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Take the Key and Lock Her Up

Death is no stranger to the royal family of Adria. Centuries ago, the royal family was murdered, which changed the political landscape of Adri. However, the infant princess survived and was hidden; those who hid the child wanted her to take her rightful place as queen. Now, two hundred years later, there are still some that believe the princess’ descendent should sit on the throne.

Grace discovers that the princess’s blood runs through her veins. If people find out that Grace is a lost princess, the news could spark a revolution. Some people want to use Grace as a pawn, others want to silence her forever. Grace must figure out a way to save herself and the people she loves. Danger and deceit hide around every corner, and if Grace fails, she will pay with her life.

Take the Key and Lock Her Up is the exciting conclusion to the Embassy Row trilogy. The third book in the series ramps up the suspense because Grace isn’t sure who wants to help her and who wants to kill her. The romance heats up, but the kissing scenes are tame and appropriate for younger readers. Even though the book is written for readers as young as twelve, there are some readers that will not be ready for the more mature themes. For younger readers, the content may be disturbing because there are several scenes that focus on a mental institution and how the drugs affect the patients. In addition, Take the Key and Lock Her Up has more violence than the first two books because there are several factions that want Grace dead. The ending of the story is a bit predictable, but that doesn’t detract from the story’s enjoyment.

Sexual Content

  • Grace and Alexei kiss five times throughout the story. The first time, Grace brings “my free hand up and weave my fingers into Alexei’s dark hair, pull him close, and kiss him. Like maybe it’s the last thing I’ll ever do.”
  • Alexei kisses Grace. “. . . Alexei’s lips are on mine, and I’m not aware of anything anymore. It’s different from the kiss on the bridge. There’s no urgency now. . . This is about now—right now. No future and no past.”
  • Alexei and Grace kiss. “. . . His lips are on mine and my fingers are in his hair and everything fades away, the streets and the darkness. . .”

Violence

  • After Grace is drugged and taken to an unknown location, she escapes. “I just pick up the candlestick and throw it over my head as hard as I can . . . I can hear the chaos behind me, cries of pain and fury and fear.”
  • Someone is trying to capture Grace. In order to help her, Alexei throws a man over a bridge.
  • When a man tries to grab Grace, Alexei fights him. Grace watches “him twist, launching himself over the bigger man, and in a flash Alexei has his arms around his neck and he’s squeezing . . . The orderly slumps as Alexei cuts off his . .” At the same time, an orderly tries to drug Grace, and she throws her “hands up, catching his wrist with both hands, pressing up as he presses down.” She makes the man put the syringe in his own leg, and she and Alexei are able to escape.
  • Grace’s friends blow up a car. “Flaming debris fills the yard. Windshields are smashed. Tires are flattened.” No one is injured.
  • For no reason, a woman attacks the prince. She “slaps him hard across the face and starts kicking and clawing.” Several people pull her off of him.
  • Someone poisons the king, and he “pitches awkwardly forward and crashes down the massive staircase. . . (he) has landed, limp and broken, on the polished parquet floor.”
  • When Grace discovers a secret, someone hits her, knocking her out. Later, this person shoots a man in the chest, “and he drops to the ground.”
  • When a woman attacks Grace, her son shoots her. “The gun is tumbling from his hand as his mother crumbles, blood-soaked, to the floor.” The woman survives.

 

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Grace drugs someone’s tea. When Grace drugs the person, “she slumps slowly to the ground, getting mud and grass stains all over her pretty white suit.”
  • A guard drugs Grace. When it happens, she feels “a pinch in my neck. I turn to see a guard behind me holding a syringe.”
  • While walking down the street, Grace passes some drunk people and goes by a café where people are drinking wine.
  • Alexei’s mother was in a mental institution, where she was prescribed drugs. Grace thinks, “I don’t know what they were giving her at that facility, but I can imagine. I know better than anyone that the medicine can be far worse than the disease.”
  • A woman is put in a mental intuition where she is given a vial of medication. Grace thinks that the medicine is “supposed to feel like peace, like bliss. But to me they always felt like your heart was covered with frostbite. They made me so numb I actually burned.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

See How They Run

Finding the truth about her mother’s murder was supposed to bring Grace peace. But the past still haunts her. Grace realizes that her mother carried secrets of her own, but there are those who want those secrets to stay buried. And there is someone who is willing to kill to make sure the truth never comes out.

Grace knows there are century-old secrets surrounding her family. The only thing she doesn’t know is who to trust in her search for the truth. And when a U.S. citizen is murdered on Adria soil, Grace realizes that death is just a tool that a powerful person isn’t afraid to use.

Full of suspense and intrigue, the second installment of the Embassy Row series will captivate readers and pull them into the mystery surrounding Grace. See How They Run focuses less on Grace’s friends, and their absence makes the story less interesting. Grace doesn’t trust her own decision-making skills, and often refers to her “crazy” nature. Her complicated character adds suspense to the story. The addition of Adria’s history and the murder of a royal family creates an eerie atmosphere.

For those who enjoyed the Gallagher Girls series, See How They Run will not disappoint. However, See How They Run focuses on the death of a royal family and the murder of a young man. Even though the violence is not described in detail, the story makes it clear that someone is willing to kill innocent people.

Sexual Content

  • At a party, a boy kisses Grace. “He is leaning closer and closer. I close my eyes and feel his lips brush mine.” The kiss ends when she shoves him back.
  • Alexei and Grace kiss. The first time they kiss, Grace thinks, “Spence kissed me. But this is more. More intimate. More gentle. More emotion pounds through my veins than anything any boy has ever made me feel.”

Violence

  • An integral part of the plot revolves around a revolt that happened 200 years ago. During the revolt, “The king, the queen, two princes and a baby girl who wasn’t even a month old yet. Five of them. They pulled them from their bed, and they killed them.” The family was murdered and their bodies were hung from the palace.
  • When Alexei finds out that Spence kissed Grace, Alexei “turns and pulls back his arm in one smooth motion, dropping Spence to the ground with a single blow. . . They tumble and twist and brawl closer and closer to the party.” The fight lasts over several pages, but no one is seriously hurt.
  • When Jamie finds out that his friend kissed Grace, he “doesn’t say a word of warning. He just hits him.” Spence’s head jerks but he stays on his feet. The boy doesn’t hit back and Jamie leaves him with a warning to leave his sister alone.
  • During the festival, a drunk man recognizes Alexei. Then a mob of people attacks him and Grace. “The first fist that hits Alexei knocks him nearly off his feet. He doesn’t see it coming. . . I can feel myself getting pushed, almost knocked to the ground. I lash out, kicking a man in the knee as he lunges at Alexei. But two other men are already upon him.” During the attack, Grace is stabbed in the side.
  • Someone bombs a car. It is unclear if the driver was killed in the explosion or if the vehicle was unoccupied.
  • Someone stabs Jamie. “. . . I see blood that covers Jamie’s shirt. He’s trying to press against the wound with his free hand, but it’s not working. My brother is going to bleed to death, die right in front of me.” A helicopter arrives to take him to an Army hospital in Germany. It is unclear if he will survive his wounds.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • In the past, Grace has been given medication for anxiety. When she has a bad dream, she blames it on “the meds that I’m not taking.”
  • During a festival, a man walks by Grace and her friends. She comments that the drunk’s “breath smells like liquor.”
  • When Grace is stabbed, someone tends to the wound and then gives her “a small glass bottle” with medicine in it to help with the pain.
  • Grace does not want Alexei to turn himself into the authorities, so she drugs him. “His hand goes limp . . . His legs wobble. But thankfully we are out of view of the street by the time he passes out completely and falls, sprawling on the weeds.”

Language

  • A character, “mumbles something that I think must be the Russian equivalent to Oh my freaking goodness.”

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

All Fall Down

Three years after her mother’s death, Grace is sent to live with her grandfather, a powerful ambassador who is too busy to spend any time with her. Thrust into a new situation, Grace isn’t sure who to trust. Grace has never been close to her childhood companion, Megan, and wonders why she would want to help her. Her new friend Noah claims to want to be her best friend. Her brother’s best friend Alexei says he’s watching out for her out of obligation. Are they really her friends or do they have other motivations for staying close to Grace?

Grace wants to keep out all thoughts of her mother’s death, but visions of her mother keep appearing.  While Grace’s grandfather wants her to put on a pretty dress and attend functions at his side, Grace doesn’t seem to be able to stay out of trouble. When the mysterious Scared Man from her past appears, Grace overhears his plans to kill. Convinced that the Scared Man is responsible for killing her mother, Grace goes on a mission to stop him from killing again.

Grace narrates her own story, which allows the reader to see into her troubled mind and understand her terror. Grace believes that others think she is crazy because she witnessed her mother’s death; despite appearing completely normal, she struggles with panic attacks and visions of her mother. Grace saw her mother being shot in the chest, so why does everyone say the death was an accident?

Full of suspense, interesting characters, and plot twists, All Fall Down is an entertaining story that will leave the reader reaching for the next book in the series. For those who enjoyed the Gallagher Girls series, All Fall Down will not disappoint. However, All Fall Down has a more serious tone with more violence. Although the violence is not described in gory detail and is appropriate for younger audiences, Grace’s mother’s death is described in a detailed flashback. Even though the book is written for readers as young as twelve, as the series progresses there are some readers that will not be ready for the more mature themes.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • Feeling overwhelmed, Grace runs from the house. As she backs out of the door, a “hand grabs me from behind” and she lashes out. “A cry rises up my throat, primitive and raw, and then I’m pushing and lunging. Falling. As I land in the rosebushes, I can feel the thorns of a rosebush tearing into my skin, clinging to my clothes.” In her panic, she hit the Russian ambassador, giving him a bloody nose.
  • While Grace is sleeping, a boy sneaks into her room and tries to wake her up. Startled, “I wrench the boy’s hand farther back, holding his thumb with my other hand.” After they talk, they sneak out of the house to attend a party.
  • Grace is told a story about a royal family that was murdered. The person speaking says, “The people stormed the palace and dragged Alexander and his family from their beds.” No other description is given.
  • Grace thinks that the Scared Man is going to kill the Russian president so she jumps off a balcony. When she jumps, “everyone is watching as I hurl myself over the railing. Even the U.S. Secret Service can do nothing but watch as I fly through the air and crash onto the Scared Man’s back.” Later she finds out that the Scared Man was holding a cell phone, not a gun.
  • Someone tries to kill Grace. “There’s a fence at my back. I can’t move any farther, and that is when the prime minister lunges for me, grabbing my arms in his massive hands, squeezing like a tourniquet. . . I can’t think anymore, so I just start kicking, screaming.” She struggles with her attacker, “when my elbow makes contact with his nose, I hear a sickening snap and feel the warm gush of blood on the back of my neck.”
  • Grace witnessed her mother’s death. “. . . I am standing there, watching my mother fall, bloody and broken. . .” The person who tried to help her was injured. “Blood rains down his face. His left eye is swollen shut. And the skin on his left cheek is almost black with blood, singed skin, and a rugged cut that runs from brow to jaw.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Grace takes prescription pills that help her deal with anxiety. Several times she refers to the pills. When she has a panic attack she doesn’t want anyone to find out because, “It will be just like after (her mother’s death). With the pills and the shrinks and the looks.”
  • After Grace jumps off a balcony and lands on the Scared Man, she is given more medication. The medication makes her act differently. The medicine makes Grace shake “my body like a pendulum that can never quite stop moving.”
  • Someone drugs Grace so that she will go to sleep. After she takes the drugs, she thinks, “I want to argue and demand answers, but it is all I can do to focus on the glass that is falling, shattering on the floor. Two seconds later, I follow.”
  • Grace’s grandfather “pours himself a drink, I can tell it isn’t the first of the night. The way things are going, it almost certainly won’t be his last.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

How to Fall

Fraya is gone, but Jess is determined to discover how Fraya ended up dead at the bottom of a cliff. However, everyone just wants Jess to stop asking questions. After all, Fraya is dead and nothing will bring her back. Despite the obstacles, Jess is determined to follow the leads and find out if Fraya’s death was a suicide, like some believed, or if there was something more sinister at play.

How to Fall is an action-packed story that will have the reader on the edge of their seat to find out what will happen next. As Jess tries to unravel the secrets to Fraya’s death, she meets Ryan and Will. Both boys hate each other, and both want Jess as their own. This budding love triangle is expertly weaved into the story without taking over the mystery of Fraya.

Teens will relate to Jess because she is a likable character who isn’t afraid of the popular mean girls or being an outcast. Jess’s confidence in herself is refreshing in a character. Even though Jess is sure of herself, she doesn’t come across as smug. The romance and language are teen-appropriate and, although there is profanity, it is used sporadically. How to Fall is an enjoyable book that shows how bullying can quickly spiral out of control.

Sexual Content

  • Jess is going out with a boy, so she can find out what he knows about her cousin’s death.  Her friend tells her to wear “Skanky jeans” so the boy talks to her.
  • Someone started gossiping about Jess’s cousin Freya and telling people she was a “slut.”
  • At the end of the story, a boy kisses Jess. “I had spent days imagining what it would be like to kiss him, but I hadn’t even come close. He kissed me like it was the start of something, or the end, and I couldn’t work out which it was, but I didn’t want to ask.”
  • Someone tells Jess that a boy likes “dirty girls.”
  • Jess goes to a party with a boy and he kisses her. “He pressed his body against mine, and with the kiosk behind me I had nowhere to go, but I didn’t have enough air to complain.”
  • A policeman gives Jess a ride home. Before she can get out of the car, he grabs her arm.  “Slowly, deliberately, he stroked my wrist with his thumb, trialing it across the veins where the blood ran close to the surface. . .” He then wipes off her smeared lipstick. “Before I could stop him he drew his thumb along my lower lip, staring into my eyes the whole time.”

Violence

  • Natasha is upset that Jess has been spending time with Natasha’s ex-boyfriend. They argue and Natasha grabs Jess. “Before I could move, Natasha shot out a hand and grabbed a handful of my hair.” Natasha then tries to throw her over a cliff, but is stopped.
  • A character retells a story about when he and a friend were being bullied. Eventually, his friend was attacked and broke an arm.
  • A group of girls was bullying Freya. One day at school, “a whole group of girls cornered Freya and held her down so Natasha could cut off her ponytail.”
  • The story begins with Fraya running and falling off a cliff. As the story unfolds, the reader discovers that Fraya had been bullied, which eventually lead to her death.
  • Someone tries to kill Jess by throwing her off a cliff.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • A character retells a story about a boy that was “smoking dope.”

Language

  • Jess and another girl were arguing. The other girl tells Jess, “Don’t think you can do better than me at being a bitch.” Several times throughout the book someone is called a bitch.
  • Jess’s friend surprises her. Jess says, “God, Will, you scared the crap out of me.”
  • Someone tells Jess, “Don’t tell anyone, but I am shit-scared of heights.”

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

The Elite

America isn’t sure if she wants to win Prince Maxom’s heart. The other six selections’ girls don’t share that uncertainty. They all want Maxon to choose them to be the next princess of Illea and are ready to fight America for Maxom and the crown.

When America is with Maxom, he sweeps her off her feet, and the choice seems obvious. Then her heart becomes confused whenever she sees her childhood sweetheart, Aspen. With Aspen back in her life, and both Aspen and Maxom competing for her heart, America’s indecision grows.

America is a strong character in The Selection, but she loses much of what makes her likable in the second installment of this series. In book one she is strong and funny, but in this book she degenerates into an indecisive and, quite frankly, whiny brat. The story is dragged on because America can’t decide if she wants to marry the Prince or Aspen.

The book loses the romance and suspense of the first book. Though there are exciting and fun scenes, they are sparse. If you enjoyed The Selection, you may find yourself reading The Elite out of obligation, rather than enjoyment.

Sexual Content

  • America kisses both Malcom and Aspen at different times throughout the book.
  • After one of the contestants gets married, she talks about the first time she and her husband shared a bed. It was, “a little uncomfortable at first. The second time was better.”
  • One of the contestants is seen lavishing affection on Maxom and kissing his neck.

