Soundless

October 5, 2015
Fei lives in a mountain village whose inhabitants have been deaf for generations, relying on artists like her for their daily news. Isolated by rockslides and unable to descend the mountain, the villagers depend on food supplied via a pulley system from the kingdom below. The price of survival is the mountain's gold and silver, and the majority of the population works in the mines. But now Fei's people, including her beloved sister, are starting to go blind, which will mean their extinction. After a vivid dream, Fei wakes with the gift of hearing and struggles to comprehend the new sensation of sound. She and her childhood friend Li Wei embark on a desperate effort to avert her people's horrifying fate. Like her heroine, Mead (the Vampire Academy series) paints with a delicate brush (when Fei sees brightly colored silk for the first time, readers feel it as an explosion of the senses), creating a fablelike story that melds folktale, sacrifice, romance, and the stark realization of humanity's capacity to exploit others for profit. Ages 12âup. Agent: Jim McCarthy, Dystel & Goderich Literary Management.

September 1, 2015
Bestselling teen author Mead weaves Chinese folklore, themes of family, courage, and loyalty, plus her signature romance into her first stand-alone fantasy novel. At the top of a jagged mountain, an isolated mining village exists in silence. Fei, like her fellow villagers, cannot hear or speak. For generations, they've been cut off from the rest of the world and rely on a zip line that carries food up from the valley below. In exchange, they send down precious metals. As artists who record daily events pictorially, Fei and her sister, Zhang Jing, live a more comfortable life than most. However, with many villagers losing their sight, Zhang Jing included, and dwindling food supplies, something must be done. One day, Fei wakes up with her hearing miraculously restored, the perfect "weapon" to save her village. Fei teams up with her childhood sweetheart, Li Wei, and they descend the mountain together. After several harrowing adventures and near misses, Fei and Li Wei discover the horrific truth behind their circumstances. Can they rally their people together against the oppressive regime and conquer forbidden love too? While Mead may be commended for attempting to create a world based on a non-Western culture, her use of Chinese mythology and culture is superficial at best. She could have renamed her characters and plonked them down in medieval England with no real narrative impact. Readers hoping for non-Western fantasy alternatives need to look elsewhere. (Fantasy. 14 & up)

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September 1, 2015

Gr 7 Up-Fei and her sister, Zhang Jing, live in a mountain village where everyone is deaf and has one of three jobs: artist, miner, or supplier. Fei and Zhang are both artists who paint pictures to illustrate the news of the day. Fei knows that her sister is in trouble when she begins to lose her vision, as she will become a miner if she can't continue to convey the news. In fact, others in the village are also losing their vision. Then, Fei suddenly can hear-but why? Knowing that the answer is out there, Fei and her friend Li Wei set out to get help from a forbidden place in the valley Beiguo. While they are there, they discover the surprising truth about their own village and know what they must do to save its members. Inspired by Chinese folklore, Mead has ventured away from "Vampire Academy" (Penguin) and written a stand-alone fantasy. While the story line is a bit predictable and Fei's ability to suddenly hear doesn't seem overly surprising to her, there is plenty of action and intensity after the duo sets out to find the valley, with a light romance between Fei and Li Wei that will please readers. VERDICT Fans of the author won't want to miss this multicultural, folk tale-based tale.-Karen Alexander, Lake Fenton High School, Linden, MI

Copyright 2015 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 15, 2015
Grades 7-10 Life is dire in Fei's village in ancient China: everyone is deaf and has been for centuries, but now some people are going blind as well, and widespread hunger is becoming a deadly issue. An artist by trade, Fei feels powerless to do anything but hope the blindness isn't coming for all of the villagers. When she awakens one morning with the miraculous ability to hear, she knows her fate will be far different than she ever expected. With the aid of childhood friend and crush Li Wei, Fei travels down the treacherous mountain to save her people and her village. It will take courage, not only to break free from her life as an observer but to act where no one else will, and when she returns, will she be welcomed as a hero or shunned as an outcast? Mead's original world building really shines here, as it did in her Vampire Academy and Bloodlines series. Fans of characters like Rose Hathaway and Sydney Sage will flock to this impressive stand-alone novel.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)