Flora’s Fury: How a Girl of Spirit and a Red Dog Confounded Their Friends, Astounded Their Enemies, and Learned the Importance of Packing Light by Ysabeau S. Wilce. Harcourt, an imprint of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. 2012. Reviewed from ARC from publisher. Final book of the trilogy. The Series: Haven’t read this series yet? Then slow down, [...]
Yellowcake by Margo Lanagan. Random House Children’s Books. 2013. Reviewed from ARC from publisher. The Plot: A short story collection from Margo Lanagan. Which means two things: each story is incredibly unique; each is amazingly good. The Good: Here’s the problem: each Margo Lanagan short story is so unique that it’s impossible to easily sum [...]
Midwinterblood by Marcus Sedgwick. Roaring Brook Press. 2013. Review copy from publisher. The Plot: Always, there is an Eric and a Merle; a hare and a loss; and the island of Blessed. These are the constants. What changes in the seven stories of Midwinterblood is the time, starting in the future, 2073, and going back [...]
Quintana of Charyn by Melina Marchetta, Candlewick Press, 2013. Reviewed from the Australia edition (Viking, an imprint of Penguin Group (Australia), 2012), a gift from a friend. will be published April 2013. Background: This is the final of three books (and one short story) that make up the The Lumatere Chronicles. It began with Finnikin of [...]
Poison by Bridget Zinn. Hyperion. 2013. Reviewed from ARC from publisher. The Plot: Kyra, sixteen, is not your typical hero. She is breaking into the home of the Master Trio of Potioners to steal a very specific, very deadly poison. So, thief and killer? Not quite. Kyra is — was — one of the Master [...]
The Brides of Rollrock Island by Margo Lanagan. Alfred A. Knopf, an imprint of Random House. 2012. Reviewed from ARC from publisher. The Plot: Misskaella Prout is the witch of Rollrock Island, so ugly and disagreeable and witchy that no man would have her for a wife. Misskaella has her revenge on those who keep [...]
Kill Me Softly by Sarah Cross. Egmont USA. 2012. Review copy from publisher. The Plot: Mirabelle has been raised by her godmothers, Elsa and Bliss, since the death of her parents while she was still an infant. As Mira’s sixteenth birthday approaches, she decides that she wants to find out more about the place she [...]
Back in August, I blogged about Melina Marchetta’s short story, Ferragost, a companion to her Lumatere books. As Marchetta explained in a blog post, “Ferragost is a stand alone short story. If you are a reader of the Lumatere Chronicles, you’ll remember that Celie is the daughter of Lord August and Lady Abian and is [...]
The Crown of Embers by Rae Carson. Greenwillow Books, an imprint of HarperCollins. 2012. Sequel to The Girl of Fire and Thorns. The Plot: Elisa, 17, is the Queen of Joya d’Arena following the death of her husband, the King. Her stepson, the Prince, is too young to reign. Being a Queen isn’t easy: she [...]
Goblin Secrets by William Alexander. Margaret K. McElderry Books, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. 2012. Review copy from publisher. The Plot: Rownie is one of “grandchildren” of the witch, Graba, children she’s collected to run her errands. His mother is dead; his older brother, Rowan, brought Rownie to Graba knowing the shelter she offered [...]
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