Violence

  • After being found together, a contestant and a guard are caned for treason. During the caning, the guard’s back is described. “His skin was already torn, pieces hanging sickeningly. Blood was trickling down, ruining what used to be his dress pants.”
  • Two of the elite get into a fight. They use their nails and fists causing mild injury to each other.
  • The rebels attack the palace several times. In one scene a guard is hit by a bullet and blood pours from his chest.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • At a banquet hosting the Italian monarchy, wine is served. When a member of the monarchy wants America to talk about Maxom, she offers America wine in order to get her to talk.

Language

  • The words hell and damn are used in the heat of emotion.

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • None

Goddess

Ares was just the beginning of Helen’s problems. The rest of the gods are free, and they have gone right back to wreaking havoc on mortals. Helen might be the only one who can stop them, but in order to do so, she must do the unthinkable. She must become a goddess.

Becoming blood brothers with Orion and Lucas has changed everything. The four Scion houses are united, yet Atlantis is nowhere to be found. Helen scrambles to keep the people she loves safe, while also searching for a way to defeat literal gods. She begins to realize that she can’t keep everyone alive. The only question is, who will die in this war against the gods?

Helen comes into her own in Goddess. She is a powerful character who drives the story forward. Lucas also narrates a bit of the story, allowing the reader to see Helen’s strength from an outside perspective. There is a decent amount of sex and violence in this story. Goddess twists and turns in a way that will keep readers on the edge of their seats until the very end.

Sexual Content

  • Aphrodite curses a city. She says, “I abandon this place. No man shall feel desire, and no woman shall bear fruit. You will all die unloved and childless.”
  • The Greek gods return to Earth. They rape and kill several mortal women. “A terrified woman was struggling against a massive claw that was wrapped around her waist. Enormous wings . . . beat the air as the giant bird hauled her into the night sky.”
  • Andy is part siren, which means all men and even some women are incredibly attracted to her. Andy “had run away from every man who’d pursued her, but that didn’t stop them from chasing. She’d run away from the girls who had pursued her, too, and there had been plenty of those.”
  • When Helen and Orion are talking, Hector yells, “Hey, Orion? Put some pants on, toss her over your shoulder, and carry her off like a man, for the love of Pete!” He’s mostly
  • Helen and Orion kiss a few times. “He lowered his head and kissed her . . . she slid her hands across his shoulders and the back of his neck. The only thing that she could think was how amazing Orion felt. Amazing.”
  • Matt “turned his head and stared at the wall as [Ariadne] tossed something silky and lace-trimmed in her closet.” Ariadne tells him, “My lingerie isn’t going to strike you blind, you know.”
  • Helen sees a vision of Guinevere and Lancelot. “His hands dug into her hair, sending her hairpins flying and her tresses tumbling down around his calloused fingers in messy locks. His lips nudged hers apart. Guinevere fell back against the flagstones and pulled Lancelot down on top of her. He slid his knee between her thighs, pushing her many-layered skirts up until his hand could reach the bare skin underneath.”
  • Orion warns Cassandra that Phaon, “only goes for little girls.”
  • Ariadne and Matt have sex. “As Matt picked her up and carried her over to his bed, he marveled at how simple a gesture it was.”
  • In one of Helen’s visions, she “woke with Paris’ naked body tangled up with hers . . . Helen joined the memory as Paris was slipping into a deep sleep shortly after they had made love for the last time.”
  • When Phaon is about to die, he says to Orion, “Why so frustrated? I already told you, you can have the little one, Orion. You know she wants it from you.”
  • Cassandra, who hasn’t hit puberty yet, “turned her mouth up to his like a shy flower opening for the first time. In a daze, Orion lowered his lips and kissed her. Lucas’s foot connected with the side of Orion’s head . . . ‘She’s just a child!’ Lucas growled . . . ‘I know!’ Orion hollered. ‘I shouldn’t have–I’m sorry!’ “

Violence

  • It was feared that Helen of Troy was pregnant with the prophesized Tyrant, so Menelaus said, “I will beat the child out of you and love you still.” Then a mob tries to stone her. “When the first stone struck her, she did not cower or try to cover herself. More stones followed, battering her from all sides, until the mob ran out of stones to throw.” Helen still does not die, so the crowd says, “Behead her. It’s the only way.” To which Helen responds, “Yes, get a sword . . . I beg you.”
  • When Helen of Troy first discovered she was pregnant, she tried to kill herself and her baby. She says, “I tried, but I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t kill us myself.”
  • When Phaon tries to kill Orion, Helen springs to his defense. Lucas “held on to her, even though in that moment she was hotter than the surface of the sun . . . She switched off the current immediately, and he fell down with a scream . . . His hands, chest, and cheek were black and bloody, burned down to the bone by the ball of lightning she had created. He writhed on the ground in agony.”
  • When Daedalus duels Phaon, they realize, “He’s going to bleed Phaon to death . . . A cut here, a bone-breaking blow there, and on and on it went.”
  • Matt and Hector duel. “Matt’s sword was buried up to the hilt in his chest . . . Hector held onto his side, still clutching the thick blade that had run him clean through the heart. He hit the ground and his head turned upward, his eyes staring directly at the clouded sun.”
  • When Lucas challenges Achilles to a duel, his brother wonders, “Are you trying to kill yourself?”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Helen finds out that Daphne has been drugging her father to keep him asleep.

Language

  • When Helen finds out her mother has been drugging her father, she plans, “to kick that no-hearted bitch’s ass.”
  • The words crap, moron, dickhead, and jackass are used once or twice.
  • The words hell and damn are used often.

Supernatural

  • Helen and her friends have many powers. These include controlling hearts, flying, breathing underwater, super strength, super hearing, and the ability to sense lies.
  • When Helen starts being able to see emotions, she says, “It’s as if everything that everyone is feeling is splashed across their insides, and I can see it!”
  • The Greek gods are real.
  • The people from the Trojan War, such as Achilles, Hector, Paris, and Helen, are real and have been reincarnated.

Spiritual Content

  • None

Dreamless

Helen’s world is turned upside down when she discovers that Lucas, her beloved, is her cousin. Tormented by the guilt of being in love with someone she is related to, and unable to banish her feelings for him, her despair begins to affect her time in the Underworld. Her experiences in the Underworld are so grueling that her friends and family begin to worry Helen is going insane, or even dying.

Despite her failing health, Helen can’t avoid the Underworld. She is the Descender. She must wander through Hades’ world, and search for a way to stop the Furies from tormenting her family. But her strength is fading. Even a demi-god can only survive so much before the trip to the Underworld stops being a visit, and becomes permanent.

Dreamless keeps the stakes high. Helen is plagued with incestuous thoughts and tries to avoid those by falling in love with her friend Orion. However, that only brings about a love triangle. Lucas burns with jealousy, and Helen is still unable to let go of her feelings for her cousin. This book has adult themes and conversations, as well as a smattering of language and a decent amount of violence. Most violence isn’t extremely graphic, aside from the final battle, which will leave readers dying to get their hands on the third and final book in this beautifully written trilogy.

Sexual Content

  • Castor tells Lucas, “Scions have been plagued with incest since Oedipus. And there have been others in this House who have fallen in love with their first cousins, like you and Helen . . . the children born to related Scions always suffer our greatest curse. Insanity.”
  • Orion and Helen kiss. “His head fell listlessly toward Helen, inch by inch, until his lips grazed lightly against her own. His mouth was very warm and soft. Like a new flavor she couldn’t quite place but that she wanted to swallow whole, Helen pulled his lower lip into her mouth to take a bigger sip of him. Catching his face in one of her hands so she could tilt his wilting mouth towards her . . . “
  • Morpheus, the god of dreams, tries to seduce Helen. “Helen ran her hands across his chest and allowed him to kiss her lightly as he spoke . . . [he] slid her hands up over her head, pinning her under him.”
  • Orion and Helen make out. “He lowered his mouth to hers and kissed her. Her knees melted. This guy was that good a kisser . . . He guided her down to the ground, careful not to crush her underneath him.”

Violence 

  • When Castor tries to stop his son from yelling at Helen, Lucas, “spun around and hit his father. The blow was so hard it sent Castor flying halfway across the kitchen and into a cabinet of glasses and mugs over the sink. Noel screamed, covering her face as shards of broken dishes went flying in every direction.”
  • The Furies make Orion and Helen try to kill each other. “There was blood on her hands. Stunned out of her trance, Helen looked down and saw a dark, wet circle expanding across Orion’s shirt . . . She had stabbed him. And then she kept pushing the tip of the blade into him a tiny bit at a time.”
  • Zach’s master abuses him. “Zach crumpled onto his knees, all the air rushing out of his lungs. Automedon had punched him in the gut so fast he’d never seen it coming.”
  • When a child is born with the ability to cause earthquakes, the child is “left on a mountainside to die of exposure to the elements.”
  • Ares tortured Helen. “Ares hit her face again and then stood up so he could kick her in the stomach. The wind came out between the seized-up muscles . . . He kicked her again and again. If she tried to avoid the blows by curling up and turning her back to him, he stomped rather than kicked. She felt her forearm snap and tried to bring her leg up to protect her side, but that only made him attack her more viciously.”
  • Automedon stabs Zach in the chest, killing him.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • The words hell, ass and damn are used frequently.
  • Other profanity is used rarely. The profanity includes crap, bitch, dick, asshole, bastard, son of a bitch, bullshit, and dickhead.

Supernatural 

  • There are Greek gods, demi-gods, and myrmidons in Dreamless. These beings have an assortment of powers, from super-strength to the control of hearts.

Spiritual Content   

  • None

Starcrossed

Helen has always been odd. Her biggest fear growing up was that someone would find out how much of a freak she really was. It’s not until a strange new family moves to her hometown on the island of Nantucket that she begins to realize just how different she is from the average teenager.

When the Delos family arrives, they open Helen’s eyes to another world. One where the ancient Greek stories of Troy, Tartarus, and Mount Olympus are true. Helen is more closely tied to this world than she could ever have dreamed. She is a Scion, a demigod, and with that knowledge comes the awakening of a myriad of powers she must learn to control.

But along with the Delos family arrives a curse. Scions have been tormented by the Furies for millenniums; three sisters who demand a blood debt be paid. This tortuous debt has cost countless lives, divided families, and driven Scions insane. Yet if that debt were to ever be paid in full, it would bring the end of the world.

Starcrossed is a page-turner that creates a world so wonderful one can’t help but wish it was real. Ancient Greek myths mesh with modern times in a delicious way, creating vivid characters and a whirlwind of action.

The Starcrossed series is best suited for more mature readers because the fight scenes add suspense, but also violence and blood.  There are few kisses but a plethora of sexual tension because Helen cannot be with the man she is falling in love with.

Sexual Content

  • While injured, Helen sleeps in the same bed as Lucas. “She gasped involuntarily as one of Lucas’s hands ran up the length of her thigh and latched on to the sloping dip from her hip to her waist. Then she felt him tense, as if he’d just realized that pillows weren’t shaped like hourglasses. His head jerked up and he looked around.”
  • When discussing Lucas with Helen, Kate says, “He’s like . . . wow! I could go to jail for even thinking what I’m thinking . . . But we’re not talking about me. We’re talking about you and Lucas and the importance of condoms.”
  • Creon lusts after Helen. “She was powerful, and yet so unaware of her potential she was nearly helpless. His hands shook at the thought of conquering her.”
  • Helen thinks she accidentally killed a child molester with her lighting. “That creepy guy . . . remember how he kept ‘accidentally’ bumping up against you and stroking your hair?”
  • When Helen is learning jujitsu Hector cracks a joke about Helen’s, “prone body and open legs.” Then Claire teases, “I would have thought it would be harder to get between your legs, but Hector doesn’t seem to be having any trouble at all.”
  • Helen and Lucas experience a lot of sexual longing while trying to stay away from each other. Helen asks Lucas, “Why are you sleeping on my roof and not in my bed?” Later she realizes that “There was a part of Helen that knew exactly how to seduce Lucas whether he wanted to be seduced or not, and that freaked her out.”
  • Helen wears the cestus, a mythical object that protects her. It looks different to everyone, because it turns into what most attracts them. When testing it, Helen “looked at Hector, focusing on him alone, and she felt her necklace change shape in her hand . . . Helen looked down and saw that she was holding a tiny scrap of lace that more closely resembled diamond-encrusted dental floss than underpants.”
  • Helen and Lucas kiss. “Lucas caught her and supported her as they tumbled on the wind, holding and kissing each other as he guided them safely back down to the catwalk.”
  • Lucas and Helen try to find a way to be together without being considered married. Helen suggests, “What if I wasn’t a virgin?” Lucas responds, “We’d be considered a married couple in the eyes of the gods, regardless of who took your virginity.”
  • When Lucas sees Helen in her pajamas he says, “since you apparently sleep in the most ridiculously transparent tank top I’ve ever seen, I’m going to have to ask you to get under the covers before I do something stupid.”

Violence

  • Helen attacks Lucas when she first sees him. “Lucas was holding her by the wrists to keep her hands away from his neck . . . if she could get her fingers half an inch closer, she could reach his throat. And then what? a little voice in her head asked. Choke the life out of him! answered another.”
  • Helen is attacked by a mysterious woman. “A wiry arm wrapped around her neck, simultaneously pulling back and pressing down until Helen fell to her knees . . . white and blue blobs bloomed across her field of vision . . . Helen crooked her arm and rammed her elbow into her attacker’s solar plexus with every bit of juice she had in her tank. She heard the person suck wind and then felt herself get dropped.”
  • Helen gets beat up when trying to learn how to fight. “Helen swallowed a mouthful of spit and blood and instantly regretted it when she choked on one of her own teeth.”
  • A reporter is murdered by a Scion. “She was lovely in terror–a perfect, pleading mast of alabaster white skin . . . Creon wanted to hold her like that for days, but a split second of enjoyment later he heard a snap. Like a switched-off TV, the light in her eyes contracted to pinpricks, and then went completely dark.”
  • It turns out that Helen is impervious to all weapons. “He started hacking away at her. Four strokes in, and the blade was ruined . . . The rain of blows ended abruptly when the sword fell apart.”
  • Creon tries to kill Helen. “He brought it down directly over her heart. Creon’s knife made a dozen pinging noises as it shattered and scattered off her skin . . . Lucas jumped on Creon with a vicious snarl, and the two of them began to fight so fast Helen could barely see their hands move. They punched and grabbed and gouged at each other, both of them changing from claw-handed boxing to some kind of strange wrestling in which they tried to bend each other’s joins in the wrong direction.”
  • Helen’s mother wakes up after being abducted. “There were deep vertical slashes on both her forearms that were still leaking fast-pumping blood even as they healed.”
  • A Scion, “drew a small bronze blade from his belt and slit Pandora’s neck so deeply he nearly cut off her head. She was dead before her blood had a chance to soak into the sand.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Helen’s mom, “Jabbed a needle into [Helen’s] neck . . . Helen felt her muscles go limp and refuse to follow her commands. The world faded into a pale gray haze.”
  • Helen’s mother is drugged with her own syringe.

Language

  • The words hell and ass are used frequently. Such as, “What the hell are you wearing?”
  • Crap and damn are said several times. For instance, when Claire sees Helen fly she says “Oh, damn it. You are a vampire.”
  • Jackass and shit are said once or twice.
  • Helen thinks, “I’m not usually a bitch–I’m just super-grouchy because I’m being stalked by three blood-crying ghosts who won’t let me sleep.”
  • When Helen is learning to fight with Hector, Jason yells, “She’s never fought before, you dickhead!”

Supernatural

  • Many of the characters in the books are demi-gods and have powers such as super-strength, super-speed, lightning bolts, flight, power over water, etc. In the book, “most of the ancient myths and great dramas are based on real people. The gods are real, and they had children with mortals. Half human, half god. We are their descendants. Their Scions.”
  • Scions are plagued by the Furies who force Scions from other houses to attack and try to kill each other. “For the first time in Helen’s life she knew what pure, heart-poisoning hatred was. She was not aware of the fact that she was running toward him, but she could hear the voices of the three sobbing sisters rise into a keening wail . . . The sisters were tearing at their hair until it came out of their scalps in bloody hanks.”
  • When Claire finds out what Helen is, she admits that she, “was a little worried [Helen] might try to drag me off to hell and drain my essence at some point.”
  • Cassandra is the Oracle. “The voices coming out of her were old and young and everything in between, all speaking in harmony . . . Cassandra’s mouth was glowing, and her hair was writhing around her head like snakes.”

