Doll Bones

Posted on February 17, 2014 by Katy K.

Doll BonesDoll Bones by Holly Black. Illustrations by Eliza Wheeler. Margaret K. McElderry Books, 2013
Zach, Poppy and Alice are twelve, just at that awkward age when children begin to turn into teens. They are still getting together to stage elaborate adventures with dolls and action figures, even though they hide it from others. When Zach’s father throws away the action figures, he’s too conflicted by everything to tell Poppy and Alice the truth, instead telling them he’s too old to play. So when Poppy wakes them in the middle of the night with a story about the creepy doll – the Queen – in her mother’s china cabinet being full of human ashes that want to be properly buried, neither of the other two know whether she’s telling the truth or making a desperate bid to keep the triumvirate together. All of them have family problems that play into their relationships with each other – Zach’s overly-harsh and only recently present father, Poppy’s neglectful family, and Alice’s overprotective grandmother. Despite not fully believing, and knowing they will all be in terrible trouble, the three set out on a journey across state lines to find a resting place for the Queen’s ashes.

Honestly, my first thought with all of this (as the wife of a gamer) is that somebody needs to teach these kids a nice role-playing game system. I hear Fate is popular these days, and I know a lot of libraries run ongoing rpgs for this age group. That being said, this really isn’t the point of the book. I’d describe it as a coming-of-age story with touches of creepy magical realism. I found it lovely as that – so nice to see the kids figuring out how they can be friends and interact as some things are changing and some are staying the same. But I’m glad I was warned in advance that it wasn’t a straight-up fantasy; magic is much more in the fore in Black’s other books, and I could easily have been disappointed. This is one that I think will do well with kids who don’t normally read fantasy, but like a little spooky, maybe more than hardcore fantasy readers. This was nominated for the Cybils, but didn’t make the shortlist. It won a much more widely recognized Newbery Honor award, which seems a better fit. It’s happy to see an author I’ve loved getting big acclaim like this. I very much enjoyed it while at the same time feeling that it needs the right reader in the right mood for this mix of adventure and introspection with a little ghostiness.

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Armchair Cybils Wrap-Up

Posted on February 15, 2014 by Katy K.

armchaircybilsIt’s time for the final Armchair Cybils post for the 2013 Cybils.
I have read two of the thirteen winners. These were:
Forest Has a SongForest Has a Song for Poetry (which I guess I never reviewed) and
Hereville: How Mirka Met a Meteorite for Middle Grade Graphic Novels.

I’d put in a request for Mr. Tiger Goes Wild, the picture book winner, but it’s still not here, though the youth librarian says she loves Peter Brown’s work in general. Here’s the summary of the rest of the picture books I’ve read.

I put off reading the Teen Speculative Fiction until after I’d finished the Middle Grade Speculative Fiction, which I haven’t yet… so, just not reading as fast as I think I ought to be able to. I’m still reading faster than I’m writing reviews, though I’m not sure what to make of that.

Hereville: How Mirka Met a MeteoriteThe one category I was looking at where I actually finished reading all the finalists was the Middle Grade Graphic Novels – in case you missed them, here are my graphic novel summaries: Part 1 and Part 2.

Now there are more books to read! I can look forward to reading the teen graphic novel and speculative fiction winners, and my daughter will be ready for the easy readers in just a year or two. Thank you to the many, many people who worked to make the Cybils the treasure mine it is, and to Amy at Hope is the Word for running the Armchair Cybils!

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Cybils MG Speculatives: 2+2+3

Posted on February 15, 2014 by Katy K.

That’s 2 new reviews, 2 I still haven’t read, and 3 links to older reviews. The 2013 Cybils Award winners were announced yesterday! Here’s a run-down of the Middle Grade Speculative Fiction finalists:
Screaming StaircaseJinx by Sage Blackwood. I own this one (a sign of love) and I have Jinx’s Magic checked out right now.

Lockwood & Co.: The Screaming Staircase by Jonathan Stroud. I’ve had a kind of book avalanche of library books coming in on hold and review copies built up. When I had a gap in which to read it, it was checked out. Now it’s in, but I have about 16 other books in queue. In any case, this is the one that won. It must be great. I hope to get to it soon!

Rose by Holly Webb. I loved this. I think the sequel is due out in the states soon!

