Review by New York Times Review
AS DISCERNING READERS are well aware, some of the most interesting fiction currently being written is published under the catchall category of young adult - a term that encompasses such a diversity of work as to be nearly meaningless, but that does suggest a book's concerns will focus primarily on the doings of adolescent characters (though, as we shall see, even this definition does not always hold true). The young adult fiction powerhouses Holly Black and Marcus Sedgwick are masters of the genre, with well-deserved reputations for pushing it to its limits, and both writers' newest books ably demonstrate that the line between young and adult is fluid indeed. Black, who previously detoured among the glamorously undead in "The Coldest Girl in Coldtown," returns to the world of the Fair Folk in "The Darkest Part of the Forest," a wickedly entertaining mashup of genre conventions and enthusiastic subversions in which the perennial adolescent desire to be seen as normal takes on a whole new meaning. Hazel grows up with her beloved, more socially adept and musically gifted brother, Ben, in a small town where humans live in blasé coexistence with a variety of mythical creatures. Thanks to their location, the siblings' teenage woes range from the mundane (does the cute boy like me back, why are my parents so weird?) to the fantastical (why have the normally placid fairies who live in the woods begun to predate upon my peers?). Though the novel's plot verges on convoluted at times, its real delights lie in its main characters' relationships. Hazel and Ben's twinned sibling rivalry and love is beautifully complex, and their relatable human yearnings for the objects of their affections anchor the novel in the believable, despite the fact that said passions are for a comatose enchanted prince and a fairy changeling. What begins as a freewheeling romp becomes, in Black's capable hands, a genuinely moving meditation on grief, falling in love and growing up. "Mortality is a bitter draught," one of the fairy characters informs another when he demands to be allowed to live and love among mere mortals. "And yet I would have the full measure," he responds, a phrase that will strike home in anyone who's ever struggled with the pain and beauty of navigating the difficult, messy and glorious human world. SEDGWICK IS KNOWN for his bold experimentation with form, as in the Printz Award-winning "Midwinterblood," which featured seven linked stories that work backward through time. He once again takes an unconventional approach to the young adult novel in "The Ghosts of Heaven." The book has virtually no young adults. Divided into four sections, it explores a web of connections among a prehistoric girl, a woman accused of witchcraft in the Middle Ages, a mad poet supervised by a bumbling but well-intentioned doctor, and an astronaut hurtling through the future on a ship that may or may not be populated by ghosts. The novel's quarters are loosely interlinked. Each main character shares a hunger for knowledge, and an eerie series of cave paintings echoes throughout the book nicely. Sedgwick is also interested in spirals: The motif repeats obsessively throughout, whether it's a spiraling funeral dance in the second quarter or the astronaut narrator of the fourth quarter observing that his spacecraft is traveling "in a spiral, a helix through space" - and, as it turns out, through time. Sedgwick's puzzle-piece conceit is intriguing, and at its best - particularly in "The Easiest Room in Hell," a deliciously creepy homage to H. P. Lovecraft complete with a prophetic lunatic and a sinister figure emerging from the sea - this sense of mystery propels the novel forward. Ultimately, however, the book raises questions it does not seem able to answer, and Sedgwick's spirals may not be enough to support its architecture. The helix never coheres into a meaningful symbol, leaving the reader with the sinking suspicion that she is meant to mistake murkiness for depth. SARAH MCCARRY is the author of "All Our Pretty Songs" and "Dirty Wings." Her third novel, "About a Girl," will be published this summer.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [January 18, 2015]
Review by Booklist Review
Magic lives in Fairfold, but the fantastical creatures rarely bother the human residents of the town, reserving their sometimes cruel attention for the tourists who arrive every year, mostly to snap photos of the horned prince in a glass casket. Hazel and her brother have spent their childhood visiting the prince, making up stories and telling him secrets, imagining that he will wake and save Fairfold from the monster in the woods. And one day, he does. The same day, Hazel wakes up with shards of crystal in her palms and mud caked on her feet, and a sorrowful monster, whose presence sets everyone to weeping, begins stalking the town and putting unlucky Fairfoldians into a coma-like sleep. Expertly weaving fairy-tale magic into a contemporary setting, Black slowly reveals Hazel's mysterious involvement with the fairy court and her heroic role in setting the prince free. Though there's enough backstory that this dark fantasy occasionally feels like a sequel, Black's stark, eerie tone; propulsive pacing; and fulsome world building will certainly delight her legion of fans. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: Best-selling Black has a long list of hits, and this grim fairy tale should add to it.--Hunter, Sarah Copyright 2014 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
