Switched

November 14, 2011
When she was six, Wendy Everly’s mother tried to kill her, proclaiming her a monster who had replaced her real child. Eleven years later, new student Finn tells Wendy she really is a changeling (Mom was right!), and he’s arrived to take her to her real home with the Trylle, a tribe of beautiful trolls with special powers. Hunted by a rival tribe, Wendy agrees. As she gets to know her birth mother and prepares for her debutante ball, Wendy finds her new life isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Tapping into the YA zeitgeist of alienation and forbidden love, Hocking’s self-published Trylle trilogy was an e-book bestseller. Packaged with a bonus short story (not seen by PW), this melodramatic fantasy tickles many of the same fancies as the Twilight books and has already established a devoted fan base. But while Hocking grabs readers early on, thinly drawn, enigmatic characters with deliberately poor communication and a flair for high school–style drama stall the story’s momentum. The plotting recovers, but the last chapter simply sets up the sequel, Torn, which pubs in February. Agent: The Axelrod Agency. Ages 12–up.

March 1, 2012

Gr 9 Up-Wendy has always been hated by her wealthy mother, who has been in a mental institution since trying to kill the girl at her sixth birthday party. She also has a strange psychic ability to persuade others to do her will. At 17, Wendy learns that she's actually a Trylle (troll) changeling, switched at birth with her mom's biological son so she could be raised in comfort and somehow cash in on a trust fund to take back to the hidden Trylle kingdom after high school. This revelation comes through Finn, a tracker sent to bring Wendy to her birth mother, the powerful and cold queen of Forening. Fond of the aunt and brother who have always cared for her, Wendy resists, until she and Finn are attacked by enemy Vittra, who would kidnap Wendy to keep her powerful bloodline within their faction. At the palace, she meets the mansklig she was switched with and begins a "Princess Diaries"-esque education, falling for her now tutor/protector Finn during cliched moments while learning of the strict social stratification that makes their electric feelings forbidden. With its occasional profanity and vulgarity, this is a book for older readers. While many fans of the genre will find aspects of the story appealing, it offers nothing particularly new or interesting. Key plot elements are predictable and often hastily or passively described after the fact. Finn is the typical smoldering-but-endearing, enigmatic older man. And Wendy is kept naive and vulnerable for most of the novel, only taking significant action in a final, hastily summarized escape. Regardless, readers will clamor for this best seller-at least until the next fantasy romance du jour pops up.-Riva Pollard, Prospect Sierra Middle School, El Cerrito, CA

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