The Elementals

August 6, 2012
Block (Pink Smog) skillfully weaves an occult thread throughout her thrilling new bildungsroman. Ariel, a freshman at UC Berkeley, has moved to the California college in order to uncover the fate of her best friend, Jeni, who disappeared in the area a year ago during a college scouting trip. In the course of her inquiry, the lonely Ariel meets John, Tania, and Perry, charismatic bohemian grad students who rename her Sylph and seduce her into their circle with a heady mixture of sexuality, drugs, mysterious elixirs, and portentous talk of magic. Ariel soon falls for John, and their consuming love eclipses Ariel’s quest for the truth behind Jeni’s disappearance. But when the ominous rhetoric of her new friends begins to shed light on Jeni’s tragic fate, Ariel realizes she must make a decision that could cost her everything, including her life. Block’s fresh take on the coming-of-age story is a compelling and quick read, and her dark renderings of familiar college types will keep readers engaged and guessing as the pages fly by. Agent: Laurie Liss, Sterling Lord Literistic.

September 15, 2012
Silver rings, a profusion of flowers, hazy graveyards and perhaps the fae embroider this hypnotic tale. Block (Pink Smog, 2012, etc.) returns with her distinctively smoldering style. Primarily aimed at young adults, this book may appeal to an adult audience as well, with its shimmering imagery and nimble characterization. On a school-sponsored visit to UC Berkeley, Ariel Silverman's best friend, Jeni, strangely disappeared. Just as Ariel herself is set to go off to Berkeley, her parents reveal that Ariel's mother has been diagnosed with breast cancer. Still reeling and numb with grief, Ariel heads to college, determined to pursue the mystery of Jeni's disappearance. Life quickly becomes a routine of classes, running and passing out flyers with Jeni's face. To escape frat boys, obnoxious football players and her lascivious roommate, Ariel begins to wander the streets at night. On Halloween, an ominous giant of a homeless man hands her a flyer, an invitation to a party at the House of Eidolon. Given that dorm life is hell, Ariel goes to the party, and there, her life takes a sudden, irrevocable turn. The gorgeously Gothic house is home to three enigmatic graduate students who seduce Ariel into their glamorous lives. Perry, faunlike with his curly hair and sly attentiveness, is a classics major. Bewitching Tania has focused her psychology studies on magic, divination and superstition. Yet Ariel's eyes lock with those of John, who is studying the continuance of the soul. Worried still about Jeni, Ariel soon finds herself physically compelled to return again and again to her enchanting new friends. Why does she feel ill without them? Who is the giant who seems to be lurking about? What does the tattoo on John's wrist say? Why is Tania so welcoming? And how does Jeni fit into the puzzle? Well-paced and lushly written.

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May 1, 2012

As she faces first-year jitters at Berkeley, Ariel Silverman still mourns the disappearance of best friend Jeni. Then she meets three strangely seductive young people at a crumbling mansion, which may lead to her discovering what happened to her friend. Ultrahot YA author Block, recipient of the American Library Association's Margaret A. Edwards Award in 2005, tilts toward the adult market with a coming-of-age novel that's being plugged for book clubs.

Copyright 2012 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 1, 2012
A newly enrolled freshman at Cal Berkeley, 18-year-old Ariel, is distraught by her mother's cancer and the disappearance of her best friend, Jen, whom she vows to find. In the meantime, Ariel meets a trio of eccentric graduate students, John, Tania, and Perry, and quickly falls in love with John and, to a lesser extent, with the other two as well. But love, as Block has written elsewhere, is a dangerous angel, and Ariel's encounters with her new friends soon take on an ominous tone as The Elementals becomes a fever dream of a novel, an exercise in the surreal. Who are John, Tania, and Perry? Could they be figures from a dream or figments of the increasingly troubled Ariel's imagination? And might she find Jen through them? Few novelists mix reality and magic better than Block, though the magic here is very dark, and the atmosphere she creates with her richly ornamental language is sometimes as purposely oppressive as a greenhouse on a hot summer day. Drawing on occasional elements from her earlier work, Block has nevertheless fashioned a novel that is both familiar and original and represents a new and salutary maturity in her evolving work.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)