Book review - Gallant

Title: Gallant

Author: Victoria Schwab

Genre: fantasy/horror

Similar books: The Cursed Inheritance of Henrietta Achilles by Haiko Hornig

                      The Monsters of Rookhaven by Padraig Kenny

Rating:

 

a bit dense

Summary (provided by publisher): Olivia Prior has grown up in Merilance School for Girls, and all she has of her past is her mother’s journal—which seems to unravel into madness. Then, a letter invites Olivia to come home to Gallant. Yet when Olivia arrives, no one is expecting her. But Olivia is not about to leave the first place that feels like home; it doesn’t matter if her cousin Matthew is hostile, or if she sees half-formed ghouls haunting the hallways.
Olivia knows that Gallant is hiding secrets, and she is determined to uncover them. When she crosses a ruined wall at just the right moment, Olivia finds herself in a place that is Gallant—but not. The manor is crumbling, the ghouls are solid, and a mysterious figure rules over all. Now Olivia sees what has unraveled generations of her family, and where her father may have come from.
Olivia has always wanted to belong somewhere, but will she take her place as a Prior, protecting our world against the Master of the House? Or will she take her place beside him?

My opinion: I certainly applaud the combination of fantasy and horror. Many scenarios that are presented as magical and ideal could be terrifying if viewed through a different lens. This book starts with a fairly standard scenario: an orphan in a dreary and hopeless living situation is claimed by long lost family and whisked away to the family estate. It's upon her arrival at the house that Olivia's story takes a darker turn. It becomes clear early on that something is very wrong at Gallant. Her efforts to unearth secrets put the whole household in danger. This can be very interesting and the book is strongly atmospheric. The writing can be dense, though, so heavy with details that you can lose track of what is going on if you don't read closely. That might make it a hard sell for the middle grade set.

Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley
 

March 11 check-in

 Open on my shelf today:

Any Sign of Life by Rae Carson

DuckTales Classics edited by Justin Eisinger and Alonzo Simon

Spell Sweeper by Lee Edward Fodi

Total read in March: 18

 

Graphic Novel spotlight - Housecat Trouble

 

Housecat Trouble by Mason Dickerson

If you're familiar with Binky the Space Cat, think of this book as that for a slightly older audience. Buster is a regular housecat, largely interested in when he will be fed next and afraid of most everything. He is wholly unprepared to face the creatures that begin to take over his house. Those creatures may be difficult for a young reader to understand. If you pay attention to the details, though, it becomes clear that they represent darkness and depression. Badness in the life of humans. We then interpret this plot as saying that it is the job of cats to keep people engaged with the world and happy. Since it can be read on a couple of levels it will grow with a reader to a degree.

 

Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley

March 10 check-in

Open on my shelf today:

The Best Liars in Riverview by Lin Thompson

DuckTales Classics edited by Justin Eisinger and Alonzo Simon

Spell Sweeper by Lee Edward Fodi

Total read in March: 17

 

March 9 check-in

 Open on my shelf today:

Daughter by Kate McLaughlin

DuckTales Classics edited by Justin Eisinger and Alonzo Simon

Spell Sweeper by Lee Edward Fodi

Total read in March: 16

Book review - Mirror Girls

 

Title: Mirror Girls

Author: Kelly McWilliams

Genre: history/magical realism

Similar books: Lies We Tell Ourselves by Robin Talley

                      The Invincible Summer of Juniper Jones by Daven McQueen

Rating:

 

good idea, a bit lacking in execution

Summary (provided by publisher):  As infants, twin sisters Charlie Yates and Magnolia Heathwood were secretly separated after the brutal lynching of their parents, who died for loving across the color line. Now, at the dawn of the Civil Rights Movement, Charlie is a young Black organizer in Harlem, while white-passing Magnolia is the heiress to a cotton plantation in rural Georgia.
Magnolia knows nothing of her racial heritage, but secrets are hard to keep in a town haunted by the ghosts of its slave-holding past. When Magnolia finally learns the truth, her reflection mysteriously disappears from mirrors—the sign of a terrible curse. Meanwhile, in Harlem, Charlie's beloved grandmother falls ill. Her final wish is to be buried back home in Georgia—and, unbeknownst to Charlie, to see her long-lost granddaughter, Magnolia Heathwood, one last time. So Charlie travels into the Deep South, confronting the land of her worst nightmares—and Jim Crow segregation.
The sisters reunite as teenagers in the deeply haunted town of Eureka, Georgia, where ghosts linger centuries after their time and dangers lurk behind every mirror. They couldn’t be more different, but they will need each other to put the hauntings of the past to rest, to break the mirrors’ deadly curse—and to discover the meaning of sisterhood in a racially divided land.

My opinion: We get plenty of books about kids on opposite sides of the racial divide during the civil rights movement but I can't say as I'd ever considered what that would look like when the kids in question are biracial twins raised apart. Charlie and Magnolia, then, represent the difference between biological ties and experience. Root magic and spiritualism also play a strong role in the girls understanding their family history, their ties to the land, and what is poisoning the place. Those parts are strong but the characters are underdeveloped. More complex characters would make for a more compelling read but there's enough to consider in this book to make it worth reading.

 Advanced Reader Copy provided by NetGalley

March 8 check-in

Open on my shelf today:

The Summer We Forgot by Caroline George

DuckTales Classics edited by Justin Eisinger and Alonzo Simon

Spell Sweeper by Lee Edward Fodi

Total read in March: 15