Spiritual Content  

  • Helen and Orion spend much of their time in the Underworld, where all spirits go. They meet Hades and Persephone, and the god of death is mentioned.

Passenger

Secrets are kept to protect. Secrets are kept to survive. When Etta is suddenly thrust into another time, she realizes her life has been based on secrets. In an attempt to keep Etta safe, and keep a family heirloom out of the Irnonwood’s hands, Etta’s mother disappeared into the future. Now, if she wants to save her mother and return to her own time, Etta must find the ancient object that has been hidden for so long.

Nicholas has long been the Ironwood’s victim. In an attempt to secure his freedom, he agrees to watch over Etta and ensure that she brings the ancient object to them. Yet when Nicholas and Etta team up, he soon finds himself drawn to Etta.

As Nicolas and Etta work together, they follow clues left behind by Etta’s mother. The clues lead them across time periods and across continents. As they race to meet Ironwood’s deadline, they realize he is not the only one who wants the object. Can the two find the object and keep it out of the grasp of those who would use it to destroy their timeline?

The imagery and dialogue in Passenger jump off the page and engage the reader from the start. Action and suspense begin in the first chapter and lead the reader on an adventure that spans several centuries. For a story that has epic chases and attacks, the violence is not graphic. Although there is blood, the battle scenes are not gory or over the top.

The reader learns about racism through the eyes of Nicolas, as he struggles with being the son of a slave and a white landowner in the southern colonies. The cultures of the past cause interesting conflicts, as Etta’s worldview is based on the present.

Passenger is an excellently written book, with interesting characters, secrets galore, and suspense. However, the ending is set up for a sequel and leaves more questions to be answered. Because none of the book’s questions are answered in this installment, the reader will be left wondering what next?

Sexual Content

  • A few weeks after Etta and her boyfriend break up, she sees him kissing a girl in Central Park.
  • Nicholas explains his parentage. “Nicholas’s mother had been the family’s slave, and Augustus had assaulted her, abused her, and in the end had never freed her.”
  • Cyrus Ironwood tries to blackmail Etta. Cyrus tells her, “he was going to leave me so destitute I was going to have to resort to prostitution.”
  • Etta and Nicholas are attracted to each other. “She traced his face . . . He pressed a hard, almost despairing kiss to [her hand]. But when she tilted her face up, half-desperate with longing, her blood racing, Nicholas pulled back.”
  • Etta and Nicolas kiss several times. “He leaned forward and captured her lips, stealing the kiss himself until she had to come up and gasp for breath. Nicholas pulled her back under, and this time she did let go, only to take his beautiful face in her hands, to let his hands tangle in her hair, around her shoulders . . . he was breathing hard enough that she felt his heart jumping against her ribs, and she knew hers was doing the same. She turned, running her lips along the curve of his ear, her fingers pressed against the solid muscles of his back.”
  • Nicolas looks at Etta and thinks, “Want. His exhaustion had boiled him down to his basest instincts. He wanted her lips, her touch, her esteem, her mind. Inside her. Beside her. With her.”
  • When Etta and Nicolas are put in the same room to sleep, Etta goes to Nicolas’s bed and crawls in with him. “He ducked down kissing her, and she moved against him, urging him to touch her, to find the secret self that only ever seemed to exist with him. Etta felt him come alive in his own skin, felt the sheer stretch of him as he moved over her, with her, and she let herself fall into it, dissolving into him.”

Violence

  • Etta’s mother is kidnapped and her family Alice is killed. “Blood sputtered from her chest, fanned out against Etta’s hands as she pressed them against the wound . . . Her next breath came raggedly, and the next one never came at all.”
  • Etta wakes up on a ship that is under attack. During the attack, several people die. One crew member falls, “his chest shredded by balls of lead, his face a death mask of outraged disbelief.” During the fight, Etta stumbles over a dying man. “He wasn’t moving. He wasn’t blinking. She looked down, mind blank as it took in the dark liquid coating her skin, her chest, her stomach, the dress. Blood. Her snowy white skirt was drenched with thick crimson blood. She was crawling through that man’s blood.”
  • Etta and Nicholas are chased by three men. “A pair of hands scooped Etta up by the elbows, hauling her back before she could get her feet beneath her. The smell of cologne and sweat flooded her nose, and she threw her head back, trying to hit some soft, fleshy part of him.”
  • A man shoots at Etta. “The bullet went wide, striking the brick wall behind them. A splatter of dust and debris exploded into her hair, scratching the back of her neck.”
  • In the jungle, Etta almost steps on a cobra. Nicholas shoots it, but the bullet also grazes Etta.
  • Etta and Nicolas are again chased by men. Etta shoots at them, and they scatter.
  • Someone tries to capture Etta. The attack is described over several pages. During the attack, Nicolas is shot. “She reached out, one hand gripping his arm to steady him, the other going to his side—where a large, wet patch of violently crimson blood was spreading.”
  • In a final confrontation, a man holds a knife against Etta’s throat and later is shot in the shoulder. Etta and Nicolas are left in a desert to die.
  • At the end of the story, one of the characters is found. “The face was unrecognizable, swollen and purple as a ripe plum. She’d been stripped bare to her waist, and three jagged stab wounds to the torso looked to be bleeding through the earthy salve and bandages covering them. A thin blanket had been draped over her supine form to protect her modesty.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • Damn and hell are used frequently.
  • Bastard is used in a couple of instances. “Despite the wash of blood at his feet and the bodies strewn around him, his features went as soft as a kitten’s. The old bastard couldn’t help himself in the presence of young ladies, especially those in need of rescue. . .”
  • Nicolas says “bloody hell” a few times.
  • During a battle, one man is killed. His dying words are, “Sent . . . down . . . to . . . devil . . . by-by-a-a shit-sack . . . negro.”
  • Nicolas explains about time travel. “Christ. . . The first time I traveled, I attacked an automobile with an umbrella and nearly pissed myself in terror.”
  • “Oh my God” is used several times.
  • When Nicolas thinks, “And holy God, when she looked at him the ways she did now . . . he felt like he’d stepped into the blue-white heart of a flame.”

Supernatural

  • Several of the characters are able to use portals to time travel.

Spiritual Content

  • One of the characters describes his parents’ relationship. “Abbi and Ummi were not married—they could not be traditionally bound. It is forbidden for a woman of my faith to marry a man who is not. But Allah in all his wisdom still brought them together. . . It is blasphemous, I know; it goes against our teachings and beliefs, but I accept their choices. I cherish them in my heart. I cannot help but think, it matters not who you love, but only the quality of such a love.”

Prince of Shadows

Prince of Shadows puts a fresh twist on the story of Romeo and Juliet. Instead of focusing on the two original star-crossed lovers, Prince of Shadows focuses on Benvolio and Rosaline. Many of the scenes follow the play Romeo and Juliet. In several scenes, the words of the characters also come from the play; however, the author put the words into a new context which adds interest to the story.

Benvolio is trying to keep Romeo from an irrational and dangerous love for Rosaline. However, in doing so Benvolio finds that he is drawn to Rosaline, the beautiful niece of Lord Capulet. This complicates Benvolio’s life in several ways. Now Benvolio must not only concern himself with keeping Romeo safe from the Capulets, but he must also make sure that Rosaline does not come to any harm because of Romeo’s infatuation.

Romeo’s problems are only part of Benvolio’s difficulties. He must also deal with a demanding sister, a conniving grandmother, and hiding the fact that he is a thief. When night falls, the reader often sees Benvolio sneak into other people’s houses to exact revenge by stealing their possessions.

This book also explores Mercutio in more detail. Mercutio is full of fire, wit, and love. Yet Mercutio’s love is dangerous because he happens to be in love with another man. Although Benvolio and Romeo know of Mercutio’s “sinful” love, they are loyal to their friend.

Sword fighting, thievery and intrigue are abundant in Prince of Shadows. The fighting scenes add danger, but they also include descriptions of bloody wounds, as well as death. The fighting between the Capulets and Montagues happens often and is a major plot component of the story, and in another scene a character is hung because he is homosexual. These scenes are described in detail, so this book may not be appropriate for squeamish readers.

The story also contains a lot of sexual content. It explores the topic of marriage during the time period, as well as the prevailing beliefs of homosexuality. Because of the sexual content and the violence, Prince of Shadows should only be read by the mature reader. Although the storyline is intriguing and the book is fast-paced and entertaining, the subject matter is not suitable for the younger reader.

Sexual Content

  • The Prince of Shadows steals from Tybalt and then, “The next day, Tybalt Capulet’s sword was found driven an inch deep into the heavy oak of a tavern door. Pinned to it were ribald verses that detailed a highly entertaining story about Tybalt, a pig, and acts not generally condoned by either the Church or right-thinking sheepherders.”
  • Benvolio’s sister, Veronica is upset that she is being married to an old man. She is hiding from her grandmother because “she wishes to instruct me on the nature of wifely duties.” Benvolio replies, “Shall I go tell her you need no instruction on wifely duties?” Veronica slaps him and he continues, “I won’t pretend you are pure as the Virgin if you won’t pretend to care.” During the conversation Veronica said, “You’ll not be the one he’ll paw in the marriage bed . . . or perhaps you’d prefer that, Ben. Given the company you keep—.”
  • Benvolio found out that Mercutio was a homosexual by chance. “Walking in on Mercutio in close embrace with a pretty young man a bit older than either of us. I’d heard of such things, of course, but never seen, and I confess to a certain unsettled embarrassment that drove me from them—from Mercutio—for most of a week. . .”
  • Benvolio meets a girl for the first time. Before she leaves he, “bent over her knuckles and brushed my lips lightly over the skin. I kept my gaze on her as I did it, and saw the response in her. It frightened her, I saw; she might never have felt such a thing before.”
  • The Prince of Shadows breaks into a house and is surprised to find a girl in bed. “She mimed back a throat cutting, then looked at her bed companion. I admit, by that time I had begun to realize that the sheet did not by any means cover all of her, and though the darkness made it more of a suggestion of assets than a true sight of them, the room was suddenly a good deal too warm…I closed her fingers over them (coins) before lifting her hand to drop a kiss on the rough skin of her knuckles…then she sat up and…kissed me. It was surprising, and I should have pulled away for many reasons, not the least of which was my own self-preservation, but there was something darkly wonderful about the danger of it . . . for a moment I entertained a feral thought that perhaps he might now wake. . . ” Later he tells his friend about the encounter and said the girl was naked, “as sinful Eve . . . and quite a willing mouth on her, too.”
  • After Mercutio is forced to marry, he writes in his diary, “It is a bitter bed we make, and after, she weeps herself to sleep. I tell her that once she bears a living heir she can be shut of me…Men say that love is cruel, but it is the lack of it in the act that is cruelest.”
  • While Benvolio is with Rosaline, he thinks, “I wanted her, a Capulet, in ways that I had never wanted a woman before—not a hasty, impersonal fumbling in the dark, not the duty of a cold husband with an unfamiliar wife . . . something else, for the sake of passion, and fire, and challenge.”
  • When Romeo is looking for Rosaline, Mercutio asks, “So eager to deflower the girl? ‘Tis the job your grandmother set you, or missed you her message? Humiliate Capulet by showing that their precious convent-bound virgin is a trull.”
  • Benvolio thinks about Mercutio’s marriage and how “girls of means were sold or bartered.” Mercutio’s father would make sure Mercutio was married. Benvolio thinks, “I did not like to think on that unhappy wedding night. If it was consummated at all, it would be done coldly and ruthlessly.”
  • Benvolio was talking to Rosaline when his hand, “moved from her wrist, glided up her arm, and now it touched her cheek . . . I felt drugged with the tingles of pleasure of my skin on hers…My fingers trailed down, tracked the tight line of her jaw, and I felt the fast beat of her pulse.” Rosaline then backs away. Later during the conversation, Benvolio wonders, “would she resist me if I took hold of her, kissed her, bore her back to that curtained mattress? Would she cry for help, or would she sigh my name, rise to meet me, crave the same senseless release that I did?”

Violence

  • In one scene, Benvolio thinks about a bedtime story about a Capulet named Sophia. “The gruesome horror of being bricked up in a lavishly appointed room, with only a pitcher of water and a dagger for company. Once the water had gone, Sophia more than likely would have sought the dagger’s point for her final comfort . . .”
  • When Veronica threatens to hint that Benvolio is a homosexual, he reminds her about the boy, “they hanged last winter. Claiming someone a sodomite is no joking matter.”
  • When Benvolio sneaks into Rosaline’s room he thinks she is asleep, but then he, “felt the ice-cold prickle of a blade on the back of my neck.” Rosaline tells Benvolio must leave, but before he can Tybalt hears them talking and advances on her. Tybalt grabs her arm and twists it until she cries out. When she refuses to answer Tybalt’s questions that, “earned her an openhanded slap hard enough to leave a blood red imprint on her fair skin.” Later than evening Benvolio (in disguise) and Friar Lawrence go to check on Rosaline and find her, “wedged into a cold corner, knees drawn up, nightgown bloodied from her split lip and the open cut on her forehead. It would take time for the bruises to form, but her left eye was already swollen, and the right side of her jaw distorted from the beating she’d received. She held her right arm tenderly, and I saw the bloody scrapes on her knuckles.”
  • Rosaline writes about the abuse of Tybalt. “Of late, I have begun to fight back, since I had come into a height where it was possible—though strictly forbidden—to do so. I had scored him with my nails more than once, and even bruised him, but never did I hurt him enough to matter.”
  • There is a sword fight between a “Capulet pig” and Benvolio. In the end, “the sword plunged easily just below the ridge of his collarbone, angling down as the dagger found ribs and angled up . . . The two points almost meet at his heart . . . So I waited until the life had left the man’s eyes and he fell to the cobblestones, kicked his Capulet-given sword to the side, and turned just as the second man drove Bathasar back at the point of his blade.”
  • There is a sword fight between Tybalt and Benvolio. Several others join the fray. Benvolio thinks, “I wanted his blood, badly as he wanted mine.” The fight is interrupted by the elder Capulet and Montague and no one is injured.
  • Mercutio’s lover is, “on his knees, with his hands bound roughly behind his back, and a circle of armed men surrounded him.” Mercutio’s father then proceeds to beat him. “I was not sure if he could see through the torrents of blood that obscured his face.” Mercutio’s father then makes sure Mercutio watches his lover be hung from a tree. “Though his toes kicked just a few inches above the ground, it was enough . . . It took a horribly long time to be finished.”
  • Benvolio reflects on the above incident, thinking, “I thought I’d known the depths of cruelty men hide, but this . . . this was another thing entirely. I’d known all our lives that we were fragile, easily punctured flesh, but seeing the boy choke on that noose, seeing the laughter and jeers from those who’d killed him . . . hearing the thumps as rocks pelted his dying body . . . had shattered something within me . . .”
  • When Benvolio overhears his sister gossiping about Mercutio’s lover, he grabs “her by the back of the neck and dragged her squealing around the corner.” They argue and he lets her go.
  • Mercutio has a fight in a tavern. “He was spattered with fresh red, and his dagger ran with it, and the floor was thick with writhing, groaning men.”
  • Benvolio is in a sword fight and his, “blade slipped easily in, though, and I cut sideways to open the vessels. Blood gushed like a fountain, sheeting gory down his hose, and he let out a short, sharp cry as he fell to his uninjured knee. It was a killing wound, and he knew it instantly.”
  • Another sword fight happens, and Tybalt kills Mercutio. Tybalt, “yanked his blade free of my friend’s ribs. It slid out with a terrible sound, steel grating bone, and the blood that spouted out was the exact shade of Capulet livery…my ears seemed tuned only to the sound of Mercutio’s tortured, hitching breaths, and the pulse of his blood flowing to the stones.”
  • Romeo, Tybalt, Benvolio, and others get into a sword fight. Several people are killed. Benvolio, “stabbed him in the throat and ended him.” In the same fight, Romeo stabs Tybalt. “For an instant, the cut looked small, but then it parted, and the blood, oh, the blood. He fell into the arms of his adherents, thrashing in his death agonies.”
  • In another scene the Capulets and Montagues fight, which takes place over several pages. “The cobbles were already wet with blood, and bodies fell to my left under a strong assault . . . my sword slid between his ribs and out his heart, and he was down, grimacing now.” During this fight, Veronica is killed and the boy who killed her is dragged away to be hung.
  • When a priest discovers Benvolio is the Prince of Shadows, the priest gave, “a blow with his closed fist . . . his servants, as expected, took this as a sign, and instead of ripping away my mask, they closed in, fists flying as they screamed curses upon me for my insolence. I hunched in to try to ride the blows, but soon I was on my side, and the rope had been pulled tight. Air had become a frantic struggle, and I was all but senseless when I felt fingers tugging at the silk knotted around my face. It was wet with blood . . .” By the time the mask is pulled away, Benvolio’s face is so bloody and swollen that he is unrecognizable.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • The characters in the book are often seen drinking and in a state of drunkenness. For example, on the first page of the book Tybalt is described as, “a drunken, undignified mess in sodden linen.” Later on in the story, Benvolio, “quaffed my wine in a choking gulp.”
  • There are several references to drunkenness. In one scene, Rosaline said, “I dismissed the tales of you as drunkard’s gossip.” In another scene, Benvolio, “stumbled to a halt, as unsteady as if I’d been into Tybalt’s wine cellar instead of his apartments.”
  • Benvolio asks the friar, “Have you been into the sacramental wine again, Friar Lawrence?” Benvolio thinks, “It was obvious indeed from the eloquence of his breath.”