SidekickedSidekicked by John David Anderson. Harper Collins Childrens, 2013.
When we first meet Drew Bean, aka the Sensationalist, he’s slowly being lowered closer to a pool of hydrochloric acid. He’s a sidekick in training, hero name “the Sensationalist” for his super-powered senses. He knows what kind of acid it is just by the smell – but that’s not going to help him escape. Next to him is his fellow sidekick-in-training and best friend Jenna, aka the White Lynx, who has more useful superpowers for this situation. Really, though, both of them are bait for their superheroes – and unlike Jenna, whose super, the Fox, is both the hero of Justicia and takes an active interest in Jenna’s training, Drew’s super refuses to have anything to do with him.

So we have Drew, a sweet and geeky boy with powers that, while undeniably out of the ordinary, don’t do much to keep him safe in the life-threatening situations that are coming up all around him. We have his friends (and rivals) in the middle school H.E.R.O. group, getting along in typical middle school fashion. And we have a group of supervillains recently released from prison – the very villains that Drew’s super put behind bars as his last act before retiring as a super. Drew will have to call on all his training and his skills to save the day, even without his super. It’s an exciting plot with a twist I didn’t see coming and good character growth as Drew comes to terms with himself and his nearly nonexistent relationship with his super. No wonder it made the Cybils shortlist! It’s still too dense for my nine-year-old to read to himself, but he’d love having it read to him, and I’d recommend it for superhero-loving kids his age through adults.

True Blue Scouts of Sugarman SwampThe Rithmatist by Brian Sanderson. August feels like a long time ago, but I remember really liking this. Looks like the sequel is expected in 2015 – maybe by then I’ll have caught up with my other reading?

The True Blue Scouts of Sugarman Swamp by Kathi Appelt. This one has been checked out at all times, and I have not been able to get it, though in general I trust the Cybils committee and have heard great things about it.

The Water CastleThe Water Castle by Megan Frazer Blakemore. Bloomsbury, 2013.
Ephraim Appledore-Smith, his athletic older brother Price and smart younger sister Brynn are headed to their family’s old castle in Maine. It might be fun, if it wasn’t because their father is still unable to move or talk following a stroke. The Water Castle is named for the water bottling plant that the family ran in the 19th century. Mallory Green has grown up on stories of the Water Castle her whole life – her African-American family helped build it, took care of the Appledores, and kept their secrets for them. (Slavery is never mentioned, though the house is old enough for that to have been a possibility. It’s very clear that Mallory and her ancestors are blazingly clever and have never been subservient types.) She’s never really believed the stories – but now, things are coming to light that make her want to find out just how much truth might be behind the legends. Will Wylie, meanwhile, has been told his whole life that his family’s troubles are all the fault of the Appledores. He’s turned to science to make sense of the world – but will he be able to give Ephraim a chance when they’re assigned a school project together?

Legend says that the Appledore who built the castle did so because he thought that the Fountain of Youth was hidden nearby, and it was claims of the water being at least supernaturally helpful that allowed the family fortune to be built up from selling the water. Now, Ephraim, Mallory and Will search the network of tunnels under the castle for clues. Interwoven with their story are flashbacks to Mallory’s ancestress, Nora, who worked as old Dr. Appledore’s laboratory assistant in the early years of the 20th century. She and the young heir to the Appledore fortune, Henry, bond over the polar exploration going on, even as the kids in the modern time do a project on the same topic.

Wow. There are so many intertwining layers in this book. There’s a lot of focus on the characters, on how families and the people in them can both stay the same and change through the generations, on the boundaries between science and magic, story and history. All of the kids have family problems that regular kids will be able to relate to, while the fun of exploring hidden tunnels, old laboratories, and mysterious blue lights is kid appeal of a different sort. Also, it’s a kid’s genre book with a person of color on the cover, something we can definitely use more of. This is another one to add now to my son’s ever-growing mental stack of books to read to himself when he’s a little older, or to read aloud to him.

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3 More Cybils MG Graphic Novel Finalists

Posted on February 13, 2014 by Katy K.

Here are the last of of Cybils Middle Grade Graphic Novel Finalists – at least until next year! I am very curious to see which one wins. There were a couple my son didn’t want to read, but he’s loved all the ones we did read, and neither of us could pick a favorite.

