As the son and sidekick of a celebrity archaeologist, Tennessee Russo has been facing down ancient death traps since before he was old enough for his learner’s permit. Spending time on both sides of the camera for his father’s reality show, Ten is used to being in the spotlight, especially after coming out as gay on international television. However, after Ten and his father get into an argument over the ethics of selling cultural artifacts to the highest bidder, his dad cuts him from the show and stops speaking to him.
Two years later, Ten’s dad shows up unannounced to offer his son a chance to find the rings of the Sacred Band of Thebes. The Sacred Band was an ancient Greek army said to have comprised 150 queer couples. As with much of queer history, the warriors’ legendary love is dismissed by historians as platonic, and Ten believes that finding their missing wedding rings will prove that queer love is older and stronger than the world wants to admit. But can he trust the man who abandoned him two years ago? With the rumored magical powers of the rings drawing dangerous attention, Ten will have to figure out who is really on his side if he wants to survive another season of his father’s show.
L.C. Rosen’s Lion’s Legacy is an entertaining queer adventure reminiscent of classic movies like Raiders of the Lost Ark and The Mummy. Hidden chambers, puzzles with deadly stakes and a fun, casual romance hit all the essential blockbuster buttons. However, Rosen’s take on the genre actively interrogates the ethics of treasure hunting, posing questions about the ownership of history and the responsible way to handle historical artifacts. Much like Ten’s strained relationship with his father, there’s a lot of nuance to work through to find the right path forward. Ten’s inner conflicts and the temple-raiding thrills are well balanced by Rosen, who sacrifices neither emotional complexity nor pacing.
Lion’s Legacy is a celebration of the strength of queer community, whether felt by two queer people passing on the street, or resounding through the uncountable queer lives that have intersected throughout history. Ten knows queer history can be fun, weird, tragic and beautiful, but above all he knows it’s a history worth protecting.
Firelit hidden chambers, puzzles with deadly stakes and a fun, casual romance hit all the essential blockbuster buttons in Lion’s Legacy.
Author Abdi Nazemian won a Lambda Literary Award for his debut novel for adults, The Walk-In Closet. His debut novel for teens, Like a Love Story, received a Stonewall Honor and was recognized by Time magazine as one of the 100 greatest YA novels of all time. His fifth book, Only This Beautiful Moment, seems likely to continue Nazemian’s winning streak.
Moud is a gay Iranian American teen living in Los Angeles. He doesn’t remember his mother, who died when he was very young, and his father, Saeed, is like an indifferent zombie—tolerant but hardly accepting. When Moud and Saeed travel to Tehran to be with Moud’s grandfather, Babak, generations of trauma, secrets and love come spilling out. Contrary to what Moud’s know-it-all white boyfriend says, Iran is full of life, art, beauty and yes, even queerness. “I think Americans are so bored that they talk about things that don’t really matter,” Moud’s cousin Ava quips before whisking him away to a party.
Of course, living an authentic life is rarely simple. Intolerance, government corruption, economic instability—neither the United States nor Iran are immune. The blurriness of identity, even as it eventually comes into focus, is what makes Only This Beautiful Moment such an engaging read.
Nazemian’s epic yarn comes together in long chapters that luxuriate in the novel’s settings as they hop between Los Angeles and Tehran in 1939, 1978 and 2019. The final product is nothing short of a masterpiece, tearing down the homophobic facade that separates queer people from their own history. “We exist. We always did. We always will,” says one of Babak’s mentors. “And wait until they all die and get to heaven and realize God was on our side the whole time.”
Fans of Javier Calvo and Javier Ambrossi’s docu-drama Veneno will appreciate how Nazemian recalls the joy and pain of ancestral legacy. The novel also recalls Tony Kushner’s call to action in Angels in America: to be a better ally, to be better stewards of queer history and, put simply, to keep living.
Only This Beautiful Moment is a queer epic, a defiant piece of art that transmutes the rallying cry of “we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” into even more beautiful poetry that will almost certainly change the lives of those who read it.
Only This Beautiful Moment transmutes the rallying cry of “we’re here, we’re queer, get used to it” into even more beautiful poetry that will change lives.
