Mortal Fire

Mortal Fire
by Elizabeth Knox

Sixteen-year-old Canny Mochrie's parents go away on a vacation, so they send her off on a trip of her own with her step-brother Sholto and his opinionated girlfriend Susan, who are interviewing the survivors of a strange coal mine disaster and researching local folklore in 1959 Southland, New Zealand. Canny is left to herself to wander in a mysterious and enchanting nearby valley, occupied almost entirely by children who all have the last name Zarene and can perform a special type of magic that tells things how to be stronger and better than they already are. With the help of a seventeen-year-old boy who is held hostage in a hidden away house by a spell that is now more powerful than the people who first placed it, Canny figures out why she, too, can use this special magic that only Zarenes should know, and where she really came from. (Description from Amazon.com)

I read Knox's Dreamhunter duet a few years ago and fell absolutely in love with her worldbuilding and storytelling.  Knox once again brilliantly blends historical fiction and magical realism, creating a world where a reader feels they could step right in and feel the magic in the air. 

Canny is a fascinating main character surrounded by mysterious secondary characters whose secrets are slowly revealed as Knox layers each person’s story into others to create a complex world. If you also read Knox’s previous novels you'll catch small references to the Hame Dreamhunters, but this book brings readers into a fresh new aspect of that world with its own circuitous storyline.

Full disclosure: Review copy received from VOYA

Dust Girl

Dust Girl

by Sarah Zettel

Callie LeRoux lives in Slow Run, Kansas, helping her mother run their small hotel and trying not to think about the father she's never met. Lately all of her energy is spent battling the constant storms plaguing the Dust Bowl and their effects on her health. Callie is left alone, when her mother goes missing in a dust storm. Her only hope comes from a mysterious man offering a few clues about her destiny and the path she must take to find her parents in "the golden hills of the west" (California). Along the way she meets Jack a young hobo boy who is happy to keep her company—there are dangerous, desperate people at every turn. And there's also an otherworldly threat to Callie. Warring fae factions, attached to the creative communities of American society, are very aware of the role this half-mortal, half-fae teenage girl plays in their fate. (description from Amazon.com)

This book is a little jewel that deserves a lot more recognition than it's gotten.  Debut author Sarah Zettel builds a fantastically atmospheric world with a compelling main character. This book is a brilliant blend of magic and realism. The Dust Bowl of the Depression Era practially seeps out of the pages. I found myself reaching for my drink over and over as I was reading, so entrenched in the dust storms my imagination pulled from the descriptions.

I loved, too, Callie's complex character. Not only is this a girl who finds that she is not quite human, but even when passing amongst the humans she was terrified of having her bi-racial background discovered. Everywhere she turned, Callie only found danger, intolerence, and the need for deception. Until she met Jack in a storm that changed her entire world and she found an ally who never seemed to care about her differences. 

I am more than ready to leap back into Callie's world, to discover her new abilities, and to see where her search for her parents takes her...I cannot wait for the next book in this trilogy.  

    Full disclosure: eARC received from NetGalley

Camo Girl

Camo Girl

by Kekla Magoon

 

Ella and Z have been friends forever, both of them middle-school outsiders in their Las Vegas suburb. Ella is the only black girl in her grade and gets teased for the mottled colors of her face. (Her deceased father was white.) Z is the classic “weird kid” who maintains an elaborate—and public—fantasy life, starring himself as a brave knight. Though Z is content with his imagined world, Ella wishes for a larger group of friends, so she’s thrilled when Bailey, another black kid, arrives at their school. He’s popular and wants to befriend Ella—but to join the cool crowd, Ella would have to ditch Z. Does she stay loyal to the boy who has been her best and only friend for years, or jump at the chance to realize her dream of popularity? (description from Amazon.com)

Though somewhat formulaic and with a few one-dimensional characters, this was a quick middle grade read that easily addresses a very important topic.  Ella has trouble accepting her racial identity because it literally is written all over her face and is commented on every day.  She is biracial and has mottled skin, allowing some bullies at school to tease her mercilessly.  It is not until another black student, one who becomes very, very popular, comes to her school and stands up for her, that her classmates see how hurtful they were being, thus allowing Ella to begin to find self-acceptance.

This book was easy to read and enjoyable.  It directly addresses a problem that many kids face today, self acceptance and discrimination.  There is definitely an audience out there for this book.

Full disclosure: Borrowed from my library

The Girl is Murder

The Girl is Murder

by Kathryn Miller Haines

 

Iris Anderson is only fifteen, but she's quickly mastering the art of deception.

It's the Fall of 1942 and Iris's world is rapidly changing. Her Pop is back from the war with a missing leg, limiting his ability to do the physically grueling part of his detective work. Iris is dying to help, especially when she discovers that one of Pop's cases involves a boy at her school. Now, instead of sitting at home watching Deanna Durbin movies, Iris is sneaking out of the house, double crossing her friends, and dancing at the Savoy till all hours of the night. There's certainly never a dull moment in the private eye business. (description from Amazon.com)

 

Love mystery? Love historical fiction?  Love Veronica Mars??? (Of course you do, who doesn't??!!) Then...you NEED to check out this book. 

 

Set in the 1940's, this book's atmosphere was exceedingly well done.  The clothes, the slang, the political unrest... I felt like I'd dropped straight into the forties and I wanted to dance the night away with the Rainbows!  The best part was that even with the slang and the differences in our culture between then and today, Iris still felt like an average teenager.  I didn't have that horrible disconnect that you can sometimes get when historical fiction feels too foreign. 

 

Iris was a great character through which to view the forties.  She's Jewish, so considered an outsider, and she's just been exiled from the richest section of New York City down to a much lower socially acceptable area because of scandal and economic misfortune... (does this sound familiar to anyone else? Is your name Veronica in real life, Iris? LOL... J/K)  Similar (but not an exact rip-off, I promise) to Veronica Mars in tone, Iris decides she needs to help her Private Investigator father to close his cases because their family desperately needs the money and because she can go places he can't. 

 

Which leads to a new life built on secrets and lies.  Soon Iris is double-crossing "friends" at school and misleading her father... how long can she keep that up?  The answer...not too long.  The real question, though, is will she be able to solve a potential murder before it all blows up in her face??

 

A rollickingly good ride...and I'm looking forward to the sequel, The Girl is Trouble.

 

Full disclosure: Borrowed from my Library