and his place by chance--it is the epicenter of the new time travel technology.  Basically the title of the book sums up the whole approach to time travel very nicely.

Eddie is about to ask questions he'd never considered, like "is my mother alive or did she die in a car accident when I was a baby?"  and "will I ever see this girl I think I might love ever again."  But Eddie confusions aren't all that this story is about.  There was also a murder done, which Eddie is a witness to (or possibly no murder ever happened), and if it did in fact happen, justice needs to be done....and so, in a rather nice little side plot, we see bits of that story from a local policewoman's point of view, in both the book's present and in the future.

I enjoyed it very much; you don't often get a murder mystery that personally affects the characters, and I enjoyed splashing along with Eddie as he floundered through all his various pasts and presents.  I'm not sure I understood it all at the end, but it was a good ride.  One that was made even better by the inclusion of Frankenstein, which is the text being discussed in English class, and which echoes lots within the story.  Good food for thought,

The romance stays rather nascent, because of temporal complications and both Eddie and the new girl being rather busy, and so it is not your run of the mill sort of YA spec fic with young love front and center.  It felt at once middle grade (Eddie is still on the young side of teenagerness) and adult (with the thrillery murder mystery and all the complicated sci fi temporal paradoxes).  The library copy next to me rather coyly says "tween;" I guess I'd shelve it as YA with the caveat that the best reader of all might be the sharp as a tack 7th or 8th grader....

Short answer:   happy to have read it, happy to recommend it, pretty sure I don't need my own copy to re-read in the nursing home (I think I will only take books I am sure I understand to the nursing home with me....)

And now--what does Kirkus say? (I like to compare with Kirkus because they often disagree with me and because it is easy to find their reviews).

"At once a classic time-travel narrative and resonant fable about the price to be paid when we alter our world simply because we can, this smart, satisfying eco–techno-thriller with heart transcends genre."

All right, that's fair enough, although I'm not sure about the "eco" part.  There were some trees mentioned....possibly a sheep or two kicking around in the background...it was definitely muddy.....It's certainly not "eco" in the sense of "global warming" or "horrible drought."

Just for kicks, here's what the UK edition, which came out some months earlier, looks like:

This week's round-up of middle grade sci fi/fantasy from around the blogs (3/6/16)

Good morning, and welcome to another round-up of middle grade sci fi and fantasy gleaned from my blog reading!  Please let me know if I missed your post.

The Reviews

Alcatraz Vs. The Evil Librarians by Brandon Sanderson at The Write Path

Astrotwins: Project Rescue, by Mark Kelly and Martha Freeman, at Ms. Yingling Reads

Bayou Magic, by Jewell Parker Rhodes, at Bibliobrit

Behind the Canvas, by Alexander Vance, at Cracking the Cover

Charmed, by Jen Calonita, at Read Till Dawn

Diary of a Mad Brownie, by Bruce Coville, at Sharon the Librarian

The Dragon King, by Nils Johnson-Shelton, at Say What?

The  Fallen Spaceman, by Lee Harding, at Views From the Tesseract

Flunked by Jen Calonita, at Read Till Dawn

The Girl Who Could Not Dream, by Sarah Beth Durst, at Destined 4 Wierdness

The Grey King, by Susan Cooper, at Tales of the Marvelous

Hamster Princess: Harriet the Invincible by Ursula Vernon, at Puss Reboots

Hour of the Bees by Lindsay Eager, at Waking Brian Cells

The Last Kids on Earth, by Max Brallier, at Guys Lit Wire

Lost & Found (Witherwood Reform School #2), by Obert Skye, at The Reading Nook Reviews

Moon Rising, by Tui T. Sutherland, at Bibliobrit

The Pearl Orb, by Elizabeth Ball, at Nayu's Reading Corner

Quest Maker, by Laurie McKay (Last Dragon Charmer Book 2) at Buxtons' Fantasy and Science Fiction Novels