In the collapsed city-nation of Alante, the “other-born” are descendants of long-ago gods who have inherited their ancestors’ powers. They are stigmatized and sometimes feared, and they often live in poverty. Still, the people of Alante rely on other-born like the descendants of the Muses and the Furies to provide guidance and order for society.
Io Ora and her sisters, Thais and Ava, are other-born who trace their lineage to the Fates, whose descendants always come in the form of a trio: one to weave the threads, one to pull them out and one to cut them. With their parents dead and older sister, Thais, living far away, Io and Ava do the best they can to get by. Ava sings at the Fortuna gang’s club, and Io works as a private investigator. But the lives they’ve carefully built are threatened when a string of murders sweeps through the impoverished area of Alante. Unnatural wraiths are targeting other-born, so Io is hired by Fortuna’s leader, the Mob Queen, to investigate alongside a stranger named Edei, who is connected to Io by a thread of fate. Soon, Io and Edei are pulled into a tangle of theories and leads, finding danger at every turn, as well as solace in each other.
Kika Hatzopoulou’s debut novel, Threads That Bind, is a high-concept fantasy mystery filled with political intrigue. Drawing on the pantheons of gods from a variety of cultures, Hatzopoulou puts an enticing spin on the idea of inherited godhood: People with powers are feared rather than revered. The frame of a murder mystery allows for a layered narrative that plays on interpersonal and societal dynamics, and the political commentary is well balanced with Io and Edei’s sleuthing. Fans of Amanda Foody’s Ace of Shades or Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows will find a similar atmosphere here.
Despite Threads That Bind’s excellent concept, some clunky moments disrupt the plotting and a few important questions go unanswered. Hatzopoulou has clearly set up the narrative for a sequel, but the story as it stands may leave some readers scratching their heads. Despite these incongruities, fantasy readers who are interested in mythology will likely appreciate this unique take on the genre and enjoy a largely promising start to a new series.
Fans of Leigh Bardugo’s Six of Crows will find a similar atmosphere in Kika Hatzopoulou’s debut novel.
Our top picks for June include the latest from S.A. Cosby, Dominic Smith and Uzma Jalaluddin, plus the first major biography of Martin Luther King Jr. in decades.
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Geena Rocero was a trans pageant queen in the Philippines who became a successful model in the United States. As you’d expect, her life story is a completely engrossing whirlwind.
Humorist Harrison Scott Key’s memoir of the fallout following his wife’s affair offers plentiful food for thought about faith, humor, courage and love.
Lisa See’s spellbinding historical novel, inspired by the true story of a female physician, vividly depicts 15th-century China with artfully woven details, rich characters and descriptive language.
With Return to Valetto, Dominic Smith doesn’t reinvent the wheel, but he doesn’t need to: He is a master of his trade who has executed a flawless novel that satisfies on all counts.
Stopping by Jungle on a Snowy Evening is a rare find. It’s a combo of old and new, clever and classic, innovative and familiar—perfect for any fathomable storytime scenario.
The Icon and the Idealist is a compelling, warts-and-all dual biography of the warring leaders of the early 20th-century birth control movement: Margaret Sanger and Mary Ware Dennett.
Our top picks for June include the latest from S.A. Cosby, Dominic Smith and Uzma Jalaluddin, plus the first major biography of Martin Luther King Jr. in decades.
The only thing more exciting than the fact that author Angeline Boulley has followed up her bestselling, award-winning debut, Firekeeper’s Daughter, with a companion novel is that actor Isabella Star LaBlanc narrates the audiobook. LaBlanc, a member of the Sisseton Wahpeton Dakota tribal nation, takes a break from filming season four of “True Detective” (in Iceland!) to share her thoughts on the communal power of audiobooks like Warrior Girl Unearthed (11.5 hours), and the joys and challenges of bringing the story of Perry Firekeeper-Birch to life.