Donner Dinner Party Nathan Hale’s Hazardous Tales: The Donner Dinner Party by Nathan Hale. Amulet Books, 2013.
Even before this made the Cybils shortlist, my colleague Mrs. M brought this to my attention, saying that her nine-year-old daughter had stayed up late to read it and loved it. My son, however, heard the premise and decided that it sounded too hazardous to read. I’m 2/3 of the way through reading it myself right now. The story of the ill-fated cross-country pioneer journey is told through the framework of the spy Nathan Hale, in 1776 (whose knowledge has merged with that of the modern-day Nathan Hale, born in 1976), postponing his hanging by telling the story to the British guard and the hangman. Hale does a good job of pulling out kid characters for kid readers to latch on to and keeping facts clear while finding the humorous side of a grim tale. The hangman makes frequent interjections, over-reacting to tense moments in the story in a way that effectively breaks the tension. I haven’t yet gotten to the critical gruesome moment, but so far, it looks like it will be handled in a way that’s perfect for horror-loving, but still sensitive kids. Still, given both the subject matter and the density of the text, I’d give this to kids on the older end of elementary and into middle and high school.

squishSquish 5: Game On! by Jennifer Holm and Matt Holm. Random House, 2013.
This is the latest volume in the newer series by the authors of Babymouse. We read our first Babymouse as a Cybils nominee this year, too. It’s not that the Babymouse book that we read was especially girly, but all the Babymouse books are very, very pink. Squish is an adorable amoeba, illustrated in green, still having typical school adventures. In this volume, Squish gets addicted to video games and neglects both his homework and plans to attend a comic convention with his dad. It is adorable (yes, I used the word adorable twice. I needed to.), funny, easy-to-read, and very, very relatable. I have found a series which my son will voluntarily devour, reading through a whole book in a single sitting – this is so rare that it is cause for great celebration. I am not bringing the whole series home at once partly because he needs to do some reading at his level (this is slightly below) and partly because there’s never more than a book or two available in the library at any given time.

Lost Boy The Lost Boy by Greg Ruth. Graphix, 2013.
Moving into a new house, Nate finds an old reel-to-reel tape recorder hidden under the floorboards of his room. When he listens, he finds that it’s the journal of Walt, a boy who went missing decades earlier. But Nate and the neighbor girl, Tabitha, are seeing some of the same things – or rather, people – that Walt described. There’s a large grasshopper riding a tiny horse, a squirrel in a hunting costume, and an old china doll with a giant button on his overalls. It’s a creepy story, illustrated in dark pencil and gray watercolor, where the villain is a terrifying tree man and even the good guys don’t necessarily look reassuring. The story goes back and forth between Walt, on his way to disappearing, and Nate and Tabitha trying to solve the mystery. I’m finding that my boy is not interested in spooky: he was not interested in reading this book even after I pre-read it for him and assured him that no kids came to harm in it. For readers who appreciate their stories on the creepy side, though, this is excellently done.

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2 + 2 Cybils MG Graphic Novel Finalists

Posted on February 12, 2014 by Katy K.

The Cybils will be announced on Friday! That leaves me with a lot of writing and very little time to catch up with all of my Armchair Cybils-related reading. (I had forgotten that I knew I wouldn’t be able to write on Monday, and then my graphic novel order took all day yesterday.) I’d started out in January having read two of the seven finalists in the middle grade graphic novel category, and now I am halfway through the last of them. My son was also interested in this category, and he’s read four of the finalists with me. Here’s the summary:

BlufftonBluffton by Matt Phelan. Candlewick, 2013.
Maybe I need to get over thinking that my kids won’t like quiet books – I put off checking this book out for my son because I thought that summer vacations a century ago might not be interesting enough, even if it’s set in our home state of Michigan. It’s Muskegon, 1908, and young Henry Harrison does think that life is boring. That all changes when he starts hanging out with the vaudeville kids who are spending their summers in Bluffton on Lake Michigan, a short trolley ride away. There’s baseball, fishing, pranks, and getting to know Buster Keaton. Henry is fictional, but the tales of their exploits are based on Keaton’s autobiography. The watercolor and ink art is beautiful, capturing Keaton as well as the bright sunsets and fireworks over the lake, while winters fade to shades of gray. There’s a beautiful line from Henry’s father: “Don’t worry so much about what you are going to do, Henry. Concentrate on who you are going to be.” We both loved this book, and it’s also led to an interest in watching Buster Keaton films, which he finds so funny that he’s still laughing ten minutes after they finish.

Hereville: How Mirka Met a MeteoriteHereville: How Mirka Met a Meteorite. by Barry Deutsch. Read the full review – but this is a series that we really love.

March. Book One.March: Book 1 by John Lewis. My full review – I should read it to my son, as well. It deserves the acclaim it’s been getting – a Coretta Scott King Honor, an ALA Best Book, a YALSA Best Book for Teens, listed on at least ten Best Books of 2013 lists.

