ROAR OF THE LAMBS

A teen psychic sees a future that causes her to form an unlikely alliance with a rich interloper.

Winona “Winnie” Bray, a Black 17-year-old from Buffalo, New York, can “slip deep into someone’s past, present, and future” through a simple touch, but she sells fake fortunes at a local magic shop to save money for her dream of studying archaeology at the University of Cambridge. A reading for Apollo Rathburn, a nonbinary, biracial Black teen whose father is from an old money white Buffalo family, leads to her seeing a vision of a crime being committed at her old house. Winnie goes there and finds an antique box—and Cyrus, Apollo’s cousin. Following an altercation with Cyrus, she leaves with a broken arm, possession of the box, and a dangerous, life-altering vision that involves Apollo. As Winnie and Apollo try to figure out ways to circumvent the apocalyptic vision, the seemingly indestructible box starts showing up in unexpected places. Winnie and Apollo have distinct and compelling character arcs that readers will enjoy, and their romance is delightful and tender. The horror and occult aspects of the story are thrown off, however, by some confusion and pacing issues caused by an indecipherable language used in certain chapters (“Dgudw, uq heuj. Dgudw dgudw”) and shifts in the timeline that lead to readers bouncing between a series of fragmented secondary characters and Winnie and Apollo’s story.

A cautionary tale of magic and the effects of limitless power that lacks cohesion.