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SNAKE DREAMER

Galloway (Truly Grim Tales, 1995) revisits the Greek myth of Medusa, the Gorgon with the head of snakes, in a page-turning, occasionally convoluted, contemporary fantasy. When there seems to be no reasonable medical explanation for her continued disturbing dreams of snakes, Dusa is whisked off to Greece by herself, to undergo special treatment at the clinic of the mysterious Gordon sisters, Yali and Teno. When she arrives, all other patients have disappeared, and only the strange boy Perse remains. The slow story soon escalates with Dusa’s discovery of the jar that contains the head of Medusa, the very thing the power-hungry Gordon sisters have been searching for, in hopes of reuniting their sister with her body. Dusa doubts their evil intentions, their ability to shift shapes, their real identity (the Gorgons) until she discovers one of their former patients hidden in an attic room. Not without loss, Dusa comes face to face with Medusa in the mirror, confronting her demons and managing an escape. Dusa’s adventure is about recognizing and accepting one’s own inner strength; aspects of the original myth are murky at times, and readers who have grown up with an image of Medusa as hideous monster may have to make a leap to fathom how “victim and killer come together.” Nevertheless, even if some of the symbolism is lost on readers, and certain threads of the myth dangle, Dusa is a credible character all the way through her independent, triumphant finale. (Fiction. 12-14)

Pub Date: May 1, 1998

ISBN: 0-385-32264-X

Page Count: 231

Publisher: Delacorte

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1998

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THE GIRL OF FIRE AND THORNS

From the Girl of Fire and Thorns series , Vol. 1

Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel,...

Adventure drags our heroine all over the map of fantasyland while giving her the opportunity to use her smarts.

Elisa—Princess Lucero-Elisa de Riqueza of Orovalle—has been chosen for Service since the day she was born, when a beam of holy light put a Godstone in her navel. She's a devout reader of holy books and is well-versed in the military strategy text Belleza Guerra, but she has been kept in ignorance of world affairs. With no warning, this fat, self-loathing princess is married off to a distant king and is embroiled in political and spiritual intrigue. War is coming, and perhaps only Elisa's Godstone—and knowledge from the Belleza Guerra—can save them. Elisa uses her untried strategic knowledge to always-good effect. With a character so smart that she doesn't have much to learn, body size is stereotypically substituted for character development. Elisa’s "mountainous" body shrivels away when she spends a month on forced march eating rat, and thus she is a better person. Still, it's wonderfully refreshing to see a heroine using her brain to win a war rather than strapping on a sword and charging into battle.

Despite the stale fat-to-curvy pattern, compelling world building with a Southern European, pseudo-Christian feel, reminiscent of Naomi Kritzer's Fires of the Faithful (2002), keeps this entry fresh. (Fantasy. 12-14)

Pub Date: Sept. 1, 2011

ISBN: 978-0-06-202648-4

Page Count: 432

Publisher: Greenwillow Books

Review Posted Online: July 19, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 1, 2011

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MISS PEREGRINE'S HOME FOR PECULIAR CHILDREN

From the Peculiar Children series , Vol. 1

A trilogy opener both rich and strange, if heavy at the front end.

Riggs spins a gothic tale of strangely gifted children and the monsters that pursue them from a set of eerie, old trick photographs.

The brutal murder of his grandfather and a glimpse of a man with a mouth full of tentacles prompts months of nightmares and psychotherapy for 15-year-old Jacob, followed by a visit to a remote Welsh island where, his grandfather had always claimed, there lived children who could fly, lift boulders and display like weird abilities. The stories turn out to be true—but Jacob discovers that he has unwittingly exposed the sheltered “peculiar spirits” (of which he turns out to be one) and their werefalcon protector to a murderous hollowgast and its shape-changing servant wight. The interspersed photographs—gathered at flea markets and from collectors—nearly all seem to have been created in the late 19th or early 20th centuries and generally feature stone-faced figures, mostly children, in inscrutable costumes and situations. They are seen floating in the air, posing with a disreputable-looking Santa, covered in bees, dressed in rags and kneeling on a bomb, among other surreal images. Though Jacob’s overdeveloped back story gives the tale a slow start, the pictures add an eldritch element from the early going, and along with creepy bad guys, the author tucks in suspenseful chases and splashes of gore as he goes. He also whirls a major storm, flying bullets and a time loop into a wild climax that leaves Jacob poised for the sequel.

A trilogy opener both rich and strange, if heavy at the front end. (Horror/fantasy. 12-14)

Pub Date: June 7, 2011

ISBN: 978-1-59474-476-1

Page Count: 234

Publisher: Quirk Books

Review Posted Online: March 30, 2014

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