The legacy of colonialism casts a long shadow over the Virgin Islands. Although the enslavement of native people is consigned to the historical past, the current status of the islands as colonies of two different countries, the U.K. and the U.S., complicates travel and commerce with other Caribbean nations, as the editors point out in their introduction. Reliance on tourism also places constraints on the islands’ economic growth. This collection confronts this legacy in powerful stories like Nisha Khiani Savara’s “Jellyfish” and Hadiya Sewer’s “Interment.” Apart from Traci O’Dea’s “American Bully” and Raven Phillips’ “Bush Cat,” very few of the entries are crime stories in the traditional noir sense. In place of murder, fraud, and extortion, economic privation and exploitation are sources of misery, as in editor Georges’ “What Dread Hand,” Gillian Royes’ “The Last Sail,” and Tobias S. Buckell’s “Off the Rock.” Family conflict also takes a noir turn, as in Rea Vanterpool’s “A Guide to Grape Music.” Many of the stories have a supernatural edge, like “Interment,” editor Yanique’s “Beach” and Celeste Rita Baker’s “Pass Through Mangrove,” which also highlight Virgin Islanders’ close relationship with nature. Perhaps traditional noir is too dark for islands seen by many as a tropical paradise. But through a decade of workshops, mentoring, and literary festivals, Yanique and Georges have created a distinctive brand of noir that thrives in the scenic beauty of the Virgin Islands.

Malik “Shake” Page has honed his basketball skills, never missing morning shooting sessions in Marshall Grove, a lower-income Chicago neighborhood. He inherited his love of basketball from his father, “a legend / in Philly street ball” who played for Loyola and is now a coach but not his coach: “Mom won’t let him. / Too much pressure / for him to be just like you.” Shake believes he has what it takes for the NBA. Everything revolves around improving his game and showing up for his team—but their last game of the season stretches him in unexpected ways when he fractures his ankle and has to stop playing ball for the rest of the summer. Shake isolates himself, turning down invitations and ignoring texts. He even distances himself from best friend Kyla, and he doesn’t know how to repair what he broke between them. As his anxiety grows and he struggles with panic attacks, Shake enters therapy. Randall’s creative use of layout, fonts, and other visual effects adds flair to this engaging narrative. The team and friendship dynamics in this story centering on Black characters are well written and feel genuine, and readers will connect with the clever word play and Shake’s appealing voice. Final art not seen.

In this stand-alone story set in the same world as Allison Saft’s Wings of Starlight (2025), Periwinkle, a frost-talent who has a gift for finding things—or maybe they have a way of finding her?—discovers a lost thread of magic that grants her the ability to dream. But not all dreams are as sparkly as Periwinkle. One night, she awakens from a nightmare to find herself in the Winter Woods with a fairy she’s never met, a sparrow man named Weaver, who claims to be a rare dream-talent. Disconcertingly, Weaver knows her—he calls her “perfect Periwinkle” and for some reason doesn’t seem to like her very much. Nevertheless, Periwinkle finds herself drawn to Weaver. When he tells her he can save the Pixie Dust Root by spinning her dreams into thread if she helps him find the magic tools he needs, Periwinkle agrees. Their journey leads the pair, who are pale-skinned, to discover things they like about each other, too. This is an opposites-attract adventure with romantic tension, a high-stakes quest, personal discovery, and betrayal. The characters struggle with inner turmoil while also adjusting their understanding of each other. Bright balances the fun with explorations of themes of snap judgments, labels, and weaponizing fear.

It’s Friday, school is out, and Josie is psyched to begin her weekend. But on Sunday afternoon, she gets a pit in her stomach that can mean only one thing: “Monday is coming.” So one Sunday afternoon, she makes some desperate attempts to get out of school the next day (for instance, clutching her belly and saying, “Mom, call 911. I think it’s my APPENDA-SOMETHING”). Finally, Josie confesses her worries about Monday to her parents: “WHAT IF MY TEACHER’S SICK? WHAT IF I FORGET MY LIBRARY BOOK AGAIN?” and so on. Not only does talking about her problem make Josie feel better, but it turns out that her parents get the Sunday Scaries too; comparing notes with them empowers Josie to face the school week. This story is all message and light on storytelling beats, but for readers who share Josie’s particular anxiety, it may be just what the mental-health professional ordered. While the text strains to inject levity, Naidu finds an inventive way to convey Josie’s jitters with her caricaturish art: A giant, hairy-looking green “MONDAY” appears on the wall of her bedroom and follows her around the house, the ends of the letters becoming vine-like arms that reach for her. Josie and Mom are brown-skinned; Dad is beige-skinned.