You also narrated Angeline Boulley’s first book, Firekeeper’s Daughter. How did you feel about Warrior Girl Unearthed as you began to read it for the first time? I’m a Firekeeper’s Daughter superfan first, and a Firekeeper’s Daughter audiobook narrator second. And as soon as I started reading Warrior Girl Unearthed, I knew Angeline had done it again. It felt like returning home. I fell in love with Perry immediately. From the first chapter, I was excited to go on this journey with her.
What is your relationship with author Angeline Boulley like, especially in the time since you’ve recorded Firekeeper’s Daughter? Angeline is the best! After my first day of recording Warrior Girl Unearthed, I texted her a little selfie and let her know how thrilled I was to be back in the saddle. When it comes down to it, I really am just trying to do right by her. Angeline is such a special person and writer. Her energy is infectious. We had so much fun doing press for Firekeeper’s Daughter. I count myself lucky to be in her orbit and to benefit from her support. I really owe her so much.
Tell me a bit about transforming Warrior Girl Unearthed into an audiobook. How did you prepare, and what did you most enjoy about the preparation? I was so honored when I was asked back to narrate Warrior Girl Unearthed, but I knew logistically it was going to be a challenge. I’m currently shooting a TV series in Iceland, which has my schedule packed and unpredictable. I really wanted to make it work, so after lots of back and forth with my manager and Steve Wagner from Macmillan, we were able to figure out a remote recording setup and scheduled sessions on the days I’m not on set. So I guess the first big preparation was scheduling, which is not very exciting, but it did feel like a miracle that it worked out.
After we got the logistics ironed out, I really dove in—which for me means spending a lot of time with pronunciation and starting to identify voices. I find a lot of joy in the preparation leading up to recording. It’s always a little daunting, but there’s something so exhilarating about hearing the story in my head for the first time and figuring out how to actually make it sound like that.
What did you feel most strongly that it was important to get “right” as you narrated Boulley’s words in Warrior Girl Unearthed? Definitely the language. The Anishinaabemowin is important not only to the storytelling but also to the characters and to the people these characters represent. I want my Ojibwe relatives to hear themselves in this. So I feel a huge responsibility to do the best I can to represent the language in a good way. Angeline and Macmillan, along with Michele Wellman-Teeple from Michigan State University, set me up with some amazing pronunciation resources.
I think the language is just as much a character as Perry, and I want to honor it that way. Before we began recording, I put out some tobacco to thank the language for letting me spend this time with it. That felt like the right place to begin.
“Before we began recording, I put out some tobacco to thank the language for letting me spend this time with it. That felt like the right place to begin.”
What do you believe is the most rewarding thing that your performance brings to the listening experience of Warrior Girl Unearthed? Firekeeper’s Daughter was my first ever audiobook. I had never narrated anything before that, and going in I knew pretty much nothing about the whole process. I have a lot more books and experience under my belt for this one, and it feels so rewarding to get to return to this world where it all began for me, and to now be able to offer up everything I’ve learned. I feel more in control of my work this time around, and my hope is that listeners will be able to hear that.
To listeners, it can sometimes feel like magic to hear a narrator move between dialogue and a lead character’s inner thoughts. What is your process when moving from Perry’s inner world to external interactions? Perry is a teenager, and I think being a teenager is a lot about reconciling your inner and outer worlds. Something I notice with Perry is that her external interactions often exude confidence in a way her internal monologue doesn’t. I think there’s something really vulnerable in the way she talks to herself, and something really powerful in the way she interacts with the world. I really try to let both those parts of her peek through and to be heard in conversation with each other.
As you read Warrior Girl Unearthed, what did you take away from the experience? Did you discover anything, either about the world Boulley depicts or about yourself? I found myself left with big feelings about how the ways in which we take care of ourselves help us take care of our people. I love how the characters Angeline writes have very unique passions and strengths they honor and offer to the world. Some might argue that I’m already grown, but I want to be Perry and Daunis when I grow up.
“So much of the culture I come from is centered on gathering together and sharing stories. Audiobooks feel like a new medium to do that.”