Language

  • In a conversation about the Prince’s new mistress, the mistress is described as, “a woman no better than a whore.” Later in that same conversation, Benvolio’s grandmother said, “It isn’t healthy for a strapping young man to be introduced to whores at your age, before you’ve even settled on a wife.”
  • Trying to start a fight, a man calls Benvolio a, “Mongrel son of an English bitch.”

Supernatural

  • There is a “witch” who Mercutio’s wife seeks out, hoping for a potion that will help her get pregnant. Later, Mercutio sees the same witch who helps him curse those who betrayed him.
  • When Benvolio tracks down the witch, she explains the spell she gave Mercutio was made of three parts— “one faith, one mind, one flesh.” Part of the spell was cast by writing on Mercutio’s skin. “For the mind, it wrote down in his own hand . . . The other . . . the other was cast upon rosary beads.”
  • At the end of the story, the curse affects Benvolio and Rosaline. Because of the curse, they seek “comfort in each other’s bodies, heedless of consequences.” They fight to ensure they do not fall to the curse’s allure. In the end, Benvolio has to destroy the rosary that has been cursed. In order to do this Benvolio must, “thrust my whole hand into the flames. /The agony hit in an instant…I heard flesh sizzle.”
  • Mercutio and Romeo appear as ghosts at the end of the story.

Spiritual Content

  • Benvolio’s grandmother said it is good that he will be married soon because, “all men’s blood runs too hot, and the apostle said that it is better to marry than to burn.”
  • Mercutio is secretly in love. His love is, “not simply unwise, but reckoned unnatural by Church and law alike.”
  • Friar Lawrence questions Lady Capulet about Rosaline’s injures asking if violence was necessary. Lady Capulet said, “The scriptures tell us that a disobedient child should be corrected; is it not so?” Later in the chapter, Friar Lawrence said, “You were right to fear for her, but with God’s grace we may have saved her life. Her lady aunt will not wish to have Rosaline murdered this night; they might be within their right to so dispose of a rebellious girl-child, but they have not the liver for questions the Church must bring.”
  • Benvolio prays to the beloved Virgin, “for patience, guidance, and most of all, for my cousin to stop loving Rosaline Capulet.”
  • Benvolio goes to church looking for someone, “in the confessional…but I found that it must have been a busy morning for sinning. At least ten aspired to cleanse their souls before me.”
  • When Benvolio finds out that his sister has betrayed Mercutio’s secret, he thinks, “God does answer all prayers, but sometimes, he answers with a cold and remorseless denial…”
  • After Mercutio’s father beats him, no one is allowed to tend to Mercutio’s wounds. The next day, his father said, “You live to see the dawn, then. It is a sign from God that even He does not want you…Give up your sinful perversions, and embrace a life of piety and duty to your family.”
  • In reference to Mercutio, a character said, “I believe God loves all, sinners and saints, and judgment is His business, not mine.”
  • Benvolio’s sister, Veronica, writes in her diary that, “God wills that these vile, unnatural sinners [homosexuals] be condemned and cast out, and whatever Benvolio believes (heretic that he is), I believe that I did God’s business in whispering of the assignation—still best to blame fall on the Capulet whore, for safety’s sake, for Mercutio makes a bad enemy.”
  • Friar Lawrence marries Romeo and Juliet because, “their love was so strong that if I had refused to bless it, it would have been done without God’s seal; there is no doubt of it. Would you have me step aside and allow the sin instead?”
  • When Benvolio discusses Mercutio’s homosexuality, he says Mercutio, “was as he was formed, as God made him.”

Terrier

Beka lives in the Lower City, the roughest part of Corus. She is a Puppy, training to be one of the Dogs, those who police the streets and try to keep the Rats from causing too much hurt. The job is a deadly one and undesirable to most. But being a Dog is in Beka’s blood, and she will do everything in her power to protect the people of the Lower City–her people.

Terrier is the beginning of a trilogy, but each book is self-sufficient. This series is not like Pierce’s other books. It is an excellent and entertaining story, with heaps of action and convoluted plots that will reveal an unexpected ending. However, this series is meant for a more mature audience than the majority of Pierce’s novels. There is a decent amount of profanity as well as more sexual content. As Beka is a guardswoman, the majority of her job involves her capturing and fighting with criminals. While the fights and sexual content are not graphically described, they are plentiful.

Sexual Content

  • Beka sees a woman and notes that “there was a twitch to her hips. I’d wager she’d give her husband an extra-warm night, thinking of the tall Dog who had flirted with her.”
  • Beka calls her breasts peaches. When describing herself, she says, “My peaches are well enough. Doubtless they would be larger if I put on more pounds, but as I have no sweetheart and am not wishful of one for now, my peaches are fine as they are.”
  • There is a mage who works at the Kennel, who has “roaming hands, with their pinching and stroking fingers . . . Quick as a snake, Fulk grabbed my wrist. He smiled into my eyes, his fingers rubbing my arm.”
  • Beka accidentally lets her neighbor see her half-dressed. “I blinked at Rosto. Trouble has just moved in, I thought. Then I remembered I stood there in no more than breastband and breeches. I shrieked and slammed my door.”
  • Beka sees a male prostitute. “He beckoned to me, flexing hard chest muscles. I looked away. It was a very tight loincloth.”
  • Rostro has two girls he is intimate with at one point, which Beka and Ersken discuss briefly. “‘And he’s got Aniki or Kora.’ ‘I’d say both.’ ‘That’s his business, Ersken.'”
  • While Beka says she will never get involved with Rosto, she admits, “He makes my skin, my peaches, and my other parts tingle in an agreeable way. Naught will come of it.”
  • Beka goes to a tavern while pursuing a case. “That same knight beckoned to a serving maid as the two noblemen seated themselves. She thrust the neck of her dress lower, when it already did little enough to cover her peaches.” Later some men “made a game of looking under tables, benches, and the mots’ skirts. More than a few earned cuffs and boxed ears from the mots who objected.”
  • A knight notices a prostitute at a tavern. “The wench who’d gotten his attention was one of the higher-priced doxies there, wearing a dress and earrings that did not come from Cheappretty Row.” His friend says he “is all kinds of fat in the purse, and he loves to pay double when he’s happy.”
  • Beka finds her neighbor in “only her shift, though the day was cool and rainy. Moreover, I saw Ersken pulling on his breeches behind her . . . ‘I’m my own mot and can say who shares my bed,’ Kora told me. ‘Rosto knows.’ She smiled. ‘We’re still friends, just not bed friends.'”
  • Goodwin finds a coil of wire hidden in a codpiece. “She reached around the rusher and grabbed his metal codpiece. “‘Oh, sweet one,’ the cove said with a moan, ‘my lovey, my–’ ‘Shut up.’ Goodwin yanked the codpiece hard.”
  • A criminal tells Tunstall, “Pox on yer privates if ye think I’ve a word for ye.”
  • Kora kisses her boyfriend. “Then she kissed him again for a goodlytime. I grabbed the ham, as it seemed they would be occupied for a while.”
  • Rosto kisses Beka. He “grabbed me by the back of the neck, and kissed me on the mouth. I should have punched him, but his mouth was sweet and soft. I will punch him next time.”

 

Violence

  • Goodwin is attacked while trying to make an arrest. “Orva struck backhand, her fist turned sideways. She caught Goodwin with the butt of the hilt square on the hinge of the jaw. Goodwin dropped, her eyes rolled up in her head.”
  • Goodwin tells Beka they can’t catch every Rat. “Do you know how many robberies there are in a day in the Lower City, how many burglaries, how many purse cuttings, rapes, brawls . . . Do you know how many mothers drown newborns and tots in privies or rain barrels? How many fathers and uncles toss them into the rear yard with broken skulls?”
  • Beka has to break up a tavern brawl while on duty. “Someone pushed me against a table. I smashed him across the head hard, then shoved him behind me. I heard him smack into furniture . . . I finally remembered Ahuda’s teaching and fought my way to a wall.”
  • Beka and her partners break up a fight. “He roared and charged Tunstall, head down. Tunstall turned to the side and swung up his bent knee. He caught the charging Parks brother on the chin . . . He never saw me smack his wrist with my baton. When he dropped the weapon, he bent to grab it. I hit him on the spine, praying I hadn’t done it too hard.”
  • The Rogue mentions he will give his guards “a choice between death and life as a maimed beggar” after they failed him.
  • Beka sees a woman being abused by her brother. “He knocked her sideways, sending her sprawling on the floor. Now I knew where her bruises came from.” Beka stops him from hitting her, too. “I blocked his swing with my forearm, though it jarred my teeth. While he gaped, I grabbed that wrist with my free left hand and yanked him toward me over the counter . . . When he grabbed at me with his free hand, I seized it and twisted so he’d stop thrashing.”
  • A woman confesses that “I tried to get my man to move in . . . but he wouldn’t allow for it. Said he wasn’t meant to live with little ones. So one night I took the blanket and I put it over my boy’s face until he stopped breathin’.”
  • Beka and her team stop a robbery. “I scooped my own kick forward and up, between his legs, and slammed a metal codpiece with my foot. Had it been solid metal, not pieces, I might’ve hurt myself. Instead it gave way under my kick. The rusher groaned, his eyes rolling up in his head. I hadn’t seen him draw a dagger with his free hand. It slid just past my right side, slicing my loose tunic and shirt.”
  • When Beka deals with a criminal, “He slapped me. I didn’t try to stop him this time. I wasn’t sure I would break his arm. I had to be better than him.” The criminal tells her, “I’ll see you raped and your body left in a midden, your throat cut in two.”
  • Beka and a team of Dogs storm a house. “The cove didn’t even see Goodwin lunge in under his strike. She struck him full in the belly with her baton. He doubled over, retching. She knocked him out.”
  • Beka and her Dogs find multiple mass graves. “Half of the cellar was under a huge mound of dirt. I gagged. The smell was dreadful, like a Cesspool butcher’s dump in the summer heat . . . We worked gently, fearing what we might hit. I’d just felt the tip of my shovel touch sommat when we heard wings in that hot space . . . We found eight dead there.”
  • When Beka and her Dogs corner a criminal, “He thrust the dagger into his throat under his jaw. He did it before we could move, and no amount of healing could have saved him. He bled to death fast, making a frightful mess.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Tunstall goes out to dinner with some other adults. “So the wine was flowing well, and there was brandy after supper.”
  • While Beka does not usually partake, her partners and friends often drink ale with their suppers.
  • Beka writes once, “I fere I broke my rule and Dranke more wine thann I shud.”
  • A Puppy dies, and it is said that one of her trainers was drunk on duty when it happened.

Language

  • The words “piss,” “piddle,” and “scummer” are used often.
  • Insults such as “pig scummer,” “cracknob” and other impolite, but not profane, words are used. Beka calls a group of lazy Dogs, “scummernobs.” When particularly angry, she once says “pox-rotted pus-leaking mumper bags.”
  • Beka tells her friend that she is “making an ass of yourself.”
  • A violent woman that Beka arrested shouts at her. “You bitch! . . . You puttock, you trollop, you trull . . . I’ll cut your liver out, you poxied leech! Why wouldn’t you let me go! You ruined my life!”
  • The words “bitch” and “bastard” are used a few times. A criminal calls Goodwin a “mangy bitch,” and Beka thinks “I needed to catch up with the old bastard” when she’s following a criminal.
  • A criminal calls her daughter a “slut.”

Supernatural

  • Beka has a magical cat. ” ‘We’re not even sure he’s a cat,’ Tunstall muttered to Goodwin. ‘I say he’s a god shape-changed.’ Pounce meowed, Do I look as stupid as a god to you?
  • Beka has the magical Gift. Many people have this magic, which can be used for fighting, controlling the weather, or healing. Beka’s brand of magic lets her hear voices picked up by wind spinners, and allows her to hear unhappy spirits that are carried on the backs of pigeons before they go to the Black God’s realm.
  • Beka helps a mother speak to her son and aid him in crossing over. “‘Sweetheart, of course the Black God has birds,’ Tansy whispered, straightening. ‘Beautiful ones. But you won’t see them if you stay where it’s dark. You have to go to the Peaceful Realms.'”

Spiritual Content

  • There are many gods in Tortall, such as the Crooked God, Mithros and the Black God. Different people honor different gods. Their names are often invoked in daily conversation as exclamations of surprise or relief. One woman, when exhausted, exclaims “Thank the Goddess . . . I’m weary to death!” When Beka brings in a Rat, Ahuda exclaims, “Great Mithros bless us, you actually caught “
  • Goodwin tells Beka to toughen up “before you jump into the Olorun or slice your wrists. We lose five Dogs a year to the Black God’s Option. Don’t you be one.”
  • Farewells sometimes have the name of the gods in them. ” ‘Mithros and the Crone watch over you.’ I curtsied as he went inside. ‘Gods all bless and keep you, my lord.’ I whispered.”
  • A friend of Beka’s deceased mother asks if she “burn(s) the incense for Ilony’s ghost?” Beka says she does.

by Morgan Lynn

 

Mastiff

Pierce once again expands Beka’s world by bringing her into the exclusive circle of royalty. Caught up in intrigues and politics, the royal family experiences a tragedy of unparalleled circumstances and reaches out to Beka for help. Along with Tunstall and Achoo, the weight of the realm is on Beka’s shoulders. Struggling against enraged mages and ambitious nobles, Beka and her team are all that might prevent the end of Tortall. While success may save the kingdom, it will cost Beka more than she could imagine.

Mastiff leaps into an interesting scenario, dropping hints about Beka’s personal life that will intrigue readers. Achoo is a sweet hound and Pounce, a talking cat, is delightfully sassy. However, what starts off as an interesting and exciting story quickly lapses into a long journey, with little to break up the monotony. While the middle of the book has readers turning pages out of loyalty to Beka, and little else, the final chapters arrive with a startling twist and heartwarming ending.

Sexual Content

  • Beka “went to him and kissed his cheek. ‘Thank you, Rosto. You’re a good friend.’”
  • When Beka meets the king, “all I could think as I stood there was the jokes from the days before his second marriage. ‘Randy Roger,’ ‘Roger the Rigid,’ stories of merchants’ daughters, soldiers’ daughters, noble daughters . . . Sabine, had earned herself a spell of patrol in the gods-forsaken eastern hills when she offered her king physical violence if he didn’t keep his hands to himself.”
  • Farmer complains that Iceblade only “talk(s) about his skill as a lover and his last woman. Beka overhears Iceblade talking about a woman with, “‘—nice, firm peaches,’ Iceblade was saying, his hands shaping the womanfruit he meant. ‘No pestiferous husband in the way, either.’”
  • A servant says she is safe from reprimand because “Master Niccols has taken his pleasures in my bed.”
  • After joining the Hunt, Lady Sabine talks to some silly noblewomen, who think her “travels with the three of you . . . though gods forbid they would say it! –are one long orgy.”
  • Beka mentions her ex-fiancé. “The best thing about Holborn was our time in bed. I missed the bedding, though not the man, and I deeply envied Sabine and Tunstall that night.
  • Farmer kisses Beka. “He caught me by surprise when he leaned down and kissed me softly. His lips parted from mine gently, he stroked a lock of my hair away from my face.”
  • When Farmer sees Beka dressed in a long shirt but no pants, he says, “It’s just that I’ve, I’ve never, well, you look different. Good. Very good.”
  • An evil mage says, “Sabine’s just a crude brawler, mad for sex and fighting.”
  • After being captured, Beka and Farmer admit they love each other, and kiss several times after that. “This time he held me carefully while kissing me in a most satisfying way . . . he sat on a bench and pulled me onto his lap. Then, with most of him around me, and me around a good bit of him, I was content to hold him.”
  • When Beka won’t stop laughing, “Farmer resorted to wanton kissing. That worked. I am much in favor of wanton kissing and other things.”
  • Farmer hides a ribbon that holds magic in his bum. When captured, he asks Beka, “Did they look in your bum, or in your coyne? . . . you could have a weapon in either place. A strangling cord at the very least.” Beka doesn’t watch as he removes the object from his bum.