Fairfold is a contemporary American town long beset by fairies. This isn't a secret-it's a tourist attraction that provides the citizens with a healthy source of income (although the visitors do occasionally get eaten by the more dangerous fairies). Hazel, a local high school student, is in love with the town's biggest tourist attraction, a fairy prince who has slept for generations in a glass coffin in the forest, as is Ben, her older brother. Meanwhile, things have been unbalanced in Fairfold ever since a mortal woman refused to return a changeling-who grew up to be Hazel and Ben's friend Jack-to the fairies. Fortgang reads with a smooth, calm voice that guides listeners through the jumble of characters and landscapes in Black's supernatural tale. Still, listeners are likely to be confused by the content. The modern references (to the show Mad Men, social media, and cellphones, for examples) seem out of place and jolt, reminding us that the story takes place in the present, antithetical to what we are feeling from the mishmash of different literary genres and techniques employed. Without Fortgang's confident and expressive voice, it would be a much more exhausting effort to follow Black's progression into the many rabbit holes making up the bulk of this saga. Ages 12-up. A Little, Brown hardcover. (Jan.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 8 Up-A small town, sibling pairs, a beautiful horned boy who has been entombed in a clear casket for as long as anyone in the town can remember, and a dark forest inhabited by Fae folk of all shapes, sizes, and temperments-these are just a few of the elements Black blends together to create this riveting and engrossing story that pits four teens against an evil ruler. Hazel made a bargain at age 11 with one of the Fae, trading seven years of her life so her brother Ben could perfect his musical skills at a school in Philadelphia, but things went terribly wrong, and now she feels completely alone, and Ben no longer plays. When the horned boy is freed and tells Hazel and Ben why he was entombed, they must risk more than they ever imagined to help him. Narrator Lauren Fortgang is perfect for this book. VERDICT This terrific fantasy is highly recommended for teens who like magical creatures, a bit of mystery, unusual romances, and plenty of action.-John R. Clark, Hartland Public Library, ME (c) Copyright 2015. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
The people of Fairfold live beside the fairy folk with scant worry and not a little smugness. After all, only foolish tourists, lured to town by legend and the beautiful horned prince in the unbreakable glass coffin, risk bringing harm to themselves by offending the fae. Hazel and Ben Evans, growing up in the woods and left to themselves through the benign neglect of their bohemian parents, know differently. As children they stumbled upon a corpse and afterwards began hunting the monsters of the forest, Ben stunning the creatures with his enchanting music and Hazel wielding the powerful sword she discovered. Five years later, wounded by heartache, sixteen-year-old Hazel barely recognizes her childhood self; now she kisses too many boys in an attempt to repress painful memories, while Ben kisses boys in a desperate search for requited love. When the glass coffin is discovered shattered and empty, Hazel's memories start breaking open, too, as she confronts secrets kept, bargains made, and her feelings for Ben's best friend, Jack, a changeling boy. Author Black blends magic with the ordinary world deftly and believably; intoxicated teens dance on the horned boy's coffin in the woods as tinny music plays from their iPods. Her empathetic protagonists are familiar in their vulnerability but compelling in their bravery. Rich descriptions of beautiful but terrible creatures and the thorny briar circling a fairy mound draw readers in to the vividly conjured world. Like a true fairy tale, Black's story weds blinding romance and dark terrors, but her worthy heroes are up to the challenge of both. lauren adams (c) Copyright 2015. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Black returns to her faerie roots with a fantasy set in our very recognizable modern world. Hazel lives in Fairfold, a small town in a haunted forest full of the Folk. Brother Ben's best friend is a changeling; local kids party by the glass coffin containing a horned boy who has slept for generations. Ben himself has magical musical powers, and he and Hazel used to hunt bad Folk when they were kids. But that was before they grew apart and started keeping secrets, before Hazel kissed Ben's first boyfriend (and lots of boys since). Now a monster menaces the town, and the horned boy is awake. Black clearly knows her lore, and the broad strokes intrigue, but somehow the pieces never jell. Hazel is a series of clichs dressed in outfits described with a little too much precision, a broken girl making out with boys to dull the pain, dreaming of heroics. But there's no depth; the parental neglect and secrets are so past tense that they lack urgency (and the parents, mysteriously, are now fine). When it turns out Hazel is indeed special, too many plot threads are flying for her journey to carry the novel. In the end, Black's latest seems to mirror Hazel's fears about herself"as normal and average as any child ever born"but like Hazel, it's not without charm. (Fantasy. 13 up) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