Monster on the HillMonster on a Hill by Rob Harrell. Top Shelf, 2013.
This was the first finalist the boy and I read together. In 1860s England, every village worth its salt has its own monster – good both for thrills as they make the occasional mild rampage through the village, but also for protecting it from truly scary monsters. Unfortunately for Stoker-on-Avon, their monster hasn’t been seen out of his cave for ages. When the town’s scientist and urchin newsboy go to investigate, they find that monster Rayburn is depressed and has a very bad inferiority complex. Can they rouse him before it’s too late? It’s short on diversity, as the humans are both white and male – but that doesn’t negate the off-beat charm. It was listed on a large number of ALA lists, like Best Books for Teens and Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers. The boy and I had a lot of fun with it.

Stay tuned tomorrow for three more graphic novel finalists!

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Magic Marks the Spot

Posted on February 9, 2014 by Katy K.

I’m catching up with the last of my December reading. Here’s one that was nominated for the Cybils and a lot of fun even if it didn’t make the shortlist! I think it’s a good candidate for Ms. Yingling’s Boys Read Pink Month – an action-packed pirate story with a courageous girl in the lead.

Magic Marks the SpotMagic Marks the Spot. The Very Nearly Honorable League of Pirates Book 1. by Caroline Carlson. Illustrations by Dave Phillips. Harper Collins Children, 2013.

Hilary Westfield, daughter of Admiral Westfield, wants nothing more than to be a pirate. The Very Nearly Honorable League of Pirates has already approved her application when she tells them that she is a girl, and forward it instead to Miss Pimm’s Finishing School for Delicate Ladies. Hilary is horrified, but her parents bundle her onto the train anyway, escorted by her governess. Miss Greyson is herself a Miss Pimm’s graduate and holder of a coveted golden crochet hook. Despite making friends with her roommate, Claire, Hilary is still determined to be a pirate, and applies to join the crew of a non-League pirate ship.

In Hilary’s world, pirate treasure means magic – magic is stored in physical objects, most of which were confiscated by the Enchantress ages ago. A few wealthy families still have small magical items – Hilary has a magical talking gargoyle made by the Enchantress herself – and every pirate dreams of finding the treasure the Enchantress hid so long ago. Now, Hilary, Captain Jasper, Miss Greyson, fellow crew member Charlie, and the icky Oliver, Admiral Westfield’s former assistant, are off with a stolen treasure map trying to find it. The roommate provides back-up via letters (no explanation for how the letters are getting back and forth when Hilary is on board a ship is given.)

I really enjoyed this fantasy pirate adventure. Hilary is a really great character, determined to succeed as a pirate on her own terms, without pretending to be a boy. The story is quirky and fast-paced, balancing tension and humor. The biggest drawback to this book is that it includes frequent newspaper articles and especially letters, written in cursive on darker-tinted paper, to tell it apart from the regular story. I know that my son, who would otherwise love this story, wouldn’t be able to read these at all. However, I’ve heard good things about the audiobook, narrated by our favorite Katherine Kellgren, so I think we’d go that way for him. I’ll definitely be looking for more books in this series for myself.

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Mostly Picture Book Cybils Finalists

Posted on February 7, 2014 by Katy K.

I’m realizing that the Cybils awards will be announced next week already, and I’d better try to catch up with my reviewing before then. Here’s one Easy Reader and three Picture Book finalists. I’ve not really been making an effort with the easy readers. I have one more picture book at home that I haven’t convinced my daughter to let me read her yet, one that I put in a purchase request for, and two that I’m just waiting to be returned. I think the kids who have them right now must love them so much the parents are willing to pay the fines, as both Sophie’s Squash and Open This Little Book are long overdue at this point.

Penny and Her MarblePenny and Her Marble by Kevin Henkes. Harper Collins Childrens, 2013.

My daughter has loved both of the other Penny books – Penny and Her Song and Penny and Her Doll. Naturally, I checked them out. Penny is a sweet little mouse whose dilemmas are resolved in a few short chapters. The length is such that my daughter was able to listen through them even at three, perfect for bridging between very easy readers and early chapter books. In this book, Penny is taking her doll for a short walk when she spots a beautiful blue marble in the neighbor’s grass. She takes it initially, but then feels intensely guilty. She spends all the next day and night torn between her desire to keep it and her desire to make things right again. It’s a problem that any child will understand, told perfectly sympathetically and with a happy ending.

count the monkeysCount the Monkeys by Mac Barnett. Illustrated by Kevin Cornell. Disney-Hyperion Books, 2013.