Boulley’s books reflect an exciting shift in children’s and teen literature toward diversifying which stories are published and who gets to write them. What would books like Firekeeper’s Daughter and Warrior Girl Unearthed have meant to you when you were growing up? I think it’s hard to overstate how much of an impact these books would have had on me as a young reader. It really is a gift to see not only yourself but also your community represented with so much heart. As a young Indigenous person it’s easy to feel lonely, like so much of the world doesn’t understand what matters to you. I know I would have devoured these books, and I would have held them with me as companions while I navigated a lot of the things these characters experience. How lovely it would’ve been to have these reminders that girls like me get to be exceptional, and be loved, and save the world.
With Warrior Girl Unearthed in mind, what do audiobooks offer that a book can’t? I think there’s something communal about audiobooks. Whereas reading can feel beautifully individual, there’s something special about the idea that with an audiobook, each listener is hearing the same voices come alive. It’s almost an equalizer between listeners; it creates an inherently shared experience.
I loved hearing that people listened to Firekeeper’s Daughter with their families. So much of the culture I come from is centered on gathering together and sharing stories. Audiobooks feel like a new medium to do that. We can listen to stories together, whether we’re in the same room or miles apart.
In addition to your work as an audiobook narrator, you’ve also acted on stage and in movies and TV. What are some of the unique challenges and pleasures of audiobooks as compared to those other types of performing? How do you feel your work in other media informs your narration work? I think all of my work informs each other. I feel like if I removed even one piece of the puzzle, one tool from the toolbox, I wouldn’t be the same artist. I’ve played all sorts of characters with different dialects, different ages, different dispositions. I feel like I draw on them to flesh out these books. So many of the voices I use to narrate come from characters I’ve played.
And now I feel my narration feeding back to my acting. I think one of the most challenging parts when I started narrating was learning how to act without being seen. So many character choices in visual mediums can be solely in your body. Narrating has allowed me to explore my voice, and in doing so has offered a tool to do more with less. I’m able to find a lot more stillness in my work on screen now.
What’s one thing people might not expect about your role as narrator? That I get to redo as much as I want! When people hear I do audiobooks, the first question is usually, “How can you read without messing up?” The answer is, I mess up a lot, and then a lovely engineer punches me back in and I do it again, and sometimes again after that. So the job actually has very little to do with reading a lot of words perfectly in one go.
Who in your life has had the biggest impact on your work as a narrator? I don’t think I can pick just one. I think most of the people in my life turn up in my narration in some way. You’ll probably hear them in this book.
What do you believe is your greatest strength as a narrator? My cultural vocabulary. What I might not know about technical voice acting, I do know about Native people. I can hear our voices, our rhythms, our laughter. I know about our ways of connecting to one another across tribes and regions. I find so much joy in narrating specifically for Native authors, because it feels like I was born for it. I grew up with these stories.
Voice actor Isabella Star LaBlanc returns for an encore after her powerful performance of Angeline Boulley’s bestselling, award-winning debut novel, Firekeeper’s Daughter. As LaBlanc reveals in our interview for Audiobook Month, performing Warrior Girl Unearthed required a deep understanding of the Anishinaabemowin, or Ojibwe language.
The best books of 2023 (so far) as determined by BookPage.com readers include the latest from Abraham Verghese, Kate Morton, Jenny Odell and Ann Napolitano, as well as a remarkable debut from Margot Douaihy.
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The best books of 2023 (so far) as determined by BookPage.com readers include the latest from Abraham Verghese, Kate Morton, Jenny Odell and Ann Napolitano, as well as a remarkable debut from Margot Douaihy.
Kendall Kulper’s A Starlet’s Secret to a Sensational Afterlife opens in 1934 Chicago, in an America damaged and wearied by the Great Depression. Only trips to the movies keep 18-year-old Henny going, because “I wasn’t Henrietta Newhouse who scrubbed the washrooms and clutched at every saved penny. . . . I was just a pair of eyes and a pair of ears, taking it all in.”
Fans of the author’s Murder for the Modern Girl(2022) will recognize the Newhouse name; that book’s protagonist, Ruby, is Henny’s older sister. Ruby prowled Chicago solving mysteries, but Henny is set on California. “I wanted to be a literal star, something huge and bright and fierce and burning,” Henny says, “that turned everyone who came close to it warm and glowing.”