Violence

  • Beka is slapped by a mother that blames her son’s death on Beka’s involvement with him. “I saw her slap coming, but I did naught to stop it. Only when she went for a second blow did I grab her wrist. ‘You cold, Cesspit trull!’ she screamed. ‘My poor lad was forever trying to impress you. He wouldn’t be here if he hadn’t been trying to prove himself as good as you.’ ”
  • Beka rides to a palace after there has been an attack. “Bodies lay among the flowers. Here were the missing Palace Guards, as well as men of the King’s Own, and the Black God knew how many servants, all burned, sword-hacked, or stabbed.”
  • The kidnapped prince is disguised as a slave and travels with a slave train. In Tortall, it is legal to own and sell slaves.
  • Beka finds a Dog that has been murdered. “The Dog lay half in the water, half out, just ten feet from the road. Animals had been at her legs. When we pulled her from the water, we saw fishes had been at the rest of her.”
  • Beka and her team discover a grave. Farmer digs the bodies up with magic, to discover what killed them. “With the other hand, he beckoned the dead forward. When they were but a foot away, he gently let them settle on the grass . . . The worms and beetles had been at them already. They were black and swollen with rot, their scant ragged clothes cutting into their flesh.”
  • Beka finds a young slave girl who was strangled. “The gixie Linnet was sprawled naked atop heaped slops from the kitchens. Her face was purple and swollen . . . I used my fingertips to push her up on her side. The blood in her body had flowed down into her back and bum, pooling there, turning that part of her skin purple.”
  • Beka and her friends are attacked. “I screamed as one hacked at Achoo. She danced out of the way and leaped for his throat, snarling. Pounce went for the eyes of the cove beside that one . . . A Rat came at me on my right. I swung my baton hard into his knees, hearing bone shatter as he pitched face-first toward the fire. He threw himself to the side, away from the flames, but didn’t remember I was still there with my dagger. I killed him and hunkered by his corpse, keeping low.”
  • Beka kills a mage who is trying to kill Farmer. “I reached the road just as lightning struck the ground in front of Farmer . . . I looked for the solid form inside the wavering illusion and struck as hard as I could . . . The image vanished. The mage lay in the road, a dent in her head from my blow.”
  • An inn catches on fire. “I could hear no voices, but I saw a burning body fallen on the steps . . . Three people stood by the well . . . their magics combined to draw up water into a great snakelike column that rose all the way to the attic.”
  • Achoo finds a pile of dead bodies. “Her face was bloated and black from the time she had lain here in the sun. She crawled with maggots. They all did.”
  • An evil mage insinuates that Beka slept with her foster father. “[Lady Teodorie] never struck me as the sort to let her man keep his child mistress under her roof.” Beka spits on him. The man then “slapped me hard, rocking my head back on my neck.”
  • Sabine slaps her cousin when she realizes she was involved in a plot to kill the King. “Sabine strode up to her and slapped her across the face. Nomalla let her do it, to my shock.”
  • Tunstall and Beka get in a fight. “I drew a long, flat knife from my arm guard and shoved the blade clean through the heavy muscle of his left forearm. Gritting my teeth, I wrenched it all the way around . . . he grabbed my braid at the end this time. I lifted myself as high as I could go, raising my arms as I gripped my baton two-handed. With all my strength I slammed my lead-cored baton down on Tunstall’s oft-broken knees.”
  • When his plot for power fails, “[Thanen] leaped from the tallest height in the castle. The coward left his family and remaining allies to face the royal courts.”
  • There are many executions after the plot to take over the throne is revealed. “When the day was done and the dead were left swinging or smoking, depending upon the magistrates’ judgment . . . since Prince Baird had not led the conspiracy based on the evidence, he would not be forced to endure being hanged, drawn, and quartered, as the other nobles had. Once it was done, his head was placed over the main palace gat as a warning to others with ambition.”

 

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Beka gives the queen a bit of wine to calm her after she suffers a fright.
  • Beka will consume alcohol on occasion, but she turns it down most of the time. “Tunstall offered me the small bottle of mead he always carries in case someone needs warming up, but I shook my head. I don’t like to drink at all when I’m on duty, even when it might warm me.” Another time, Beka “decided the wine was light enough that a cup wouldn’t addle me too badly, if I had some of the bread and cheese first.”
  • Farmer checks some water for sickness and poison. Beka is grateful and thinks, “I would have hated to slow us down while I shit my tripes out because someone had dumped offal upstream—or while I died of poison or spells.”
  • Beka drinks a bit while undercover. She “took a seemingly deep drink from my tankard. It was filled with strong ale. I sipped and let the rest stay where it was. The last thing I needed tonight was a gut full of spirits.”

Language

  •  “Piss” and “scummer” are used often, typically in regards to the smells that Beka’s hound can track, but occasionally they are used as profanity as well. “Just now I felt like an unmade bed, while the sky continued to piss on me.”
  • Phrases and words such as “cracknob,” “cracked mumper,” “doxy,” “guttersnipe,” and “pox rot it” are used often.
  • “Ass” and “arse” are used often. Tunstall says, “We’re wasting time here, standing about with our thumbs up our asses.” Beka once says, “Craven canker-licking sarden arseworms,” when she discovers the kidnappers have burned a bridge so she can’t follow.
  • “Bastard” is said a few times. Achoo is called a bastard dog, and a ghost tells Beka, “Well, he’ll soon learn I won’t do as some randy bastard with a title bids. He’ll rue the day he crossed by friends and me!”
  • When Beka is strict, a man says, “I bet she sets the Corus Rats to kissing the mules’ arses . . . Stricter than their old mams!”
  • “Bitch” is said once, when a mage tells Beka, “We were only a day behind you, stupid bitch, riding hard. We passed you by night.”

Supernatural

  • Some people in Beka’s world have the Magical Gift, as it is called. This varies widely, and can be used from anything from healing and fighting to predicting or controlling the weather. A pair of mages manages to raise two sunken ships from the bottom of the sea after another mage senses them and projects an image of the ships above the water. “Two ships drawn in fire floated over the middle of the cove.”
  • Beka travels with a mage who calls himself Farmer. He is a powerful mage, who practices magic often. Sometimes his magic isn’t visible; sometimes it is very flashy. Once he sets a trap for another mage. “The blue sheath that covered him sent power flowing out over the little river to its opposite bank. An image formed over the water, bright against the dark and the magic. It was that of a woman in dull olive silk . . . The mixed-color fires rose from the river and flowed into the image of the Viper, swirling around until they swallowed her.”
  • Beka and some companions travel “under magical sleep, trapped onto their bunks to keep from flying off of them” because the ship is blow by mage-winds and are so fast “they don’t sail over the waves, they bounce off of them.”
  • Beka has a magicked mirror that “seemed to show me all manner of magics, whatever they were for and no matter what their strength.”
  • Beka’s cat is a constellation visiting the human world. After a nasty sea voyage, the cat says “I went to the Realms of the Gods once Achoo was under the sleep spell . . . Why should I remain for such an abysmal voyage if I don’t have to?” The constellation is not supposed to meddle in the human world, so he does so at the risk of angering the gods.
  • Beka can hear unhappy souls that ride on pidgeonbacks until they go to meet the Black God in his realm. As such, Beka is considered to be in the Black God’s service, and she often says prayers for the dead. “I closed the big cove’s open eyes with my fingers and set two copers from my purse on them . . . ‘Black God take you gentle, brave defender,’ I whispered. ‘The living will carry your duty now. Find the Peaceful Realms and rest.’ ”
  • An evil mage melts people who get in her way. “We both raised our lamps so we could better see the nastiness that was before us. It was a great soup that lay on the grass, trickling slowly into the river. I stared at it, fascinated. I recognized pieces of metal from horses’ tack, metal amulets and jewelry, and swords and daggers, but naught that was leather, cloth, or skin.”
  • Pounce steps in to stop Achoo from dying, even though he knows the gods will be angry. “Pounce set a forepaw on Achoo’s bleeding wound. Achoo shuddered all over and whined, but held still. Pounce kept his paw there a moment longer, then took it away . . . The wound closed and shrank, until it looked like an old scar.”

Spiritual Content

  • There are many gods in Tortall, though most rarely interact with mankind. The Mother, the Black God, Mithros, and the Drowned God are a few. Their most-often appearance in Tortall culture is their names being used as profanity, or exclamations of surprise. Tunstall says, “Mithros’s spear, what kind of cracknob picks a mage name like Farmer?”
  • The gods’ names are also invoked in greetings and blessings. One man tells Beka and her team, “I’ll make sacrifice to Great Mithros in your names, in hopes he’ll keep guiding you.” Another time Beka writes, “Gods all aid me and my Hunting team, I beg,” in her journal.
  • Beka and her cat can talk silently during hunts and when they are bored. “Pounce and I had entertained each other through prayers at Lord Gershom’s for years, and had begun again when our Hunts took us to noble houses.”
  • When Beka almost cries because they don’t have time to bury the bodies they discover, the Black God appears and buries them for her. This is the first time she has seen the Black God, the god of death. “You need not try to bury them, my finest priestess. I will do so . . . The god I’d been taught to call black reached out hands gloved in ever-changing colors, holding them over the murdered slaves, the guards, and the Viper. Suddenly green tendrils sprouted from the earth, twining around limbs and bodies like so many agile snakes . . . By the time they had stopped, the ground where the dead had lain was sunken. It looked as if their remains had been placed there decades ago and only flowers remained.”

by Morgan Lynn

Melting Stones

Evvy is a young stone mage; someone who can communicate with and control stone. Her mentor is a nature mage, and their less-than-welcome traveling companion is a water mage. These three have powers that frighten and impress most people they meet, but they might not be enough to stop what’s coming to the island of Starns. Strange deaths and earth shakes are only a hint of what is to come, and Evvy will need all the help she can get if she is to survive.

Melting Stones is a wonderful stand-alone novel. Evvy is not a people person. She would rather be alone with her rocks than talking to people, but she has a beautiful soul. This is a story of a traumatized girl learning to be a better and more caring person. Placed in an intriguing world of mages and spirits, this story will be enjoyed by kids of many ages.

Sexual Content

  • ” ‘Bored is the last thing we’ll be!’ The man laughed. I suppose they were talking about fooling around. People always think they have to discuss it like I don’t know what it is. That’s grown-ups for you. I let them do their sideways joking about sex, while I let my power trail along the ocean floor.”

Violence

  • Evvy disarms and beats up a couple of boys. “I had a problem with some rich boys . . . They were bothering some of my friends. I said I would hit them with my staff if they didn’t stop, and they drew swords and daggers on me. It wasn’t as if I actually broke any of their bones.”
  • Evvy has a flashback from a war she was in. She panics and accidentally hurts a companion. “Terror flooded me. I forgot where I was. I thought I was a captive . . . Was I back in Gyongxe? . . . They beat me last time! They’d beat me again to make me tell on my friends. I screamed and slammed my head forward, hard, into the soldier’s nose. Then I lashed sideways and bit deep into his arm.”
  • Evvy talks about a war she was in. She says, “I knew where people were hiding. The soldiers tried to make me tell by hitting the bottoms of my feet with a cane.”
  • Jayat confesses that his master used to beat him, and Evvy thinks, “My owner had beaten me when I was a slave, after all. Joobe-Hooba . . . would have beaten me. I bet he would have smiled as he did it.”
  • Nory is upset and hits Evvy. “Even if I could have moved, I wouldn’t have been fast enough to escape the hard slap she landed on my cheek. Then she slapped me again. She was crying . . . Then she punched me in the eye and walked off.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Evvy’s mentor drinks a medicinal tea, though it is not said why. ” ‘Did you drink your medicine tea?’ I asked her. ‘The kind that smells like boiled mule urine?’ “

Language

  • Evvy complains that people aren’t grateful for mage services. “They should half-kill themselves in the service of this, this beetle-spit village next to its chicken-piddle lake on its donkey-dung island.”

Supernatural

  • Mages can commune with certain elements of nature, like growing things, rocks or water. “Alongside the ship came a long arm of seawater with Rosethorn’s hat on top of it. It passed the hat to Myrrhtide, who patted the tentacle as he’d pet a good dog.”
  • Luvo is the heart of a mountain. He appears as a small crystal bear who can talk and walk.
  • Evvy has a spirit self that can travel through stone. “In my magical shape I swooped through a vein of rock-water, the indigo crystal cooling me as I passed . . . My magical body was all ideas and power, controlled by my mind, but I was certain that if my magical self burned to ashes, my real body would die, too.”
  • Evvy senses magma spirits. Their energy is so enticing Evvy appears as though possessed while pursuing it.
  • Evvy meets magma spirits. “When they’d first grabbed me they were like a pair of comets, gripping me with long, molten stone tails. Now they were shifting, their bodies getting shorter . . . Flare was sapphire blue, still with his trailing flame of hair. He had blacked-rimmed eyeholes around flame eyes.”
  • Local mages can’t control nature, but they can do some small spells. “Jayat and Tahar drew spell designs on the floor. Their lips moved as they called on the rocks to show where they came from.”
  • Luvo makes contact with the spirits of several islands. “I didn’t know this great, female voice, but it was familiar. I knew the stones in it, from mica to obsidian to basalt. It sounded like . . . Starns. It sounded like the island.”

Spiritual Content

  • Slavery is looked down on, but is legal in some places. Evvy says, “my mother sold me as a slave when I was six. It was because I was one mouth too many, and only a girl.”
  • Evvy says she would leave the villagers to deal with the volcano. “It’s their island, they have to solve getting off. They’re lucky I could warn them.” Her mentor asks, “You would abandon even the babies, Evvy?”
  • Evvy says, “Heibei, take this bad luck and bury it . . . Heibei’s the god of luck back home in Yanjing. I asked him for help. He’s a good god, not undependable, like your Lakik.” She mentions a few other gods as well, for example, “Kanzan the Merciful smile on me.”
  • After the volcanic incident is resolved, Evvy says crossing the island, “was like a journey through the hell of those who defy the Yanjing will of heaven. I thought I’d stopped believing in those hells, but they hadn’t stopped believing in me. They had followed me all the way here. This one had, anyway.”
  • “Gods of all stones be praised,” Luvo says. “We are not too late.”
  • A young boy tells Evvy that, “You mages is god-touched.”

by Morgan Lynn

Alanna, The First Adventure

Alanna may look like her brother, but where Thom is timid and studies magic, she is reckless and filled with a desire to learn how to wield a bow and sword. When Alanna is to be sent to a convent and Thom to become a knight, the twins take their lives into their own hands. By forging their father’s letters, Alanna becomes Alan, a page in training to be a knight, and her brother goes to learn sorcery. Training to be a knight would have been difficult without hiding her true sex; with that secret on her shoulders, it becomes almost impossible. But Alanna isn’t one to quit, and being a knight is all she’s ever wanted.

The first book in a quartet, this novel is a wonderful introduction into a richly drawn world of knights and magic. Alanna is a noble and stubborn girl who will sweep readers along on her adventures and will have you rooting for her every step of the way. While there is much fighting in her story, the lack of gory descriptions and clean language will make this story entertaining for teenagers and younger readers alike.