Red: The True Story of Red Riding Hood by Liesl Shurtliff, at The Book Monsters

The Screaming Staircase by Jonathan Stroud, at Cover2Cover

Stingray City, by Ellen Prager, at Mom Read It and Kid Lit Reviews

Well Witched by Frances Hardinge, at Leaf's Reviews

Which Witch? by Eva Ibbotson, at Pages Unbound

The Whispering Skull, by Jonathan Stroud, at Great Imaginations

A Wizard of Earthsea, by Ursula Le Guin, at By Singing Light

The Wrinkled Crown, by Anne Nesbet, at Leaf's Reviews

Two at Ms. Yingling Reads--How to Capture and Invisible Cat, by Paul Tobin,  and Forest of Wonders, by Linda Sue Park

Authors and Interviews

Kelly Barnhill (The Girl Who Drank the Moon) at Tor

Natalie Lloyd (The Key to Extraordinary) at The Hiding Spot

Ross MacKenzie (The Nowhere Emporium) at The Guardian

Ross Montgomery (Perijee and Me) at Middle Grade Strikes Back

Dianne Salerni (The Morrigan's Curse) at My Brain on Books

Other Good Stuff

A MG fantasy, The Nowhere Emporium by Ross MacKenzie, is the winner of the 2016 Scottish Children’s Book Awards "younger readers" category (read more at  The Guardian)

"Middle-Grade Novels Have Gotten 173% Longer over the Last 40 Years" at The Book List Reader

"One Day You Wake Up and You Are Grown: Catherynne Valente’s Fairyland and the Secrets of Growing Up" an essay at Tor

The White House wants to use science fiction to settle the solar system (at Gizmodo, via Views from the Tesseract)

The Seventh Bride, by T. Kingfisher

"I would follow this hedgehog into the mouth of hell," says Rhea, the heroine of The Seventh Bride, by T.Kingfisher (pen name of Ursula Vernon), at a difficult moment toward the end of the book.  She has reason to trust the hedgehog, which joined her on the dark and terrifying journey to her betrothed's home ("She was still going somewhere terrible, but she had a hedgehog, dammit").  Rhea, an unexceptional young miller's daughter, has been chosen by a lord to be his bride, and their difference in status is the least of the wrongnesses at work.  But at least Rhea has her hedgehog friend to stand beside her as she copes with the fact that her betrothed has been married six times before, and all but one of these wives are still alive (more or less). 

Rhea, with hedgehog assistance, completes various tasks the sadistic sorcerer lord sets her, and copes with the terror of her situation as best she can.  And in the end, with the help other wives, she wins freedom for them all.   It's a fine story, with bits that are disturbingly horrible, and Rhea is a fine heroine, and there were bits of humor (not just the hedgehog) that I enjoyed very much.   But somehow it's not a book I think I need to re-read to get more out of it--everything is pretty much right there, plot and character, without much subtle depth and nuance.  And I'm not quite sure what the point is of the tasks the evil lord sets Rhea to do, as her fate is the same regardless of whether she does them or not (he's not going to let her off marrying him), and so they were more divertissements of story rather than powerful pieces of it.  Still, The Seventh Bride makes for good reading, and I enjoyed it.

But I absolutely adore the hedgehog.   And if you enjoy fairy tale reimaginings, this might be right up your ally--it echoes both Bluebeard and The Robber Bridegroom. At the right is the cover of the ebook edition (as best I can figure); and it shows nicely some of the creepiness (zombie birds as garden décor, delivering scary advice....)

It could easily be shelved as YA, seeing as Rhea is a young teenager, but it isn't much like standard YA fantasy--there is no romance.

