Innocent Darkness

July 9, 2012
In Lazear’s debut novel, partly set in an alternate 1901 California, the author presents a world and a heroine animated by the can-do spirit that typifies the steampunk genre. The independent streak that lands 16-year-old Magnolia “Noli” Braddock in a draconian reform school (after she crashes a flying car) also attracts Kevighn Silver, huntsman to the faery high queen. He’s searching the mortal realm for a girl with “the Spark” to save the faery Otherworld from fading away forever. Desperate to escape the terrible Findlay House, Noli unwittingly transports herself to the Otherworld and into Kevighn’s clutches. It’s up to her natural smarts—and her best friend V (who has secrets of his own)—to keep her alive. In addition to creating an intriguing world and cast, Lazear weaves real substance into her story. The characters wrestle with the ethics of the situation, which boil down to the life of one girl weighed against those of an entire race, and their roles in it. This first book in the Aether Chronicles has style and substance to spare. Ages 15–up. Agent: Laura Bradford, Bradford Literary Agency. (Aug.)■

July 1, 2012
A good concept suffers from poor execution in this steampunk fairy tale. Noli lives in 1901 Los Angeles, in an alternative Victorian era that allows for steam-powered flying cars and airships, in keeping with steampunk conventions. Caught flying a car without a license, she's sent to a school in San Francisco that turns out to discipline its students with torture, including waterboarding. There she finds a fairy garden with an old oak tree and inadvertently wishes herself into fairyland. But danger lurks there, too. The fairies need to find a mortal with the "spark" to sacrifice every seven years, or their world will die. Noli fits the bill. Fortunately her best friend turns out to be a fairy prince determined to save her. Noli loves V, the prince, but she's also attracted to Kevighn, the huntsman. Frequent redundancies and awkward phrasing, coupled with poor transitions, make the prose difficult to follow. Despite the life-or-death dilemma (solved through an absurd coincidence) in fairyland, the narrative flounders, focusing on Noli's constant indecision between her two lovers (never mind that she firmly decides several times). Lazear emphasizes the difficulties women had in Victorian times quite well, but despite corsets worn on the outside, the clever steampunk angle disappears early. Sadism in the school and torrid if clothed scenes that border on soft porn in the fairyland power much of the narrative. Here's hoping for more punk and less steam in the planned sequels. (Paranormal romance. 14 & up)

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February 1, 2013

Gr 10 Up-This steampunk fantasy opens with 16-year-old Annabelle being pursued by evil Queen Tiana's faery huntsman Kevighn in 1895. She drowns herself rather than serve as a blood sacrifice to perpetuate the Otherworld's magic. Fast forward to 1901 Los Angeles, where 16-year-old Magnolia Braddock and her friend Steven "V" Darrow test drive and crash her missing father's flying Pixymobile, resulting in Noli's being sent to a cruel boarding school. A wish uttered one Midsummer night transports her to the Otherworld, where Kevighn tries to lure her into being Annabelle's replacement once he recognizes that she has the "Spark." V and his brother, who are actually exiles from the Otherworld who rejected their mother, Queen Tiana, and her insatiable lust for power, come to her rescue. Lazear's details of early-20th-century life ground her story in its historical time, even as the tale blends together different genres. Noli is a well-developed protagonist, and her friends Charlotte and "V" and antagonist Kevighn are interesting secondary characters. The novel is filled with fanciful words (e.g., "hoyden," dollymop," "bodger") and sexual episodes and references. Though the story moves at a good pace, it often adds unnecessary complications, and the all's-well-that-end's-well ending is predictable. Unfortunately, the book promises more than it delivers and ends up being little more than an excuse for the sequels it will spawn. Libraries should opt for proven gems such as Cassandra Clare's "Mortal Instruments" series (S & S).-Nancy Menaldi-Scanlan, formerly at LaSalle Academy, Providence, RI

Copyright 2013 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

October 15, 2012
Grades 8-10 Lazear handily marries steampunk and fairy elements in this satisfyingly complex adventure that features a strong female protagonist (human) and a credible fantasy world. In California in the first decade of the twentieth century, 16-year-old Noli faces a variety of difficulties that range from her placement in a nineteenth-century-style delinquent-girls' institution (complete with period behavior-modification treatments ) to a duplicitous fae suitor and the revelation that her best childhood friend is himself the son of an ambitious fairy queen. The tale unfolds mostly as Noli experiences it, with occasional peeks at some of the other central cast members when they are out of Noli's presence. Although this is the first in a planned series, it comes to a solid closing in which some of Noli's deepest longingsfor home and for her true friendsare met. As with Lauren DeStefano's Chemical Garden trilogy, this new series offers romance and adventure in equal balance, along with an engaging world.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)