Sexual Content

  • When Alanna begins to grow, she has to bind her breasts to keep them hidden. “Watching the glass closely, she bounced up and down. Her chest moved. It wasn’t much, but she had definitely jiggled. Over the winter her breasts had gotten larger.”
  • Alanna doesn’t know what is happening when she has her first period. “She got out of bed–and gasped in horror to find her things and sheets smeared with blood.” A woman healer asks her, “Did no one ever tell you of a woman’s monthly cycle? The fertility cycle? . . . It happens to us all. We can’t bear children until it begins.”
  • Alana is given a pregnancy charm, which she claims she’ll never use. The healing woman asks, ” ‘Do you know what happens when you lie with a man?’ Alanna blushed. ‘Of course.’ “
  • When Alanna visits George, “he wasn’t dressed–he always slept bare.” When Alanna reveals that she is a girl, George orders her to turn around while he gets dressed. She does, but she says “That’s silly. I’ve seen you naked before.”
  • Alanna and Jon fight beings of power who are nearly immortal. They expose her secret by vanishing her clothes. “Her clothes were gone. All she wore was her belt and scabbard . . . She looked at Jonathan. Her friend was openly staring . . . [Jon] pulled off his tunic and handed it to her.”

Violence

  • George hints that he killed the last Rogue and took his place. “Who knows when some young buck will do for me what I did for the king before me, just six months back.”
  • When the bully Ralon tries to force Alanna to swim, she “rammed herself into Ralon’s stomach. The older boy yelped as he tumbled into the pool . . . When Ralon finally surfaced, he was half blind and three-quarters drowned.”
  • A boy bullies Alanna mercilessly, and as a result they get into several fights. “She hit low and hard. Ralon doubled over, clutching his lower belly.” During another fight, “She bloodied Ralon’s nose. Ralon broke her arm.” When Alanna finally beats the bully, “She slammed a fist up and under, into his stomach again, knocking the breath from his body. Swiftly she broke his nose with the other hand. Ralon collapsed, crying like a small child. ‘Never touch me again. If you do, I swear–I swear by Mithros and the Goddess–I’ll kill you,’ ” Alanna tells him.
  • In an attempt to protect Alan, her friends “beat Ralon thoroughly.” When Ralon doesn’t stop the bullying, “Gary held Ralon. Raoul administered the beating, his face impossible to read.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • George gives Alanna a tankard of ale, and he and his (adult) friends often drink at his inn.

Language

  • A bully tells Alanna, “If I say you’re the goatherd’s son, you say, ‘Yes, Lord Ralon.’ ” Alanna responds, “I’d as soon kiss a pig! Is that what you’ve been doing–kissing pigs?”
  • Ralon calls Alanna “dunghill trash.”

Supernatural

  • Some are born with The Gift, which can manifest in different ways. Some are great healers, while others use their Gift to control the weather or to fight.
  • Alanna threatens to make a man see things that aren’t there, unless he helps her become a knight. She also admits that she has made people see things in the past. “Coram turned pale. The afternoon the tarts were discovered missing, Cook started to see large, hungry lions following him around the kitchens… When the twins’ godmother came to Trebond to snare Lord Alan as her next husband, she had fled after only three days, claiming the castle was haunted.”
  • Magic is used to send a fever to the palace, in an attempt on the prince’s life. “The fever continued, drying Jon’s lips till they cracked and bled.”
  • Alanna uses her magic to heal. “She reached inside herself. It was there: a purple, tiny ball of fire that grew as she nudged it with her mind. Her nose started to itch, as it always did when she first called on her magic.”
  • Alanna asks the Goddess for aid, and the Goddess tells her to call her friend back from edge of death. Alanna has to go through the Black God to get to her friend. “She was twisting in a black, writhing well . . . Shrieks and cackling and the screams of doomed souls sounded all around her. She was on the edge, between the world of the living and the Underworld . . . A huge, dark shadow shaped like a hooded man came between them . . . This must be the Dark God, the Master of all death.”
  • Alanna and Jon fight powerful beings who say, “We are gods and the children of gods . . . We were here before your Old Ones, and we laughed when their cities fell.”

Spiritual Content

  • There are many gods in Tortall, such as the Black God and the Crooked God. Some gods guide mortals, while most never interfere directly.
  • Alanna discusses whether or not she should use her magical Gift. She says, “If a person has power–something that can be used for good or evil, either way–should they use it?” Her mentor tells her, “Magic isn’t good or evil by itself. I believe you should only use it when you are absolutely certain your cause is just.”

by Morgan Lynn

In the Hand of the Goddess

Few know that tiny Alan, who is squire to none other than the prince himself, is actually a girl named Alanna. In order to become a knight, Alanna has been forced to disguise herself for years. Despite this secret, she has managed to become one of the greatest squires of her year. Squire Alan is admired for his skill with the bow and sword, and he’ll need those skills for what’s coming. Dark magic and treachery surround the crown and Alanna’s friend, Prince Jon. Alanna might be the only one capable of bringing such plots to light.

While this book has slightly more adult content, the descriptions are not gory and the writing is discreet. During the course of the book, Alanna kisses two men and takes one for her lover, but there are no descriptions of her having intercourse. This book continues the exciting adventures found in the first installment, and Alanna remains a strong and likable female heroine.

Sexual Content

  • The Goddess asks why Alanna fears love. “Yet what is there for you to fear? Warmth? Trust? A man’s touch?” Alanna replies, “I don’t want a man’s touch!”
  • George and Alanna kiss. ” ‘Alanna,’ he whispered, ‘I’m takin’ advantage of you now, because I may never catch you with your hands full again.’ He kissed her softly and carefully. Alanna trembled, too shocked to do anything but let it happen.”
  • Alanna thinks about Jon’s relationship with Delia. “The girl would convince Jon one day that she was his alone, and ignore him the next. Soon they were sleeping together–”
  • George kisses Alanna goodbye. “George kissed her, pulling her close. His mouth was warm and comforting. Alanna had not forgotten the last time, and she had discovered that she liked his kisses. Relaxing, she let her friend hold her tightly.”
  • Jon kisses Alanna. “Suddenly he was very close. Alanna discovered she was afraid to breathe. Carefully, almost timidly, Jonathan kissed her mouth.”
  • Alanna is walking in a garden. “A night for lovers, she thought, then bit her lip. She had no lover, and she didn’t want one.”
  • Jon kisses Alanna again. “Swiftly he kissed her again and again . . . She was scared. She suddenly realized she wanted to be the one in his bed tonight. Jonathan stopped kissing her, only to start unlacing her bodice. Alanna shoved him away, terrified.”
  • Alanna and Jon start sleeping together, though it is not described further than “At night, Jonathan taught her about loving.”
  • When joking about bathing, Alanna says, “You just don’t want Gary to see me bare.” Jon replies, ” ‘You’re right I don’t! Do you?’ . . . When Alanna only giggled, Jonathan repeated, ‘Do you?’ “
  • Jon kisses her goodbye. “He kissed her fiercely before letting her go.”

Violence

  • When Alanna duels, her partner breaks the rules. “She stepped back too slowly, and the tip of Dain’s sword sank deep into her right arm below the elbow… According to the rules, Dain had won… He lunged for her chest, his eyes wide and crazy. Alanna jumped aside, just missing dying on the Tusaine’s sword.”
  • Alanna gets into a border skirmish. “Swiftly Alanna slid Lightning into the opening between the knight’s arm and chest armor, thrusting deep. With a gasp of surprise, her enemy fell from his horse, dead.”
  • Alanna is attacked by a wolf. “She saw nothing but the wolf, who was doing his best to fling her off his back. She held on, desperately striking again and again with her knife. Suddenly the wolf shuddered and howled; her blade had entered his side. He fell, his paws twitching. She had stabbed him to the heart.”
  • Alanna and George are attacked. “She rode Moonlight straight at a man who was putting an arrow to his bow. The mare trampled him ruthlessly as Alanna drew Lightning, slashing at a third attacker.”
  • Alex tries to kill Alanna when they are practicing their swordplay. “The blunt edge struck her collarbone rather than her skull. Bone cracked in her shoulder as she fell to her knees with a cry of pain. Helplessly she watched the sword swing up and down, unable to stop its slicing toward her throat.”
  • Alanna kills Roger after he tries to kill the Queen. ” ‘The Goddess!’ She yelled, leaping forward. Lightning struck the cloud, slicing it open to find Roger at its heart . . . The sword cut even deeper this time as Alanna opened her eyes, blinking to clear her vision. Roger stood, trying to pull her sword out of his body.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • George and his other friends, all in adulthood or their late teens, drink ale.
  • George offers Alanna brandy in celebration. Alanna says, “Normally I just drink this stuff to clear my head, but–this is quite pleasant.”
  • George knows Alanna will worry herself silly before her Ordeal of Knighthood, so he sneaks something into her drink that makes her sleep.

Language

  • When captured, Alanna distracts a man so her fellow captives can escape. “Behavior I’d expect from the goatherd’s bastard, not a nobleman . . . Perhaps your mother tricked your father?”
  • Alanna occasionally curses with the gods’ names when surprised or upset. ” ‘Great Merciful Mother!’ Alanna gasped.”
  • Damn is said once or twice. “Myles said he was damned if he would get up at this hour . . . “

Supernatural

  • Alanna is blessed by the Mother, also known as the Goddess, who is one of Tortall’s many deities. The Goddess visits Alanna occasionally, bestowing advice and sometimes gifts.
  • Someone tries to kill Alanna with sorcery. “When an ugly, cloven hoof burst through the beaten snow over the tent opening, Alanna thrust upward with all her strength. She burst from the snow, shaking clumps from her face, to feel her sword wrenched from her hand… Gripping her sword hilt to pull it free, she stopped; the boar’s eyes were a demonic red. Suddenly he shuddered one last time–and vanished.”

Spiritual Content

  • There are many gods in Tortall, such as the Dark God, the Goddess, and the Crooked God. Different people honor different gods, and Alanna has glimpses of them because she is god-touched. “A huge shadow figure was bending over her. ‘Thor,’ she sighed, recognizing the Dark God. ‘You want Thor.’ Reaching out a hand that was blacker than night, the God touched Alanna’s eyes.”
  • Alanna’s partner cheats during a duel. Afterward, her friend says, “he gave you every excuse to kill him . . . even his Ambassador would have understood if you had.” Alanna replies that “Just because he behaved badly is no excuse for me to behave badly.”
  • Alanna thinks that soldiers, “only cared about pain and the Dark God’s arrival.”
  • When Alanna finds a dying friend, he asks for her help. ” ‘I’d just like to . . . go to sleep. I’m that tired.’ Alanna trembled. Healing was natural for her, but she had never killed a human being with her Gift. She didn’t think she could . . . Alanna pressed her good hand to Thor’s forehead, her Gift lighting the clearing with a deep violet fire. ‘Sleep, Thor,’ she whispered. She felt him falling away gently, slipping into a long, dark well. Alanna rose. Thor’s chest was still.”

by Morgan Lynn

Lioness Rampant

Alanna is restless. She has already accomplished the impossible by becoming a female knight, but that is not enough. She craves the sort of adventure that can only be found in legends. Luckily for Alanna, her life is quickly making her story legendary. Lioness Rampant introduces enjoyable and richly developed characters. Along with the reappearance of an old evil, Alanna must decide where she fits in. Will she ever be welcomed back at court, or will she spend the rest of her life wandering along the edge of the world?

There is slightly less fighting in this book than the others, but still plenty of excitement to keep readers engaged. Alanna takes a lover, as she did in book three, but there are no graphic descriptions and her relationship is not the main plot. Alanna continues to be a likable heroine and a fun character to follow.

Sexual Content

  • Coram tries to warn Liam off, but Liam assures him that his interest in Alanna is because he likes her, not because she is famous. “I’m not a village lad wanting to boast of having the Lioness’s pelt in my hut, Master Smythesson. I like her.”
  • When Alanna tells Coram that Liam didn’t touch her, Coram says, “maybe he’s plannin’ to.” Alanna responds, “Nothing wrong with that.”
  • Alanna gets involved with Liam, who is a Shang Dragon, a great warrior. She sleeps with him, but nothing more than kissing is ever described. “He kissed her gently, then passionately, and Alanna surrendered. Any misgivings she had were put away for thought at another, less interesting time.” Another time, “His first kiss was gentle, the second passionate. Alanna let him pull her into his arms, thinking, We should talk some more about why he was angry. I don’t think lovemaking will settle anything. The Dragon was so determined, however, that once again she put her questions aside to be dealt with later.”
  • Alanna kisses Liam a few times. “He jumped down and held his hands up to her. She slid into his grasp, and they kissed.”
  • A background check is run on a man called Claw. It is discovered that “He was disinherited after the attempted rape of the second daughter of the bailiff… The girl’s maid threw acid in his face, thereby leaving the purple scars of which you spoke.”
  • George kisses Alanna awhile after she breaks up with Liam. “He cupped Alanna’s face, his grave hazel eyes searching out her own. He nodded, liking what he saw, and kissed her gently.”

Violence

  • A group of rogues tries to kill Alanna and her man-at-arms. “The thieves understood simultaneous attack. Alanna and Coram blocked automatically . . . One of the staffmen swung and missed–she ran him through. Coram shouted fiercely, and someone screamed. When a swordsman looked to see the screamer’s fate, Alanna slashed his leg.”
  • Alanna finds a pile of dead bodies, the aftermath of a war. “Here the dead had been piled up and left, until only skeletons remained . . . Bone hands still clutched weapons. Kneeling, Alanna slid a lowland sword out of the pile.”
  • Buri tells a story of a queen who killed herself in protest of how her people were being treated. “Lowlanders take us for slaves; they steal our horses . . . She and Thayet tried to make the Warlord stop . . . Kalasin stood at her window and sang her death chant, about her shame at jin Wilima’s laws. A crowd was there to witness: nobles, commonborn, and slaves. My mother and brother were killed, but they held the door until it was too late for the Warlord’s men to stop her from jumping.”
  • An assassin shoots an arrow at a princess, then jumps off a roof to escape capture. “She lifted the assassin’s headcloth. The face, sickeningly misshapen after the fall, was male and coarse, the cheeks filled with a drunkard’s broken veins.”
  • Alanna battles an elemental for the Dominion Jewel. When she decides she does not want to kill the beast, it gives her the jewel. “She ducked and dodged. When he gave her an opening, she executed one of the jump kicks Liam had taught her, slamming into the ape’s shoulder and making him roar. When he swung to chop her down, she was away and circling. She sought her chance and flew in again, hitting the same shoulder . . . “
  • After the Queen dies, the King kills himself by jumping into a ravine. This act is not described, and the reader only learns about it when the Prince tells his friend.
  • A man is attacked. We don’t see the fight, but Alanna finds him afterward. “The old man staggered in, clutching a bloody right arm. Alanna grabbed a towel and swiftly bandaged the priest before he lost more blood, fighting brief nausea. Si-cham’s right hand was gone.”
  • Alanna is attacked by her once-friend, Alex. “He lurched once more, cross-cutting with a speed she could not dodge, slashing across her cheek and her bare right hand. In the split-second opening in the path of his sword she rammed forward, crushing his windpipe with one fist as she struck his nose with the other, thrusting bone splinters deep into his brain.”
  • Alanna kills the evil sorcerer who tries to destroy Tortall. “The effect was like loosing a bolt from a crossbow. Released from her pull, the sword shrieked as it flew . . . He didn’t even seem to know what she’d done until Lightning buried itself in his chest. Roger grabbed the hilt. Amazingly, he laughed. He laughed until his dying lungs ran out of air.”

 

Drugs and Alcohol

  • A man buys a glass of wine for Alanna, who is now an adult.
  • Alanna’s man-at-arms, Coram, drinks regularly. His worst behavior while drinking, is singing raucous songs that are not described. “Coram awoke late, with a head he would not wish on his worst enemy. For a long time he waited for his knight-mistress to arrive with her hangover cure.”

Language

  • A jealous girl calls Alanna a slut.

Supernatural

  • Many people in Alanna’s world have the magical Gift. Some use this Gift for fighting, while others use it for healing or to control the weather.
  • Alanna searches for the Dominion Jewel, which “may be more directly used, in healing and war, for fertility and death. A knowledgeable ruler, knowing fully the creation of magical formulae, may create new land from ocean deeps, or return the breath of a dead child.”
  • Alanna has a magical cat who can talk.
  • Thom’s magic is stolen by an evil sorcerer.