My daughter was thrilled when I brought this home for her – she’d seen it at school and fallen in love with it. This really is a counting book, but the monkeys are only on the cover and the final endpaper. First they’ve been scared away by a cobra, then mongooses frighten away the cobra, followed by mongooses, crocodiles, grizzly bears, bees, beekeepers, wolves, lumber jacks and more lumber jacks, and rhinoceroses with bagpipes. The brightly colored, cartoony illustrations add to the appeal of this very silly book. Honestly, I wasn’t sure that I found it so extraordinary personally, but the number of times I found the girl reading it to herself speaks highly in its favor.

JourneyJourney by Aaron Becker. Candlewick Press, 2013.

This is a wordless picture book. In general, I’d say that wordless picture books are challenging for adults to read aloud, but great for sparking conversations over the book and for encouraging narrative skills in children, the important ability to tell a story in the kid’s own words. This is possibly the most beautiful I’ve ever seen, a fantastical homage to Harold and the Purple Crayon. In the beginning, a girl in a beige world goes to each of her family members in turn, all absorbed in their own pursuits. Bored, she goes to her room and draws a door with her red crayon. It takes her to another, full-color world, through which she journeys by drawing things for herself with the red crayon – a boat to go down the river from the forest to the (steampunky) city, a balloon to carry her through the sky. She rescues a bird with long purple plumage, and eventually comes out a purple door, back to her own world where she meets a boy with a purple crayon. There are so many details that this is a book worth visiting over and over again, and one I’d love to own. No wonder it got a Caldecott Honor as well as being a Cybils finalist!

If You Want to See a WhaleIf You Want to See a Whale by Julie Fogliano. Illustrated by Erin Stead. Roaring Brook Press, 2013

Honestly, this was one, like How to that I thought would be too quiet for children to really enjoy. It is a quiet, personal kind of book, starting with its smaller than average size. A boy and a small bird start on a blank page, and the world around them gradually fills in as it talks about all the interesting things you will have to ignore if you want to notice a whale. The soft colors and gentle, poetic phrases celebrate the importance of stillness and taking time to notice things. Again, I was wrong – maybe I needed reminding that children need this, too. My daughter and I both loved it.

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The Chronicles of Narnia, 2 and 3

Posted on February 5, 2014 by Katy K.

Laurence KriegSo my father (pictured at left) corresponded with C.S. Lewis as a child, over a disagreement he and his mother (my grandmother) were having over which order the books should be read in, as well as other matters. My father remained a life-long fan, and I remember knowing the books well enough by second grade to know when my teacher was abridging the text in her classroom reading. As a result, I’ve been feeling a bit guilty for not reading them to my son earlier – I read The Magician’s Nephew to him last year, but decided that I should save my precious reading-aloud time with him for books that we can’t get on audio. Bonus, though – my daughter is much more interested in having this on in the car than most of the books he’s been listening to lately, partly because it’s not as scary and partly because there is a character with her name.

lionThe Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. The Chronicles of Narnia Book 2. by C.S. Lewis. Narrated by Michael York. Harper Children’s Audio, 1950, 1978.

Everyone knows the plot here, right? Four children in World War II England stumble through a wardrobe into a land of perpetual winter, held thus by a witch whose power they are prophesied to break. There is betrayal, adventure, magical animals, mythical fauns living very British-seeming lifestyles, a visit from Father Christmas, and of course, a retelling of the Christ story.

The awkward part for me is that I am no longer so orthodox in my personal theology as I was as a child, and I was unsure how I would feel going back to this. I know many adults who’ve found this particular series gone flat on them when they returned to it as adults. In this book, I felt that the theology fit in just fine for me. My son hadn’t recognized the story in this context, though he is familiar with it, and seemed to enjoy it both before and after me telling him about it.

What I noticed especially here was that C.S. Lewis, much more than most authors, seemed to be writing with reading aloud in mind. The narrator makes fairly frequent comments to the reader, which might seem out of place when reading silently, but which felt pretty natural (if still old-fashioned) to me as an adult aside to the child listener in the book. The chapters are mostly 15 minutes, which fit nicely into our car time, but also work very well for bedtime reading, and the pacing is beautiful. I was glad that the chunks mostly worked smoothly with our travel time, as the audio book is of the variety that very unhelpfully has tracks only once a chapter, and my car audio system doesn’t allow for fast-forwarding. Michael York does a perfectly passable, but not stellar, reading – but here I am spoiled rotten. My father, who read these books aloud to us nearly annually, is both a really great reader himself and based his accent in the readings on recordings of C.S. Lewis. I really wish that I could convince him to record them for us now! Continue reading →