Pedrito explains to younger sister Pipay that they’re going to celebrate Undas, “when families visit the cemetery and gather around their dead loved ones’ tombs.” This is typically celebrated on the first and second day of November during All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day. Pipay innocently asks if they’re still a family without their nanay and tatay (Tagalog for mother and father), prompting Pedrito to point out the different families they encounter as they walk. The candle sellers are an example of a “BIG AND LOUD” family; the flower sellers are “small and quiet.” The dialogue-heavy narrative flows naturally as they enter the cemetery. Soft, borderless hues bleed into one another, artfully textured with simple lines. Dreamy, impressionistic scenes enhance Pedrito’s gentle observations of families: Some include members living apart—an acknowledgment of overseas Filipino workers. Others are headed by same-sex parents. “Some families have babies born in the tummy. Some have babies born in the heart.” A satisfying climax is reached as the pair visit their parents’ graves with their grandparents and Pedrito assures Pipay that they’ll always be a family, “as long as our love for each other remains.” Tagalog words are interspersed throughout, with a helpful glossary and backmatter providing more insight into the celebration.

Left parentless by her mother’s death, Unnur grew up under painful circumstances. At age 11, she’s dumped at a coastal work farm by her mother’s intolerant identical twin sister. Unnur gets over her initial shock and dismay thanks to the presence of Freyja, a playful but elusive girl her age who’s made a playground of the rocky environs. But Freyja fails to return from one of her solo jaunts to what locals call the Dark Valley with its black-sand beach, leaving a swirl of urgent secrets behind her. Some crucial ones involve Elias, the aging American veteran who owns the farm. Flash forward to 2018, when Unnur is shaken out of a quiet existence with her 7-year-old daughter, Lilja, by a mysteriously delivered envelope of old Polaroids. It bears the words, “Hœ Unna. Remember me?” Only one person ever called her that: Freyja. When Unnur’s long-absent ex-husband, Nói, shows up with a surprise wife, Lóa—and an even bigger surprise, a little girl named Freyja—the unnerving of Unnur continues. Still to come: threats to her custody of Lilja by Lóa, a shady antagonist who turns out to be a police detective investigating the original Freyja’s disappearance. Melding past and present, Thors effectively toys with the impulsive Unnur’s own dark secrets and reliability as a narrator—one who can’t remember “what kind of things [she] had done.” Could she have done something terrible to her friend? A long section of belatedly presented material about the Icelandic mysticism Freyja was drawn to throws things a bit off keel. But the threatened mother’s raw emotion and the book’s atmospheric pull are difficult to resist.

In Dream by the Shadows (2025), Esmer Havenfall fell in love with Erebus, the Shadow Bringer, and freed him after 500 years of imprisonment, reshaping the truth of who he really was. As Shadow Weavers, Esmer and Erebus must now help the Seven—immortal Weavers who rule the Dream Realm—by defeating the demon king Raelion and stopping Corruption from destroying the world. Armed with the strength of their shadow magic and a willing legion of dreamers, Esmer and Erebus accept the Seven’s request and prepare themselves, their followers, and their realm for battle. But the quest for freedom and light brings terrible challenges, including mind control and heartbreaking betrayal. This story with a gothic atmosphere and white-presenting leads focuses on the price of power and how corruption destroys a society, starting with its most vulnerable members; many readers will notice parallels with contemporary social and political challenges. The relationship between Esmer and Erebus reveals a balance of power; each one’s determination to save the other is a sign of their all-consuming love, which at times leaves readers breathless. Similarly, the tension over power is explored in the setting: Darkness and light do battle, while all along they need to work together.

About two years after his boyfriend, London Sanders, died in a terrible auto accident, August Clarke feels like a shadow of his former self. Instead of going to UC Santa Barbara like he’d planned, he’s working at a pizzeria. He’s even stopped writing songs. Luckily, August’s friend and apartment-mate, Maxine Cho, is a stable anchor amid the chaos. But that stability gets turned upside down when August meets Cary, a mysterious boy who keeps showing up whenever someone dies. The big reveal: Cary is a Deathless from a realm called Aides who escorts souls to their final resting place. When August follows Cary after one fateful encounter, he accidentally winds up in Aides too. Can he find London’s soul there? And, based on the way Cary keeps looking at him, does August even want to? August’s tight first-person narration alternates between the present day and before the accident. The prologue and epilogue cleverly show London’s perspective, which allows for a satisfying sense of closure. In this fresh riff on Greek mythology, Winters draws a memorable, racially diverse cast with multiple queer characters; August is Black, and Cary has pale gold skin. The worldbuilding is comfortingly familiar without being derivative, and the storytelling is compelling. But what really shines here is Winters’ wise take on grief, which manages to feel authentically messy while hopeful.