Declan Collins is far less passionate about being a stuntman, but as his best friend and manager, Pep, reasons, it’s a good gig for a man who cannot be injured. It’s getting harder for Declan to hide his invincibility, so Pep arranges a screen test with Henny. To her delight, she’s signed by Silver Wing Studios as the next big starlet while, to his chagrin, Declan is enlisted as her faux boyfriend.
Their chemistry sparks steamy sidelong glances and hot-tempered spats, making for an entertaining will-they-won’t-they energy. Eventually, the two share secrets: Declan is helping a PI search for a missing actor named Irma, and Henny has been seeing ghosts. The first was her friend Midge, who supposedly quit Hollywood and moved home; she’s soon joined by a heartbreakingly large group of young women who also disappeared after being signed by Silver Wing. Can the duo find out what happened without getting harmed themselves?
A Starlet’s Secret to a Sensational Afterlife is an engrossing supernatural murder mystery, a fierce ode to feminism and a potent reminder of the dark underside of glamour and fame. Indeed, Kulper writes in her acknowledgments, “So much of this book was inspired by the real activists, whistleblowers, truth-tellers, and courageous survivors who spoke up about the injustices of the Hollywood system. . . . Your bravery, hope for change, and dedication to equality, fairness, and justice push us all to work harder and do better.”
A Starlet’s Secret to a Sensational Afterlife is an engrossing supernatural murder mystery and a fierce ode to feminism.
Sixteen-year-old Maya Krishnan, an Indian American aspiring artist, lives in Citrus Grove, Florida, a suburb of Orlando with “two sides, like a coin.” There’s the side she and her friends live on, with a diverse community of people “who have thick accents and even thicker blood.” And then there’s the side of bake sales, white picket fences and bigoted remarks about immigrants. Maya seethes about the hypocrisy around her but is unsure how else to express her frustration other than through her art.
Maya’s portfolio attracts Juneau Zale, a wealthy white senior with a rebellious spirit. Juneau sees a spark in Maya and invites her to join the Pugilists, a secret society of students who use “art, pranks [and] mischief” to shine a light on inequalities in their school, such as the overpolicing of students of color. Soon Maya’s falling for Juneau, despite the cracks appearing in Juneau’s carefully crafted facade. As tensions at school rise and pranks turn into potential crimes, Maya will have to decide how close she’s willing to fly to Juneau’s sun.
In All the Yellow Suns, debut author Malavika Kannan captures the emotional turmoil of high school, with relationships as likely to bleed into one another as the watercolors on Maya’s palette. Kannan’s dialogue is natural in a way that reflects the author’s experience as a 22-year-old student of comparative studies in race and ethnicity and creative writing at Stanford University. She crafts beautiful prose filled with eloquent metaphors such as, “When two humans wear each other down, erode until their bodies fit together like clay—that’s what love feels like. Sanding somebody’s edges and crooks. Settling into their ridges.”
The fact that All the Yellow Suns is so intensely character-driven means the plot with the Pugilists doesn’t quite pack the punch their name promises. However, Maya is such a likable, passionate narrator that readers will relish the intimate story of her coming to terms with her sexuality. The large cast of side characters is spread thin throughout the book, though each is as complex as they can be for the space they receive. Juneau’s character is the most complex of all, fascinatingly difficult to pin down: a manic pixie dream girl who has a potential white savior complex and is battling internalized homophobia.
Darker than Casey McQuiston’s I Kissed Shara Wheeler and lighter than Courtney Summers’ I’m the Girl, this sapphic contemporary coming-of-age story is intensely realistic and beautifully heartbreaking and will capture the attention of readers who are passionate about activism.
Darker than Casey McQuiston’s I Kissed Shara Wheeler and lighter than Courtney Summers’ I’m the Girl, Malavika Kannan’s sapphic coming-of-age debut is beautifully heartbreaking.
Marlow Briggs is a 17-year-old cursebreaker for hire, the most in-demand badass in Caraza City, a metropolis in the gritty region known as the Marshes. It’s an always interesting, occasionally life-threatening existence of evading gangs and sneaking around speak-easies. Her curse-sensing cat, Toad, keeps her company, and she works with her best friend, Swift, at the Bowery Spellshop.