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Top Ten Books that Require Hankies

Posted on February 5, 2014 by Katy K.

toptentuesday Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.
These days, I tend to actively avoid books that will make me cry, unless somebody I know and trust puts the book in my hands and tells me I will love it so much that it will be worth the extra hanky laundry. (That’s why I haven’t read Code Name Verity yet, despite all the great things I’ve heard about it and my high school obsession with WWII resistor stories.) But really, the right sad book at the right time is an experience that makes me understand the Greeks and their love of tragedy better. Here, approximately in order by when I read them:

whereWhere the Red Fern Grows by Wilson Rawls. It was second grade, and my teacher read this aloud. And then I read it to myself many more times.

Rilla of Ingleside by L.M. Montgomery. Walter! Oh, my goodness!

Histories of King Kelson trilogy by Katherine Kurtz. King Kelson was an early book crush, who had one bride after another murdered or married away from him through treachery. I never quite got around to the letter I meant to write, offering myself as a fictional bride so the poor guy could have some sort of happy ending.

Kelson Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold. Not so tragic as the others, but a moving and mystical tale of a widow coming into her own.

Love that Dog by Sharon Creech. I found this in library school, and read it aloud to my love through the tears because it was just so beautiful.

Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech. Somehow I put this into my car’s CD player without reading the summary, knowing only it had won some awards. I need to be better prepared when going into a tearjerker, I tell you.

The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh. My colleague S- is one of the few people to whom I will listen when they tell me a book is worth the hankies. (the close office proximity might help.) I might be extra sensitive to stories of mothers having nursing problems.

The Piper’s Son by Melina Marchetta. OK, my now-retired colleague C- is another one I trust. She knows her way around audiobooks, as well as what I like, though this story of a family recovering – badly – from the death of a beloved uncle/brother three years earlier hit particularly hard.

RedshirtsThe Fault in our Stars by John Greene. This is on lots of lists, I know. What got me was not so much the expected sadness, but her relationship with her parents, early in the book.

Redshirts by John Scalzi. The book has a hilarious premise. It made me laugh for most of it. And right at the end, he twisted things just enough that there were actual tears in our eyes – both mine and my love’s.

Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell. Another popular one – but it’s rare enough for me to have actual tears over books that it’s worth mentioning. It is beautiful, and broke my heart.

What are your favorite weepy books? And do you look for them or avoid them?

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Renegade Magic

Posted on January 29, 2014 by Katy K.

Renegade MagicRenegade Magic. Kat, Incorrigible Book 2. by Stephanie Burgis. Atheneum Books for Young Readers, 2012.
Back to Kat in Regency-era England with more magical mayhem! This book opens as she’s sneaking off to the kitchen with her brother, Charles, for an illicit fencing lesson to blow off steam before her sister’s wedding.

In Kat, Incorrigible, Kat managed arrange for her eldest siste to be married to her own true love, instead of to a rich but cruel and much older man. Naturally, this came at the cost of bending some rules and stepping on quite a few toes.

Now, all of this catches up with her. The ill-tempered Lady Fotherington, one of the Guardians who has carried her grudge against Kat’s mother over into the present day, arranges for a very large scene to be made in the middle of Elissa’s wedding, by no other person than the mother of Mr. Carlyle, sister Angeline’s sweetheart. Kat’s resulting tantrum in the Hall of the Guardians results in her access to the Hall and the offer of magic lessons being revoked.

Now Stepmama has decided that the family should retreat to Bath to ride out this scandal. Angeline has a dangerous plan of her own to make Stepmama allow her to see Mr. Carlyle again. Kat finds both that the head of the Guardians – a man she’s been told by her advisor to avoid at all costs – is in Bath himself, of all places – and that the springs are filled with a dangerous wild magic.

Of course Kat can’t just let things slip – especially when her siblings are in danger – but what can she do when she’s not allowed to use magic herself and everyone thinks she’s telling stories to keep herself out of trouble? Especially when she’s being trailed by Cousin Lucy, who thinks that witchcraft is a charmingly romantic game!

Burgis brings early Bath to life with her descriptions of the places and rituals around this high society gathering-place, while Kat is the same irresistibly impetuous heroine I fell for in Kat, Incorrigible. This is such a fun, zingy series, one I’d recommend to fans of fantasy and Austen aged about ten and up.

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