Shortly after Finnegan Kelly’s arrival at a youth correctional facility, he and Clemence Todd are both placed in “administrative segregation”: Clem for speaking up for his classmates, Finn for making a correctional officer uncomfortable. Clem observes, “You don’t do anything unexpected. / You don’t be tall and big. / You don’t do anything tall or big.” When the boys are released from their cells for yard time, they’re only allowed to socialize with one another. Finn, who’s been ill since he came to the facility, tells Clem that he’s found a wormhole in his cell and that he plans to travel back in time and undo the action he regrets most—and then he vanishes, leaving Clem to be questioned by a panel of adults, some well-meaning, some hostile. Clem is a poet who narrates the past in spare, thoughtful verse while conversing with the interrogating adults in present-tense prose. Leavitt accentuates the small scale—two friends, a tiny patch of sky, a notebook, a ribbon, a dog—vividly rendering compact spaces, particularly in the verse passages. Readers are left to weigh little details as evidence for or against Finn’s claims, and though the scales tip slightly to one side, the circumstances remain refreshingly ambiguous. The boys read white.

A skinless Boo Hag and many other truly terrifying creepy creatures, depicted in garishly lit detail, lunge and grimace directly at viewers in this unusually wide-ranging set of supernatural horrors. Organizing his entries into eight alliterative general categories—beginning with nine “Heinous Hags” and ending with assorted “Dark Divinities”—Forst pairs each full-page, and occasionally full-spread, portrait with an equally chilling description or scenario: “Her fangs and long, claw-like nails are the last things you see before the Pontianak sucks the eyes out of your head, digs her sharp nails into your stomach, and begins to feast on your blood.” Though his subjects are drawn from traditional folklore or urban legendry, he frequently brings them up to date with helpful side notes on comics or video games in which they figure and also tucks lists of recommended creature features and other modern media in at the end. For all the familiar boojums haunting these pages, from the closet-dwelling Boogeyman to a blood-spattered La Llorona (dragons are, oddly, absent), it’s the large array of lesser-known threats that give this a leg up over many similar scare catalogs. “A lot of them have pretty sharp teeth,” the author warns with fantastic understatement.

Abel’s 7-year-old brother, Micah, has been dragon cursed, an affliction placed on humankind by Diu, War-Torn God of the Suns, as a punishment for their greed. A cursed person is transformed into a murderous dragon during a monthly solar event, involuntarily and unknowingly wreaking destruction. Rather than kill his brother’s dragon form, golden-haired, olive-skinned Abel goes against his dragon slayer oath, performing experiments in an attempt to cure Micah and documenting his findings in a journal. This earns him the ire and mistrust of the Slayers Guild and the citizens of Florent. Short on money and eager to repair his reputation, Abel continues hunting dragons. Eighteen-year-old Claire Belgard, who’s raven haired and pale-skinned, is hiding her own affliction with the dragon curse. Having killed her father and razed the family farm, Claire is hopeful that Abel’s research might offer her a cure. Under the pretense of knowing the identity of his latest bounty, Claire strikes up an acquaintance with Abel and insists on accompanying him on his mission, awaiting the opportunity to inspect his journal. Although the novel feels overlong, the grim scenarios unfolding against intriguing worldbuilding add freshness and originality. Bold, resolute Claire contrasts well with the more reserved and morally complex Abel, enhancing the development of their ensuing romance.