A year ago, she was living an entirely different life in fancy Evergarden with her mother. One terrible day, Mom went missing and Marlow fled to the Marshes, an area lacking the beauty and amenities of Evergarden but rife with clients who need her magical know-how and investigative savvy.
As Katy Rose Pool’s inventive and engaging Garden of the Cursed opens, a potential client turns up in the form of Adrius Falcrest, Marlow’s former friend and scion of one of the wealthy and powerful Five Families. Despite their now-frosty relationship, Adrius implores her to break a curse that threatens the lives and fortune of his family.
Marlow agrees to a fake-dating situation in order to explain her and Adrius’ unlikely reunion. His habitual snideness and family’s snobbery ensure the couple’s antagonism persists as Marlow’s investigation proceeds, making a difficult job even tougher. Pool, best known for her Age of Darkness trilogy, adeptly explores the ways miscommunication and mistrust can warp relationships of all sorts. But with help from Swift and the new friends Marlow makes along the way, Pool also shows how strong friendships can provide sustenance and joy.
As Marlow picks her way through a minefield of class conflict, criminality and frustrating uncertainty, she realizes her mother’s fate may be tied to Adrius’ curse. Mom’s disappearance is “the great unsolved mystery of her life. The question that lived under her skin, that prodded at her when her thoughts were otherwise quiet.”
Pool keeps Garden of the Cursed moving right along, punctuating the story with suspenseful conflict and emotional reckonings, then revving up to a cliff-hanger ending that will leave readers eager for the next installment in this exciting duology.
Garden of the Cursed is an exciting start to a duology starring a teenage cursebreaker.
Aurelie possesses the rare skill of Seeking, the art of finding people, but she’s given up on magic—it’s an outdated practice in the kingdom, anyway. Being a baker’s apprentice isn’t her dream, but it’s safe and stable, and she’d be content to remain a baker forever. That is, until a bounty hunter named Iliana visits her shop and asks for help in her quest to rescue Prince Hapless. Aurelie joins Iliana and her troll associate, Quad, and gets swept up into a kingdomwide adventure involving strange creatures, mysterious assassins and royal conspiracies. Their odyssey takes Aurelie far from the bakery and calls into question whether she’s living the life she really wants.
While author Emma Mills takes inspiration from classic fairy tales in Something Close to Magic, she also challenges traditional fantasy tropes. Magic, for example, is seen as antiquated and pointless, and those who practice magic are largely dismissed by society. And Prince Hapless is the story’s damsel in distress, needing the female characters to save him. Mills also gives each character more depth than a traditional fable would, diving into Aurelie’s complex emotions about her future, Hapless’ tense relationship with his role as a thirdborn royal son, Iliana’s hidden past and Quad’s perspective on humanity. Nuanced, profound scenes mingle with lighter, humorous moments, making the characters feel real and their growth believable. It’s easy to root for their success as a team after watching the steady development of their relationships.
Mills’ mastery of language is on full display here, with fun, clever prose and dialogue that are bound to make readers laugh out loud. The banter between characters feels natural, with conversations showcasing Aurelie’s tenacity, Iliana’s wit, Hapless’ charm and Quad’s candor.
Classic fairy-tale settings, compelling mysteries and a charismatic cast of characters make Something Close to Magic an entertaining, fast-paced read, and its ending strikes the perfect balance between satisfaction and the promise of more adventures. Readers will be reminded of The Princess Bride; Something Close to Magic may be a fantastical tale, but it’s also one with relationships that hit close to home.
Emma Mills’ Something Close to Magic will remind readers of The Princess Bride: a fantastical tale with relationships that hit close to home.
Wannabe detectives and aspiring magicians alike will delight in The Grimoire of Grave Fates, an anthology of 18 interlinked stories penned by such beloved YA authors as Kat Cho, Marieke Nijkamp, Mason Deaver, Darcie Little Badger and Kwame Mbalia.
