Spring's Arcana

December 1, 2022

Set in an alternate 1840s New England, To Shape a Dragon's Breath features Indigenous teenager Anequs, honored by her people when she bonds with a newly hatched dragon but challenged by the repressive rules at her dragon school, run by Anglish conquerors; debuter Blackgoose is an enrolled member of the Seaconke Wampanoag Tribe. Disappointed in love and life, Harlow Estrada returns home to The Enchanted Hacienda, where the women in her family purvey a gift she lacks, creating magic from flowers--but who knows what kind of magic might come her way as she runs the house in their absence; an adult debut from best-selling YA/Middle School author Cervantes. In The Water Outlaws, Hugo Award winner Huang draws on the Chinese classic Water Margin to tell the story of Lin Chong, who is driven from her job training the emperor's soldiers and taken in by the Bandits of Liangshan--thieves and murderers who seek justice for the empire's downtrodden (30,000-copy first printing). Living in an isolated apartment outside London five years after a microplastic storm killed most of Earth's population, Katie and son Harry--born after the storm--learn they are Not Alone in ecologist Jackson's debut; a stranger barges in, unsettling their lives but inspiring Katie to seek out her fianc�. In British Fantasy winner/Bram Stoker finalist Khaw's The Salt Grows Heavy, a mermaid murders her husband, destroys his kingdom, and runs off with a mysterious doctor to the taiga, where they discover a village full of creepy children whose blood sport jeopardizes their visitors (125,000-copy first printing). It is foretold that Psyche will vanquish a monster that makes even the gods quake, and she dutifully trains for battle, but in debuter McNamara's retelling of the Psyche and Eros myth, her victim is the god of love himself, pricked by his own arrow (100,000-copy first printing). In the mega-best-selling Paolini's Fractal Noise, a huge pit clearly made by someone or something is spotted by the crew of the Adamura on the supposedly uninhabited planet of Talos, and a team is dispatched to investigate (400,000-copy first printing). Seeking a cure for her desperately ill mother, Nat Drozdova travels to a snow-shrouded Manhattan skyscraper, where she encounters a winter goddess who sends her on a dangerous mission in the New York Times best-selling Saintcrow's Russian fantasy-inspired Spring's Arcana (100,000-copy paperback and 10,000-copy hardcover first printing). In this new fantasy from Wells, winner of Hugo, Nebula, Locus, and Alex honors for her New York Times best-selling "Murderbot Diaries" series, Witch King Kai-Enna has been confined to a complex water trap after being murdered and is struggling to understand why he was imprisoned and why the Rising World Coalition is getting stronger by the day (200,000-copy first printing).

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March 15, 2023
When Nat Drozdova finds herself in the lobby of a Manhattan high-rise, she thinks she is fulfilling her dying mother's final wish. She fingers the business card her mother thrust into her hand and turns it over. The words "let her in" are scrawled on the back. When she holds up the card, she is whisked into a world her mother has hidden from her. A world where the Baba Yaga runs her criminal syndicate in that very high-rise, where cats talk and invisible seamstresses make gorgeous gowns, and where blood taken without consent feeds, and violent ritual sacrifices bring forth new magical beings. The fantastical--all living behind the thin veil of Nat's reality. That afternoon, when Nat promises to do Baba's bidding in exchange for saving her mother's life, she has no idea of the extent of her mother's lies, or whether the dangerous path forward will lead her to power beyond her wildest imagination or to her own demise. For readers who love the retelling of dark fairy tales, Saintcrow's series starter is a thrilling ride that will not disappoint.

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March 13, 2023
Saintcrow (Rattlesnake Wind) posits that gods, heroes, and characters from myth and lore live in an invisible world alongside humans in this unfulfilling urban fantasy. Nat Drozdova’s cancer ridden mother insists she can be cured—but only if Nat seeks out a mysterious woman named Mrs. de Winter. Nat’s visit to de Winter’s Manhattan offices introduces her to a fantastical world she never knew existed, where cats talk and divinities live in magic and luxury. It’s a world her mother is apparently very familiar with, and if Nat wants to cure her, she must team up with Dmitri Konets, who makes it clear he wants her and her mother dead, to recover the artifact her mother stole from de Winter and then lost. Much of the story consists of minor fetch quests to uncover key items needed to complete the main quest, bogging the story down and providing little in the way of real action. Nat is a frustratingly passive character, and while brooding Dmitri seems like he’s being set up as a potential love interest, readers will have to wait for future installments for the payoff. Indeed, the novel ends abruptly on a “to be continued,” leaving few threads tied up. The result is underwhelming.

March 1, 2023

Nat Drozdova placates her dying mother by visiting Mrs. de Winter in New York City's Morrer-Pessel Memorial Tower, but she doesn't expect what she finds in the penthouse office of Y.A.G.A. Fine Arts and Antiquities. The mysterious de Winter claims to be her grandmother who's willing to save Nat's mother's life if Nat can retrieve a few items that her mother stole before she left the old country. Thus Nat launches on a mysterious, magical tour. Saintcrow (Duty) returns to her roots in this epic-tinged urban fantasy. It's a road-trip story, like Neil Gaiman's American Gods, in which Nat will find the roots of her heritage as she takes a dangerous foray into the mystic places where the Slavic myths such as Baba Yaga and the deathless Koschei still guard their secrets--and her own. VERDICT There's much to savor here for readers looking for a deeper dive into the same legends as those in The Witch and the Tsar by Olesya Salnikova Gilmore, but in a more contemporary setting. Also a good choice for readers seeking stories imbued with the sensibilities of urban fantasy, like The Book of Night by Holly Black.--Marlene Harris

Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.