In this world, there are the magicless and those who are part of magical society, which is itself divided into privileged, powerful Mages, discriminated-against Laborers, and violent, outcast Lawless. Hardworking Eloise Belrose hopes to become the first in her Laboring family to be admitted to the prestigious University of Magical Arts, while handsome, talented Grayson Stone, the High Chancellor’s nephew, is expected to be marked Gifted and admitted to all four university guilds: Alchemy, Illusion, Botany, and Elemental. Shockingly, their graduation exam mysteriously binds them and briefly manifests the Archive Key, which unlocks a hidden room containing powerful, dangerous books. Ordered to procure the Key within two weeks, Eloise and Grayson are forced into constant, surveilled proximity as the ruthless Chancellor prepares to conquer the Lawless. The duo’s reluctant alliance quickly turns into a fake-dating cover story that develops into real feelings. The well-paced plot combines familiar elements—rigid social hierarchies, elite magical schooling, a simmering rebellion, and secret motives—into a gripping, genre-bending page-turner. Mather thoughtfully explores class politics and injustice, but the antagonist and worldbuilding would have benefitted from more nuanced development. Eloise and Grayson (both cued white) make an appealing couple whose banter-filled dialogue entertains, and a diverse supporting cast, especially Eloise’s scene-stealing queer best friend, Maggie, adds ride-or-die humor and heart.

There are bodies everywhere in Araki’s lively fiction debut: bodies in the trunks of cars, on the side of the road and, most significantly for university student Haru, hanging from the ceiling at home. As an asteroid hurtles steadily toward Earth—the planet’s destruction is inevitable—it triggers a gamut of reactions. Haru’s mother has left the family, and her distraught father has died by suicide. She dutifully arranges his body before heading off to her driving lesson with charismatic instructor Isagawa. Though they’re not unmindful of the coming disaster, these two women are determined to continue their normal lives while contemplating their options. During the driving lesson, they discover a young murder victim riddled with stab wounds. Isagawa’s righteous indignation is triggered, and since the overworked police will likely ignore the crime, she decides to investigate. It turns out she’s a former police detective. Haru is inspired to assist her. Part mystery and part road trip, Araki’s brisk novel rests on a cushion of banter between the two women. Despite its dark premise, it’s surprisingly entertaining. Araki stylishly depicts the duo’s blossoming friendship, their shared fervor to untangle a complex mystery, and the growing confidence reflected in Haru’s engaging first-person narration. Simmering beneath the surface is a slyer exploration of human behavior in the face of imminent disaster.

The Sea Breeze volunteer fire department puts out the blaze before it does further damage to the town’s small library. But Laura Meehan, who moved back to the Jersey Shore community to run her late father’s paint store, is incensed that the authorities aren’t taking the incident more seriously, especially considering the online threats against library staff in the weeks before the fire. Part of the problem is jurisdictional. Det. Hannibal Watson, who’s as personable as a starfish, reports to the Sea Breeze Police Department, while the even more taciturn Lt. Andre Delacorte belongs to the Atlantic County arson squad. Even when library director Evelyn Melbourne vanishes, Watson and Delacorte play Alphonse and Gaston until an infuriated Laura cashes in her trump card, enlisting her ex-cop father who, although dead, continues his spectral activities, at least within the confines of Breezeway Paint and Wallpaper. The interplay between firecracker Laura and her ghostly dad on the one hand and the ostensibly living but otherwise inert authorities on the other should make for a lively round of trademark mayhem from Copperman. For once, however, the author chooses to play it cool. With the help of Roy, her computer geek husband, Laura traces leads, roots through financial records, and hunts down known associates—doing things a police investigation would typically consider routine but the Point Breeze/Atlantic County crew seem to have overlooked. It’s an odd day in Copperman town when nerdy Roy’s dad jokes are the zaniest thing going.

Journalist Sy sets the scene in 1937 in the Philippine capital with the arrival of a new high commissioner to join what later became what the author calls the Manila Poker Club. This was Paul McNutt, former Indiana governor and ambitious Democratic rival to Franklin D. Roosevelt. He joined Philippine President Manuel Quezon, Lieutenant Colonel Dwight D. Eisenhower (chief of staff to General Douglas MacArthur), and two Jewish American businessmen who had built a successful cigar manufacturing business. Hosted by Quezon at various venues, the weekly card games were “irreverent stag affairs that often lasted all night.” Few at the time were aware of the awful treatment of Jews under the Nazis and that thousands were fleeing Germany—and no advanced nation, including the U.S., wanted them. The Jewish businessmen were not shy about bringing up the subject at the card games, and Quezon turned out to be amenable to accepting refugees. Almost all were penniless when leaving the Reich, and few expected the Philippine government to pay for their travel and settlement. Sy delivers a compelling account of efforts over the next several years. American activists worked to raise enough money, about $40,000 per person. It was decided to settle refugees as farmers in Mindanao, a large, thinly populated island. “The president envisioned it ‘as a bigger project than Palestine’ given its fertile land,” Sy writes. “Quezon also intimated that…‘he would be happy if we could settle a million refugees in Mindanao.’” This was a stretch, but more than a thousand Jewish refugees arrived before the war began. The program fizzled out, however. “The Japanese threat loomed over the islands,” Sy writes, “posing an even greater risk to the Mindanao Plan.” This occurs halfway through the book, which then describes the brutal course that led to Philippines’ postwar independence from the U.S.