"Young Woman in a Garden" by Delia Sherman, for Timeslip Tuesday

"Young Woman in a Garden" is one of the stories in the anthology of the same name by Delia Sherman (Small Beer Press, November 2014), and it's my Timeslip Tuesday pick this week.  This is something of a spoiler right from the get go, but I really liked the story and wanted to share it, and there are plenty of other good stories in the book that aren't spoiled...There will be more and worse spoilers for this story to come, though, so before I get to them I will simply say--this story is about a young woman working on her PhD in art history, who has come to the rural home of a rather less famous French impressionist and his wife Celeste (who herself was a fine painter, before marriage), hoping to find among his papers something that will make him a more interesting subject for her dissertation.  What she finds is a whole lot more interesting than she ever imagined (which is an awfully generic sentence of unspoilerishness, but true, especially given that the protagonist isn't all that good at imagining things....).

Edouard Beauvoisin was known primarily for two paintings, "Young Woman in a Garden," and "Reclining Nude," whose model was a Spanish woman, Luz Gasco, that any art historians who thought much about him assumed was his mistress.  Theresa, the young grad student, is a great great great niece of the painter, and has used her family connections to get an introduction to the keepers of the museum that is Beauvoisin's house.  Instead of the usual set up of such museum houses, she finds a home lived in by two old women, with a lovely garden, and no other visitors.  She spends little time thinking of the strangeness of the situation, but becomes absorbed in following a web of clues in journals and letters that almost spring from the house as if waiting for her to discover them.  While she is absorbed in her work, she comes almost to be a stand in for Beauvoisin himself, the outsider to the relationship between his wife Celeste and Luz Gasco....and solves the mystery of Beauvoisin's relationship, such as it was, to Luz Gasco, which is what the two women wanted.

Starting the spoilers for real, now.

And having learned the truth, that it is Celeste and Luz were the lovers, and that Celeste was the artist of the two paintings, she sees that the beautiful gardens of the house are no such thing, but a rather neglected overgrown tangle (the garden changing is what makes this clearly time travel, and not ghosts).  All afire with what she's learned, she spares little though for the remarkable fact that she had been spending the past few weeks back in the past, but fortunately the reader (not having a dissertation to write) gets to enjoy the thought.  (I'd say that she'd spent her time back in the mid 20th century, based on the two women now being old, but not dead....).

It is very unusual to have a time travel story in which the main character doesn't get that they have gone into the past.  It only works if you can plausibly get rid of modern conveniences (by setting the story in what is assumed to be a historical museum house), and it helps if, as is the case here, the only two other characters are somewhat in on the truth (they recognize Theresa is standing in for Edouard, and want her to find things out...).  Of course, the reader is also taken aback, but it makes for nice re-reading!

So basically it is an academic detective story about a romantic relationship in which the protagonist has travelled several decades back to a time when two of the players in the relationship are still alive, but who are unable? unwilling? to actually tell her the whole story.  It's a perfect short story for any feminist art historians, or those who want to spend a month or so researching in a country house in France.

And just for the record--the other stories in the anthology range from horror to domestic fantasy, and offer a nice variety of mood and tone.

The Head of the Saint, by Socorro Acioli

The Head of the Saint, by Socorro Acioli (Delacorte Press, March 8, 2016, YA, translated by Daniel Hahn), is a Brazilian import I picked up at ALA Midwinter because it is about a boy, Samuel, who lives in the titular head--a head that was supposed to crown a giant statue of St. Anthony, which in turn was to bring economic zip to the small Brazilian town of Candeia.  (I really like stories about kids on their own making homes for themselves in odd places like hollow concrete heads).  The head had never made onto the giant body prepared for it.  And gradually all the townsfolk are moving away from the surreal headless colossus that is Candeia's shame, or dying in their hoes with no-one left to care.  Samuel's father had left his mother before he was born in another small town a ways away, and never made it back, and Samuel, fourteen years old and alone in the world after his mother's death, was barely able to make the long walk to Candeia, his father's hometown, with his grandmother's address his only hope of family.  But instead of feeding and sheltering him, which he badly needs, she sends him up the hill to the concrete hollow head of Saint Anthony.