The compelling Agatha Christie-esque whodunit is set at the Galileo Academy for the Extraordinary, a prestigious school founded by famous “astronomy sorcerer” Galileo Galilei that educates future sorcerers. In recent eras, the academy has adopted a “more global view of magic,” resulting in updated classes, travel to different countries and policies meant to ensure greater diversity and inclusivity.
Unfortunately, this has had no effect on the employment of Septimius Dropwort, a professor of magical history—and a proud, vocal, abusive bigot. It’s not surprising, then, that when he’s found murdered on school grounds, nary a tear is shed. But accusations aplenty arise: Since he has mistreated and alienated pretty much everyone, everyone is therefore a viable suspect.
The book’s writers have created an appealing cast of characters with a range of backgrounds, abilities and personalities, all of whom are preoccupied with fulfilling their magical destinies while attempting to excel in a place that can feel inhospitable.
As The Grimoire of Grave Fates editors Hanna Alkaf (Hamra and the Jungle of Memories) and Margaret Owen (Little Thieves) write in their note to readers, “Some readers may have felt painfully excluded from stories about witches, wizards, and magic schools that could not imagine people like them; some have been deliberately shut out. Above all, we hope that everyone can see themselves somewhere in these pages.”
As the story progresses and the students join forces to find the killer before one of them is blamed, they gradually realize they’re not as alone as they first thought. Delightful details abound: Taya, in the art-based magic program, has a lioness familiar named Ketesl; Maxwell blends math and magic; and Jamie sneezes ice crystals after walking through a ghost. Together, the students home in on the elusive culprit, attempt to evade harm and collectively remind the school that its extraordinary attendees deserve more support—a resonant message of hope for a better future, magical or otherwise.
This YA anthology set at a magical academy offers a resonant message of hope for a better future.
Blood and gore are everywhere. Screams echo through the night. The masked killer, machete in hand, is at the gate . . . but Charity, ready with her knife, stabs him first. She announces that she’s the final girl—the one who always survives.
It’s just another night at Camp Mirror Lake, a terror simulation game where Charity and her teenage co-workers chase paying guests through the woods in a loose reenactment of a cult classic horror movie that was filmed there a generation ago. The summer is almost over, but Camp Mirror Lake is short staffed—where have Heather, Jordan and Felix gotten to?—so Charity invites her girlfriend, Bezi, and their friend Paige to pitch in for the last few days. The sound effects are cued up, the fake blood and raw chicken mixture is ready to be poured and the latex body parts have been strategically placed. But on the night before the season finale, someone appears who isn’t in the script. And then the real terror begins.
Author Kalynn Bayron knows the ins and outs of the horror genre, and she lets us in on all the tropes through the character of Paige, a wise and wisecracking horror fan who’s quick to call out the dangers of flirting (“As soon as people start having sex, it’s like a bat signal to the killer.”) and the stupidity of chasing clues after dark (“Why do the thing that always leads to somebody getting murdered in the woods?”). Like the Scream franchise and Joss Whedon’s The Cabin in the Woods, these self-referential hat tips don’t give away the plot as much as they make the path through it even more fun. The tension is high, the isolated camp setting is delightfully creepy and the premise of embedding real murders among the trappings of fake ones is used to clever effect. Creaky trapdoors, secret passageways, dusty storage rooms and bobbing canoes abound, creating spookily atmospheric imagery that matches the characters’ increasing sense of dread. And Paige is right that pieces of the full story are often lurking in the corners, revealed little by little as the body count rises.
Plan to read You’re Not Supposed to Die Tonight under a blanket with a flashlight, but only if you’re willing to stay up late. As horror fans know, there’s always one last twist at the end.
In You’re Not Supposed to Die Tonight, Kalynn Bayron uses the premise of embedding real murders among haunted house-style fake ones to clever effect.
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Maria Ressa’s book is a political history of the Philippines and an intimate memoir, but it’s also a warning to democracies everywhere: Authoritarianism is a threat to us all.
Sean Adams has dialed down the dystopian quotient from his first satirical novel, The Heap, but that element is still very much present in The Thing in the Snow.