Spiritual Content

  • Tortall has many gods, such as the Crooked God, Mithros, and the Black God. Alanna was chosen by the Great Mother, also known as the Goddess. The Goddess visits Alanna occasionally, to bestow advice.

by Morgan Lynn

The Woman Who Rides Like a Man

Alanna has revealed to the world that she is a woman; the first woman knight in hundreds of years. Thanks to the less-than-warm welcome she received at court, Alanna decides to travel south in search of adventure. After a violent conflict with some hillmen, Alanna is set on a course that leads to her being adopted by a tribe of Bazhir. After becoming the tribe’s shaman, Alanna must train the young Gifted children in the tribe how to control their magic. As she begins to learn what life is like in the Southern desert, she finds herself the student as often as the teacher.

Alanna has become a knight, a duty that she takes seriously. She is a kind and honorable woman; a strong role model. Her story is packed with fighting, magic and adventure. The fighting is exciting but not gory, making it appropriate for a wide range of readers.

Sexual Content

  • Alanna and Jon are lovers. “He kissed her fiercely. She returned the kiss, feeling heat rush through her at his touch. He bore down to her sleeping mat; in the time that followed, they knew they still desired each other.”
  • Alanna tells Jon that, ” ‘women of bad reputation’ go without veils among the Bazhir . . . All this time I haven’t worn a veil, but it took me until tonight to get a bad reputation.”
  • Jon proposes to Alanna, then asks. ” ‘Do you still wear that charm Mistress Cooper gave you to keep you from getting pregnant?’ She showed it to him, hanging half-hidden on the same chain that suspended her ember-stone. ‘I never go without it.’ ‘I trust you’ll leave it off after we’re married,’ he said with a yawn.”
  • Alanna and Jon get into a fight. ” ‘What about all those women at the palace and the way they look at you?’ Alanna demanded. ‘And I know you’ve had affairs with some of them! They’ve made you into a conceited–’ “
  • After Alanna breaks up with Jon, she asks George to kiss her, but he says, ” ‘Oh, no . . . If I kiss you again now, one thing will lead to another, and this isn’t the proper place for that sort of carryin’-on.’ ‘Then take me to a place that is,’ she suggested.”

Violence

  • Alanna and Coram fight with hillmen. Coram is, “trying to fend off three at once. He yelled in pain as one of them opened a deep gash on his sword arm. He swore and attacked again, dropping his shield and switching his sword to his good left hand . . . Alanna caught another blow from the crystal blade on her shield, feeling the shock through her entire body.”
  • Alanna duels a Bazhir to prove her worth. “He feinted high and then drove in, his knife coming up from beneath. Alanna turned her side toward him; as his arm shot past her, she seized it and wrenched him over her hip . . . Twisting, Alanna stabbed through the web of muscle on the bottom of his upper arm. She yanked her knife free just as one of his fists struck the middle of her spine, driving the wind from her lungs.”
  • Alanna is forced to fight a shaman. “Violet fire sprang into being, whirling to encircle Ibn Nazzir. He shrieked and swept the sword around him; the wall vanished. He charged; Alanna jumped, kicking him to the ground. With a roll she was on him, wrestling for the sword.”
  • Alanna tries to tame an evil sword. “She ducked under the swing of the axe-man and came up inside, running him through. For an instant sick, black triumph roared into her mind. She froze, knowing the sword’s magic was turning her fierce pride in being the better fighter into an ugly joy at killing.”
  • Alanna helps her tribe fight off another tribe with her Magic. “She sent a whip of violet fire at the shamans, determined to end the problem at its source. One dropped to the ground when her magic reached him, screeching in agony. A second streak of fire, red in color, picked off another shaman–Ishak had seen her purpose, and was helping.”
  • A boy is destroyed by a magical sword. “The sword’s magic reflected back from her protection, enveloping Ishak in a ball of flame. He screamed, once. Then he was gone.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • The Voice of the Tribes smokes a “long pipe.”
  • Alanna gives a girl wine to calm her down.
  • George tells Alanna’s brother that he, “Best have a shot of brandy to steady your nerves.”

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Some people have the magical Gift, which manifests differently in different people. Some are able to heal, while others use their Gift to fight or control the weather. In the Bazhir, people with the Gift are trained to be shaman. Alanna eventually starts a school for magic.
  • Alanna is adopted by a Bazhir tribe. “In a swift movement the man opened a low shallow cut on the inside of her forearm. Holding out his own wrist, he did the same to himself, then pressed his wound to Alanna’s . . . Alanna shuddered as an alien magic flooded into her body. She knew without being told that Halaf Seif was only a pathway for this sorcery, that its origins were as old as the Bazhir tribes.”
  • A shaman attacks Alanna’s pet. “Frantically he drew shimmering yellow magical symbols in the air . . . A wall of purple magic streaked from her fingers to surround Faithful, just as yellow fire left the shaman’s hands. It shattered against the wall protecting Faithful.”

Spiritual Content

  • There are many deities in Tortall, such as the Dark God and the Crooked God. Different people honor different gods. Alanna is watched over by the Goddess, who has visited her and given her a token. ” ‘It is a token given me by the Great Mother Goddess, from Her own hand!’ Those listening drew back, awed and frightened. The Mother was as well known and worshipped here as she was in the North; none of them would use Her name lightly.”

by Morgan Lynn

The Rosemary Spell

As Rosemary is moving into a new bedroom, she discovers a mysterious book hidden in a locked cabinet.  The book used to belong to the town’s famous poet Constance, an elderly poet who has lost most of her memory. With her best friend, Rosemary tries to unravel the secret of the words. However, when they read what is written within, Shelby suddenly disappears—no one remembers her, not even her own parents.

Rosemary and Adam desperately try to figure out how to keep Shelby’s memory alive and how to bring her back. As they embark on their quest, they need Constance’s help, but her memory is fleeting. The two aren’t sure how to get the answers they need to break the spell. And as each minute passes, memories of Shelby are harder and harder to remember.

Right from the start, The Rosemary Spell will capture readers’ hearts with the characters. The mystery of the old book adds just a bit of creepiness without being scary. The Rosemary Spell is full of suspense, but what really drives the book is the close relationship between the three characters. Throughout the story, the reader will also gain insight into Rosemary’s feels of being abandoned by her father, as well as how Alzheimer’s affects the elderly. In the end, Rosemary learns that “There is loss in life, and the best we can do is face it head-on and meet it with grace and remembrance.”

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • During a storm, Adam and Rosemary take a small boat across a swollen river. Rosemary injures her arm. “Swearwords I have never spoken, that I didn’t even know I knew, rise up inside me, but I keep my mouth shut. If I open my mouth, I’ll throw up.”
  • Adam, Rosemary, and Shelby try to cross back over the swollen river, and the three almost drown.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • Adam and Rosemary find an ancient book that has writing that appears and disappears. The book also has a spell, which when read out loud makes whoever hears it no longer exist. Not knowing it is a spell, Adam and Rosemary say it, and Adam’s sister, Shelby disappears.
  • When Adam and Rosemary repeat a line from Shakespeare, “Rosemary, that’s for remembrance. Pray, love, remember,” they remember Shelby.

Spiritual Content

  • None

Aru Shah and the End of Time

Aru makes up stories such as having a fancy chauffeur and traveling to Paris. She doesn’t mean to tell lies, she just wants to fit in at her private middle school. While her classmates are vacationing in exotic places, Aru is stuck at home, which just happens to be connected to the Museum of Ancient Indian Art and Culture.

Not all of Aru’s classmates believe her stories. One day, three students show up at Aru’s home hoping to catch her in a lie. Aru told them that the museum’s Lamp of Bharata is cursed. When they dare her to light the lamp, Aru doesn’t really believe anything bad will happen.

Aru doesn’t know that lighting the lamp will change her life forever. When the fire touches the wick, it awakens the Sleeper, an ancient demon, who is intent on awakening the God of Destruction.  Now Aru’s mother and her classmates are frozen. Aru must do something to save them, but how is a young girl supposed to defeat an ancient evil?

Aru Shah and the End of Time will captivate readers from the first page. Action, adventure, humor, and interesting places in Indian Mythology come to life. The beautiful descriptions and interesting characters (including a pigeon sidekick) are just some of the reasons readers will fall in love with Aru’s world. Although the story contains many Indian words, the reader can figure out most of them through the story’s context. The back of the book contains a glossary that helps explain the Indian Mythology and terms.

Told from Aru’s point of view, readers will relate to her desire to fit in and her struggle with being truthful. Aru and her companion, Mini, are unlikely, lovable heroines. As the two girls fight to defeat the Sleeper, they discover that one doesn’t have to be perfect in order to accomplish great things, such as saving the world.

Told with compassion and humor, Aru Shah and the End of Time is a must-read for middle school girls. Not only will the story take readers on an amazing adventure, but it also teaches the importance of friendship, working together, and honesty. Because of Aru’s experiences, she realizes the importance of looking at situations from different perspectives. The many lessons in the book are seamlessly integrated into the plot and never feel forced. Once you open the pages of Aru Shah and the End of Time, you will not want to put the book down.

Sexual Content

  • At a school dance, the chaperone yells, “Leave enough room between you for Jesus.” As the dance progressed, she begins yelling, “LEAVING ROOM FOR THE HOLY TRINITY.”
  • When Aru looks into the Pool of the Past, she sees her mother and father. “They were strolling along the banks of a river, laughing. And occasionally stopping to . . . kiss.”

Violence

  • Aru and Mini trick a demon to make herself turn into ash. “The demon’s palm landed with a loud thunk on her own scalp. A horrible shriek ripped through the air. Flames burst around Brahmasura’s hand… Aru covered her face. Her ears rang with the sound of Madam Bee’s screams.”
  • Boo attacks the Sleeper and poops on him. The Sleeper “growled and threw Boo across the room. The pigeon hit a shelf with a loud smack and slumped to the floor.”
  • Shukra becomes consumed with his beauty. Because he spends so much time focusing on himself, his wife stops loving him. Shukra’s wife tells him, “How can I love someone I no longer know?” In anger, he kills her. “I do not remember doing what I did. . . It was only when the red had cleared from my eyes that I saw her corpse.”
  • Memory-stealing snow falls on Aru and Mini. “This time, when the snow landed on Aru, it stung. Because it (the snow) was taking. With every flake another memory was ripped from her.” Later Aru causes someone to lose his memories.
  • Aru, Mini, and the godly mounts plan an ambush. The ambush is described over a chapter. When the Sleeper arrives, he brings demons with him. “Aru ducked under the guest sign-in table as someone’s head (literally) flew past her . . . The seven-headed horse shook its head. Blood and spit flew over the walls . . . Boo acted quickly, and bird droppings rained across the demon’s eyes and forehead.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The story focuses on Indian Mythology and includes gods, demigods, monsters, and demons.  The back of the book includes a glossary of Indian mythology, so the reader can understand who the mythological characters are.
  • Aru lights the Lamp of Bharata and awakens the “Sleeper, a demon who will summon Lord Shiva, the fearsome Lord of Destruction, who will dance upon the world and bring an end to Time.”  When Aru lights the lamp, people are “suspended in time… Their skin was warm. A pulse leaped at each of their throats. But they didn’t move.” The Sleeper is a demon that can take many forms.
  • In order to save Time, Aru and Mini must find the keys to the Kingdom of Death. The first one is found in the hair of a demon—anything that touches the demon turns to ashes.
  • Aru discovers that her mother is a part of a sisterhood. “Five women who are reincarnations of legendary queens from the ancient stories. These days their job is to raise and protect us.”
  • Aru and Mini meat the Seasons, who are tailors. Winter explains, “We dress the world itself. I embroider the earth with ice and frost, the most delicate in the world.” The Seasons give the girls magical gifts that will help them on their journey.
  • Aru and Mini go to a market that has a library of living books.
  • The Sleeper turns the “mounts of the gods” into clay and puts them in a birdcage. Aru uses a magical ball to free them.

 Spiritual Content

  • Aru and Mini are “siblings because you share divinity. You’re a child of the gods because one of them helped forge your soul.”
  • When trying to explain the Otherworld, a character explains, “Many things can coexist. Several gods can live in one universe. It’s like fingers on a hand. They’re all different, but still part of a hand.”
  • Aru’s mother said, “the Hindu gods were numerous, but they don’t stay as one person all the time. Sometimes they were reincarnated—their souls were reborn in someone else.”
  • Aru and Mini go to the Halls of the Dead, where Aru can “hear the final words of people who have died: No, and not yet. . . And I hope someone clears my internet browser. But mostly, Aru heard love. Tell my family I love them. Tell my wife I love her.”
  •  After leaving the Hall of the Dead, Mini remembers, “in Hinduism, death wasn’t a place where you were stuck forever. It was where you waited to be reincarnated. Your soul could live hundreds—maybe even thousands—of lives before you got out of the loop of life and death by achieving enlightenment.” Later in the story, Aru and Mini visit that place where reincarnation takes place. The sign says, “REMAKE, REBUILD, RELIVE! REINCARNATION MANUFACTURING SERVICES.”
  • Aru and Mini go to an office where a character explains karma. The story talks about Chitrigupta, who “kept a record of everything a soul had ever done, both good and bad. This was why karma mattered.” Later, someone explains, “As you live, your good deeds and bad deeds are extracted from karma . . .”

A Nearer Moon

Luna’s world revolves around her little sister, Willow. Willow is happiness and sunshine, and she brings the family together. When Willow becomes sick with the mysterious river sickness, everyone tells Luna there is no way to save her sister. They say she will be dead in three weeks. Luna refuses to sit by her sister’s side and watch her die. Luna and her friend Benny embark on a series of adventures to find a cure for Willow.

Interwoven into Luna’s story is the story of Perdita, a spunky river sprite. The fairies moved to a new world, far from humans. But in a devastating twist of fate, Perdita was left behind when the fairies went through the magical door to a new home. All alone, Perdita flees to the bottom of a swamp and hates anything that shows joy.

Luna offers herself to Perdita in exchange for Willow’s life. Luna hopes the sprite can save Willow but has Perdita’s grief made her blind to others’ needs? Can Perdita find hope again?

A Nearer Moon is a beautifully written story about the love of sisters. The parallel stories about Luna and Perdita add interest. Luna is a plucky character who younger readers will love. The story has beautiful, vivid descriptions of Luna’s world. The only downside to this story are the long descriptions that slow the action.

Sexual Content

  • None

 

Violence

  • While riding in a boat, Willow’s laughter disturbs Perdita, who goes up and tips the boat. When Willow is dunked into the water, she “sputtered and coughed the filthy swamp water off her tongue . . . Willow leaned over the side of the boat, her stomach heaving as she retched, her eyes teary and her nose running . . . The creature slid, unseen, back to its cave, the silence, smothering its aching heart like a damp blanket over hot coals.” Both Willow and Luna know the water will give Willow the river sickness.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • None

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The sprites used magic to build a door to take them to another world because humans poisoned the sprites’ world. “Only a hazy wrinkle of air betrayed that any magic had been done in that place or that anyone had passed through at that spot, passed through from one world into another.”
  • A girl’s grandmother “told us a story about a wood sprite that lived in her rafters when she was little. They never once saw it, but if they so much as dusted the beam where its bundle-of-sticks house was, the milk would turn sour and vegetables would rot overnight.”
  • Gia, a sprite, makes two lockets, one for herself and one for her sister. “These, when opened, would be like doors of their own. Private doors through which to call a lost thing home.” If both lockets were open, Gia could speak a word and her sister would be magically transported to wherever she was.
  • When Willow becomes sick, Luna tries to discover how to cure her. Some people “call it a sickness. Call it a curse . . . Maybe it was all the same thing, only different words used by different people struggling to understand the sort of thing no one can comprehend.”
  • Luna finds a book that has fairy recipes in it. Luna makes “a dram of flower essence for use in the purification of soured water.” When she uses the potion, she whispers a phrase. “She didn’t know if this was magic. It was pleading. It was hoping. It was speaking the deepest wish of her soul and asking the air to hear her.”