A badly infected wound from a dog bite guarantees that he'll have to stay in the head for a while, and fortune smiles on him when he meets a boy from town who's snuck up the hill with a small illicit stash of porn to enjoy in peace.  Samuel promises not to tell Francisco's secret, and in return (not just because of being blackmailed) his new friend brings him supplies, food, and things scavenged from the many abandoned homes.   So the head is a reasonably snug shelter...but it is full of prayers to Saint Anthony, which only Samuel can here.  Francesco, with his local knowledge, is able to pin specific prayers to specific people, and the boys decide they can maybe make a bit of money and have some fun by making prayers come true.  Their first venture, making a girl's dream of love happen, is so successful that the head becomes a place of pilgrimage, and through luck and common sense, and quite possibly divine intervention, more successful romances are made.  Candeia beings to live again; the abandoned houses are in demand again, the church is refurbished, and there's a small economic boom.

But Samuel, still living in the head, is plagued by the pilgrims outside, and prayers inside, and the one voice in the head he wants to keep hearing, a girl singing sadly beautiful songs morning and evening, is being drowned out by the clamor.  And the mayor of the town is not at all happy (he's a bad one).  And there is a sad dark story behind the head, and the misfortune it brought to the town when it couldn't be put on the body.  And there is the fact, too, that Samuel is still alone; his grandmother shows no interest in being family....

But Saint Anthony, though he'd doing a great job with romance, is primarily the patron saint of lost things and people; and happily (because my maternal heart was so sad for Samuel), the lost are found and the book ends with hope.

It's a lovely moving rewarding book, and I recommend it very highly!  It is fantasy, because there are magical elements besides the voices in the saint's head (like someone being dead, but still getting around and doing things), but the point isn't the fantasy, but more the interconnectedness of people.  Quite possibly I found it very moving because Samuel is about the age of my own boys, making it natural for me to feel all sorts of maternal feels for him.   But also I found it moving because it is such a clearly depicted set of people, many of them good people, several not so much, living their somewhat precarious lives as best they can.  I also liked it very much because it is such a clear, interesting portrayal of a place I'm not familiar with.  And I did like the little house inside the head, just as I thought I would.

In short, it was a read in a single sitting book(it's only 192 pages) that has left me with vivid memories.  And lest I have made it sound too sad, I shall mention that it is also quite funny in places.  And finally, if I were a high school English teacher, I'd seriously consider using this one--there is lots to think about, and lots to enjoy.

This week's round-up of middle grade sci fi and fantasy from around the blogs (2/28/16(

Here's what I found in my blog reading this week; please let me know if I missed your post!

The Reviews

The 26-Storey Treehouse,by Andy Griffiths, at Sharon the Librarian

The Adventures of Lettie Peppercorn, at Cracking the Cover and Charlotte's Library

Anna and the Swallow Man, by Gavriel Savit, at Ex Libris (I haven't read this one myself yet, so am not sure it's really fantasy, but I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt....)

The Aviary, by Kathleen O'Dell, at Puss Reboots

Cuckoo Song, by Frances Hardinge, at Bibliobrit

Darkmouth, the Legend Begins by Shane Hegarty, at Geo Librarian

The Dungeoneers, by John David Anderson, at Bibliobrit

Finders Reapers, by Anna Staniszewski, at Sharon the Librarian

Flunked, by Jen Calonita, at Imaginary Reads

The Fog Diver, by Joel Ross, at Geo Librarian

The Freedom Maze, by Delia Sherman, at Time Travel Times Two

Fridays with the Wizards, by Jessica Day George, at Book Nut

The Goblin's Puzzle, by Andrew Chilton, at Always in the Middle

The Green Ember, by S.D. Smith, at Charlotte's Library

The Incredible Space Raiders from Space, by Wesley King, at That's Another Story

The Key to Extraordinary, by Natalie Lloyd, at Read Till Dawn

The Lincoln Project (Flashback Four #1), by Dan Gutman, at Ms. Yingling Reads and books4yourkids