Spiritual Content

  • When Willow becomes sick, her mother “sank to her knees beside her own bed, clicking her prayer beads around and around again.” Willow’s mother goes to the chapel often to “click” her prayer beads.

The Serpent’s Secret

Kiran’s parents are just a bit odd, and she has never really fit in. Even so, she thought she was just a regular sixth grader living in New Jersey. Then, on her twelfth birthday, her parents disappear and a rakkhosh demon crashes through her house to try to eat her.

When two princes show up, trying to rescue her, she realizes that her parents’ stories are really true—she really is a princess that comes from another world. With the help of the two princes, Kiran is taken to another dominion, one with magic, winged horses, moving maps, and annoying talking birds. Before she can save her parents, she must fight demons, unlock riddles, and avoid the Serpent King of the Underworld.

The Serpent’s Secret is an interesting and action-packed retelling of Indian mythology. Filled with riddles, jokes, and a talking bird, the story will entertain middle school readers. Black and white illustrations will help readers visualize the characters. As Kiran learns about her cultural background, she also learns to accept herself. Although there is violence, the scenes are appropriate for younger readers because they are not described in detail and much of the action is running away from demons instead of battling them.

Kiran and the two princes talk like stereotypical teenagers. The main character’s dialogue is filled with slang and idioms such as when Kiran looks at the prince and thinks, “While I got my fill of Lal-flavored eye candy.” There is a lot of creative name-calling throughout the story, which does not involve cursing.

A dynamic story with a strong heroine, The Serpent’s Secret will delight those who like a good adventure story.  For readers interested in adventure stories or India’s mythology, Aru Shah and the End of Time is a must-read.

Sexual Content

  • The king has multiple wives.

Violence

  • A rakkhosh, or demon, swallows Kiran’s parents and then tries to swallow her. When Lal tries to help, the rakkhosh knocks him out. “I shrieked as the monster’s fist managed to connect with Lal’s head. The prince slumped forward, unconscious, and then began to slip off the rakkhosh’s neck.” The fighting takes place over several chapters.
  • A teenager spits at Lal. “The goober hung on a lone blade of grass, shimmering like a disgusting jewel.”
  • The Demon Queen attacks Kiran. “. . . The rakkhoshi ripped a handful of her own hair from her head and threw it at me . . . As soon as the magical hair hit me, I couldn’t move at all.” Neel saves Kiran, but not before the Demon Queen turns Neel’s brother and friend into spheres. The battle lasts over several pages.
  • When Kiran and Neel try to steal a stone that is being protected by a python, the “snake grabbed a hold of Neel, wrapped itself around him, and began to squeeze. . . Neel’s face got redder as the snake squeezed.” The battle scene takes place over a chapter. In the end, the python is defeated. “The python’s giant body lay still, oozing dark blood on the cavern floor. Trying to reach the jewel, it had instead split itself in two on Neel’s sword.”
  • A baby rakkhosh wants to eat Kiran, her parents, and Neel. “That snot-nosed newborn demon transformed himself into a whirlpool.” When the rakkhosh “eats” them, they end up in a cave with a seven-headed snake, who “wrapped Ma, Baba, and even poor terrified Tuntuni in his coils. As a last flourish, he slapped his nasty tail over all their mouths.”
  • The serpent king imprisoned Neel in a flaming sphere. “The prince screamed in pain—a sound that made my blood run cold. He writhed around within the glowing orb, his body twisting in unnatural contortions, as if he were being tortured.”
  • Kiran and the Serpent King battle. “He shot bolt after bolt of green fire, but I met them all with the shimmering, diamond light of my own.” Kiran’s moon mother shows up, and “as he launched the cracking lightning from his hands, the moon shot a white-hot beam at the Serpent King. He glowed an incandescent green, but then began to writhe and decay, his energy going from green to brown to gray to black.” The Serpent King disappears and everyone is safe.

Drugs and Alcohol

  • A rakkhosh sings a song, “Hob, gum, goom, geer! Pass the blood! Pass the beer!”
  • A “band of drunken demons” chase Kiran and Neel.
  • Kiran sees a warning sign that reads, “After whisky, fighting demons risky.”

Language

  • A bangle seller says her bracelets are for “generously proportioned and the skinny-butt offspring of slimy snake creatures alike.”
  • The Demon Queen calls Kiran a “snake in the grass” and “cobra dropping.
  • When Kiran is fighting a python, she thinks, “Holy serpent poop.”
  • Kiran thinks that Neel’s “Granny still had some chutzpah left in her.”
  • Kiran calls Neel a “Royal Pain-in-the- Heinie.”
  • Crap is used twice and heck is used once.

Supernatural

  • The story focuses on Indian mythology, including mythological monsters and demons.
  • Kiran’s parents are “swallowed by a rakkhosh and whisked away to another galactic dimension.”
  • Kiran’s father was a serpent king and her mother was a moon maiden. Her adoptive parents found her “in a clay pot floating down the River of Dreams.”
  • Kiran’s biological mother exiled her to New Jersey and put a protection spell over her and her adoptive parents. “Anyway, an expired spell also makes everything around it unstable—in this situation, the boundaries between the various dimensions . . . which is how the rakkhosh came into your world.”
  • Kiran’s tears have healing properties. “I remembered how Tuni had seemed dead, but how he’d come to life in my arms.”
  • Kiran can understand horses. “And then, as clearly as if the horse were speaking to me, I heard his voice in my mind.”

Spiritual Content

  • Kiran explains that her “Baba always tells me we’re all connected by energy—trees, wind, animals, people, everything. . . He says that life energy is a kind of river flowing through the universe.” Neel continues the thought and says, “When our bodies give out, that’s just the pitcher breaking, pouring what’s inside back into the original stream of universal souls . . . so no one’s soul is ever really gone.”

Took

When Daniel and his sister move to rural West Virginia, Daniel doesn’t think things can get any worse.  The students at his new school torment him. The teachers are indifferent. He has no friends. His parents are unhappy. And to make matters worse, his sister spends all of her time talking to her doll.

When Daniel hears stories of Old Auntie, who kidnaps a girl every 50 years, he thinks it’s just an old tale used to frighten children. But then he feels someone watching him. He sees strange shadows. And when his sister suddenly disappears, Daniel is convinced Old Auntie isn’t just a story.

As Daniel’s parents lose themselves in grief, Daniel decides he must face his fears and bring his sister home. With the help of his neighbor and one of Old Auntie’s descendants, Daniel fights for his sister’s freedom.

Right from the start, Took: A Ghost Story will capture the reader’s attention. Young readers will be able to relate to Daniel, who feels as if all of life’s decisions are out of his control. Although Daniel clearly cares for his parents and sister, his frustration with them is understandable. Daniel is a likable character, who faces his fears and in the end, brings his family back together.

The story is primarily told from Daniel’s point of view but has several chapters told from Old Auntie’s point of view. This adds suspense to the story and helps develop the creepy mood. This is not a book to read with the lights out. Because Old Auntie and Bloody Bones are described in such realistic, vivid detail, readers will be entertained and frightened.

Sexual Content

  • None

Violence

  • Bloody Bones kills someone. “Tore him clean apart with the panther’s teeth and ate him up. Then he dug his grave with the bear’s claws and brushed the ground smooth with the raccoon’s tail.”
  • The kids at school are mean to Daniel. They “accidentally” hit him and kick the back of his seat on the bus.
  • When Daniel and his sister, Erica, are in the woods, Daniel sees something and forces Erica to leave with him. They get into a fight. “. . . She struggled harder to get away from me, crying and screaming . . . she managed to bite me twice and scratch my face.”
  • Bloody Bones is going to throw Daniel off of a cliff, so Eric throws rocks at him. “Bloody Bones plunged over the edge of the cliff, screaming as he bounced from rock to rock, his bones flying apart and scattering as he went.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Daniel and Erica’s parents are seen drinking wine. When Erica is “took,” their parents drink even more. “There was an empty wine bottle on the table and an ashtray full of cigarette butts and ashes.”
  • When Daniel goes to a friend’s house, his friend’s father smells of beer and cigarette smoke.

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • The story revolves around Old Auntie, a “conjure woman” who takes a girl every 50 years. When she takes a girl, she returns the one that was “took;” however, the girl is the same age as she was when she was first “took” and has no memory of her former life. Auntie weaves spells to influence people’s decisions.
  • One character describes Old Auntie as “a haunt come back from her grave.”
  • Old Auntie takes the form of a girl, so she can talk to Erica without scaring her. Auntie also uses a doll to convince Erica that no one loves her except Auntie.
  • Auntie has a razorback hog, called Bloody Bones, which she called back from the dead. “His bones put themselves together and rose up on their hind feet. His skull jumped on top of the bones, and off he danced.”

Spiritual Content

  • The townspeople are mean to the new family because they do not join the only church in town. “We weren’t only outsiders, we were godless outsiders.”

The Rose Legacy

Since the death of her parents, Anthea has never felt wanted. Her family shuffles her from relative to relative. Her life is uprooted when she receives a letter from an uncle who lives in the exiled lands. Anthea dreams of being a Rose Maiden to the queen like her mother, but she fears that being sent to live beyond the wall will end her dream. Feeling scared of living beyond the wall, Anthea’s nightmare becomes worse when she learns that her uncle breeds horses—animals thought to be extinct after bringing a plague to Corona.

Anthea questions everything that she has been taught as she learns more about her family, her country’s political history, and herself. When Anthea tries to flee, she meets Florian, a horse from her childhood. For years, Florian has dreamed of being reunited with Anthea. With the help of Florian and a mix of interesting characters, Anthea learns that things are not always what they seem.  When danger threatens her new family, Anthea learns to trust others as well as herself in order to save the horse that she has come to love.

Jessica Day George’s cast of characters in The Rose Legacy is diverse, interesting, and captivating. The story is told from both Anthea’s and Florian’s points of view. This allows the readers to understand Anthea’s confusion, fear, and her desire to be wanted. The connection between Anthea and Florian is remarkably sweet and shows the true meaning of love.

Anyone who loves a good story should add The Rose Legacy to their reading list. Full of suspense, emotion, and surprises, the story will captivate readers of all ages. The story isn’t just about horses, but the power of friendship and overcoming one’s fears as well.

Sexual Content

  • As part of the narration, Anthea mentions that a man had “gotten fresh” with her teacher.
  • A boy gives Anthea a necklace for her birthday and “kissed her on the cheek and then fled.”  Anthea thinks, “It had been a very nice kiss. . . . His lips had been very warm and soft.”

Violence

  • When Anthea tries to save an owl, a horse named Constantine gets angry and tries to trample her. Another horse, Florian, intervenes, and the stallions fight. “Constantine bit Florian’s neck with his yellow teeth. . . . Constantine came thundering toward them, seeing that Anthea was about to escape . . . lashed the boards, trying to break through to get to them.”
  • One of the horses gets caught in a hunter’s snare. When Anthea tries to free him, “the wires that were still wrapped around his legs arced through the air with a singing noise. . . . A wire slashed open her face just below the left eyebrow, narrowly missing her eye, and a rivulet of blood obscured her vision.”
  • A hunter shoots and hits a horse and Anthea. “When the bullet ripped through her side, Anthea honestly didn’t understand what had happened.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • A train conductor offers Anthea’s uncle a glass of whiskey.

Language

  • None

Supernatural

  • People who have “the Way” can communicate with horses and feel the horse’s emotions.

Spiritual Content

  • One of the characters says, “Then they’ll probably find some long-lost sacred tablet that says that horses are the devil’s pets and we have to destroy them all or burn in hell!”

Pieces of Why

Twelve-year-old Tia dreams of changing the world with her voice. That all changes when a carjacking occurs outside of the church where she practices with the Rainbow Choir. When the carjacker kills an infant, people begin gossiping about Tia’s father who is in prison.

As Tia tries to understand the death of an infant, it makes her wonder why her father is in prison. Her mother refuses to go to any of Tia’s activities, and she also refuses to talk about Tia’s father. As Tia struggles with the question of why bad things happen, she discovers that sometimes the answers don’t bring understanding, but there can still be healing.

Pieces of Why is an excellently written book that brings the New Orleans streets alive. New Orleans is depicted as having a rich community with diverse people that are not always kind. Despite the fact that Tia is surrounded by her best friend’s family, the story shows life as it really is–twelve-year-olds can be cruel, adults’ gossip can hurt, and not everyone is accepting. Despite this, Tia learns that understanding and accepting the past is essential.

Pieces of Why is an easy-to-read, compelling story. Although the story revolves around the death of two children, the violence is not described in detail; however, the content of the story may upset young readers. Pieces of Why explores the beginning stages of finding a boyfriend and the feelings of liking the opposite sex. It is one of the few stories that show that not all boy-girl relationships end with a happily ever after, but that some end with hurt.

The story shows how all aspects of life are not clearly defined. People cannot be classified as all good or all evil. Even Tia’s father, who is a murderer, isn’t shown to be evil, but a man who made a tragic mistake. Pieces of Why does an excellent job of showing life as it is—messy, confusing, but good.

Sexual Content

  • When Tia and a boy are talking, another choir member sees them and asks, “You dog! Down here makin’ out with your girlfriend?”
  • Tia’s friend Keisha tells her, “We’ve made out before rehearsal. Twice . . . We were in the adult choir room and no one saw us.” Her friend said it was “nice.”
  • Keisha finds out that her boyfriend was cheating on her. “I let that boy touch me like he had some right to, and now . . . Do you think I’m not a good enough kisser?” She tells Mia, “Why did I ever trust him? I let him talk me into—.”  Tia then wonders if Keisha had done more than she was telling.
  • After singing a song together, Tia looked at Kenny. “. . . he looked handsome, so before I could chicken out, I leaned over and kissed him.”

Violence

  • During a carjacking, an infant is killed. After hearing the shots, the pastor goes out to investigate. Tia thinks, “. . . I knew that someone must have died. There was blood on his right hand, a thin streak from the thumb to the wrist, and I couldn’t stop staring at it. He wiped it off right away, but the image was branded in my brain.”
  • When Tia was four years old, her father was sent to prison. “My father had been out drinking.  He’d broken into the Mortons’ house late at night, shot their only daughter during the course of a robbery, narrowly escaped through a back window, and then hid from police before being caught.”
  • Tia’s mother describes the night that Tia’s father shot a girl. He, “came home with blood on his hands. It dripped onto the floor right where you’re standing, and when he told me what he’d done, I screamed so loud, you hid in the closet behind the brooms and dust mop . . . I got on my hands and knees and scrubbed that girl’s blood off the floor. Took me days.”
  • When Tia gets angry and yells at her mother, her mother slaps her.
  • Tia’s father tries to explain why he killed the girl. “It was a whole bunch of stupid decisions one right after the other. Shouldn’t have been drinking, shouldn’t have been in that house, and shouldn’t have had my gun. Shouldn’t have bought the damn thing in the first place.”

Drugs and Alcohol

  • Tia has to walk by a group of gang men that are, “Hanging out on the steps of a boarded-up building drinking beer.”
  • Tia’s father said he was drunk when he broke into the house and shot the girl. “I wish I would’ve thought it through some more, but I didn’t and some things . . . you can’t take ‘em back.”

Language

  • When Tia was four she visited her father in jail, and he said it wasn’t her fault that she had a “trucker” for a dad. “Years later I’d realized my dad hadn’t said trucker after all. He’d said a real bad word instead . . .”
  • Tia’s friend said she felt “crappy” that she didn’t know about something.
  • Tia’s father uses the word damn.

Supernatural

  • None

Spiritual Content

  • The Rainbow Choir practices in a church and there are often references to God. After the carjacking the pastor said, “the devil is roaming.”
  • As the Rainbow Choir begins to sing, the director said, “That’s right. Lift it up to the Lord.”
  • After the carjacking, the director is upset that half of the choir doesn’t show up, and she blames the devil for stealing half of the choir. “I guess God never said He was going to make things easy, now did He?”
  • Tia sees a picture of the baby’s mother. “Her face was turned up to the sky as if she were sending God an ocean of fury. Maybe God deserved her anger. Or maybe the person who did the carjacking deserved it and God was getting a raw deal. I don’t know.”
  • Tia asks the choir director, “Do you believe in the stuff we sing about? I mean, about God being good and people going to heaven when they die?” The director tells Tia about where gospel music came from and told Tia, “But what matters is what you believe.”
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