The Nest, by Kenneth Oppel, at Welcome to My (New) Tweendom

Nightbird, by Alice Hoffman, at Supernatural Snark

 Nightborn, by Lou Anders, at Read Love

No Flying in the House, by Betty Brock, at Log Cabin Library
Ravenous, by MarcyKate Connolly, at Mom Read It

The Remarkable Journey Of Charlie Price, by Jennifer Maschari, at Pop! Goes the Reader and Supernatural Snark

Serafina and the Black Cloak, by Robert Beatty, at Big Hair and Books

Seven Dead Pirates, by Linda Bailey, at Kid Lit Geek

The Silver Chains, by L.J. Clarkson, at This Kid Reviews Books

Snow in Summer, by Jane Yolen, at Fantasy Literature

Space Hostages, by Sophia McDougall, at Views From the Tesseract

Warren the 13th and the All-Seeing Eye, by Tania del Rio and Will Staehle, at Kid Lit Geek

A Whole Nother Story, by Dr. Cuthbert Soup, at Mister K Reads

Witherwood Reform School, by Obert Skye, at The Haunting of Orchid Forsythia

The Wildings, by Nilanjana Roy, at The Book Wars

Authors and Interviews

Abi Elphinstone (The Shadow Keeper) at The Book Zone (for Boys) and Mr Ripley's Enchanted Books


Other Good Stuff

A great list of sci fi for middle graders at SLJ

The Guardian asks why so many children's fantasy books are adapted as films

And also at The Guardian, the best quotes from children's and teen fantasy books

And just continuing on with The Guardian, "how fantasy can inspire us to live in the real world"

Via Tor--Ava DuVernay to Direct Disney’s A Wrinkle in Time

Joining the March "Take Control of your TBR Pile" Challenge

My TBR piles have been weighing heavily on me for several years, so I'm joining this March challenge hosted by Caffinated Book Reviewer to at least make a small dent.  It will be too little too late, but every book read helps.  2016 has been a very slow reading for me, too, so I'd like to get my numbers up a bit!  I'm going to aim for 50 books, because why not.

The Green Ember, by S.D. Smith

This is me making an effort to move a few more of the Cybils books from last season off my piles and into the library!  The Green Ember, by S.D. Smith, was nominated for the Cybils by Sherry at Semicolon, who found it very popular at her library and among the homeschoolers she knows, and it's definitely one I'd recommend to fans of Redwall.

Heather and her brother Picket have a happy, peaceful life, in which the sad tales of the fall of the good king are simply stories, until the day their family is brutally attacked by the enemies of their kingdom.  Fortunately, two strangers come to their aid, one of whom turns out to be the uncle they never knew they had.  Their uncle takes them to a place of refuge, where arts and crafts are cultivated in the hopes that a new king will arise, and usher in a new era of peace. 

Heather is happy to join in the community, though many of its residents seem strangle unwelcoming, and it is clear that there are many secrets,  but Picket is bitter and sullen, until he forces himself into an apprentice with a mysterious and tremendously skilled fighter.   The skills he learns come in all too handy when treachery threatens to destroy any hope of restoring the good king's heir, and all the secrets are revealed....and Heather too has her part to play in the frantic race to salvage hope.

So it's a pretty solid kids saving the day type fantasy story, with a twist--these kids are rabbits.  Rabbits who make stained glass windows and do embroidery, who wear clothes, and who are referred to as having 'hands," which of course are much better than paws when it comes to arts and crafts.  And this was something of a deal breaker for me.  If you are going to make your characters rabbits, pitted against wolves and hawks, that's fine, but please, make there be some other point to the rabbitness! Powerful kicking action comes into play at times, but otherwise there isn't anything rabbit about these characters way of being in the world.  And this fretted at me, keeping me from fully enjoying what is a fine "kids discovering their place in an epic saga" type story. But if you have a young reader of nine or so who enjoys animal fantasies, and who really loves desperate hope, bolstered by sword play, this might be just the ticket.

disclaimer: review copy received for Cybils Award consideration