In Vilest Things (2024), Calla Tuoleimi, accompanied by Anton Makusa, managed a coup, dethroning the prince August Shenzhi and forcing him out of his beloved capital, San-Er. While August lurks in the provinces, waiting and scheming to gain back his birthright, Calla holds the crown, with the promise of power and complete rule over Talin. But it’s not just August or the Weisanna guards she has to fend off in her attempts to usher in a new reign. The Crescent Society takes on a new role in the city, always at Calla’s back and in her business. The very old and legendary Sinoa Tuoleimi now steps onto the stage, in Otta Avia’s body, and shakes up the game board. No one knows what actions she’ll take, only that her endgame is complete control of Talin. The war across the crumbling empire makes way for the rumored return of the old gods, the rise of heretics, and a great release of qi, tilting the game board off its axis. With very little trust to go around, characters are left wondering if there are sides to pick, or if the gods’ return challenges the power of the crown altogether. The war for the throne sets all the characters on paths that cross with allies, enemies, lovers, and old friends. While the world expands in this volume, and Gong incorporates new points of view from the capital, the provinces, and the gods, relationships between the existing characters are somewhat neglected.

Sixteen-year-old Georgie is less than thrilled to be shipped off with her older brother, Hamish, to star in their stepmother’s latest bid for fame: a survival reality TV show designed to monetize teen dysfunction. The show’s premise is that a group of high school delinquents will be dropped off in the middle of the woods for eight days. From the outset the set-up strains credulity in terms of the legality of leaving minors without food, water, or shelter in dangerous weather conditions, but this can be set aside in favor of the gripping plot that is kickstarted by the disappearance of the counselors. Although the cameramen initially claim they have nothing to do with it, they’re eventually pressured into revealing the teens have been purposefully abandoned as the first in a series of twists. A small contingent decides to split from the group try to catch up with the counselors, taking a cameraman and the satellite phone with them. Thus begins the slow dwindling of their numbers as the line between fabricated scares and actual peril blur. The survivors will have to work together to survive the horrors in store for them. Lovise excels in conjuring a mounting sense of dread through the misty, unsettling woods and a sinister presence just out of sight. The fairy tale elements are updated for the modern age in fun, interesting ways—a social media–obsessed evil stepmother, a trail of protein bread wrappers instead of crumbs, and an evil witch who punishes “bad” children in a creatively gruesome fashion. While the general adult negligence that permeates this novel almost borders on cartoonish, the characterization of the rest of the cast is more believable: with common archetypes like the spoiled rich kid and the mysterious bad boy Mack, who Georgie inevitably falls for. Her and Hamish’s close bond is a more compelling emotional anchor than a budding romance that seems out of place amidst all the blood and violence. Still, the novel is committed to its dark vision until the gory climax, dampened only slightly by an unnecessary twist, and ends on a satisfying note.

Brown-skinned young Mayuri takes comfort from sounds: the music streaming from a boom box, the words “sa re ga ma” (the foundational notes of Indian classical music, which serves as a comforting mantra for the child), and especially Appa’s deep, drumlike voice (“THA-ka dimi, THA-ka dimi”). When father and daughter go out, these sounds envelop Mayuri, providing security as “the outside spins and whirls too fast.” Ice cream in the park is a sweet treat, but an errant drop, melting too quickly, trails “a cold, sticky trickle, squiggling and wriggling down” Mayuri’s hand. That unpleasant sensation breaks the music’s safe spell. Mayuri strives to repeat the words “sa re ga ma,” but the world is dark and windy, illustrated by a convincing storm that clearly swirls within her. A close-up shows Mayuri’s face ravaged by the loss of her sheltering sheath. But Appa’s reassuring voice breaks through the shadows, supporting Mayuri as she struggles to pull the threads of her sounds around her again. She succeeds, and her father scoops her up, carrying her home cocooned in a blanket, harmony restored. Senthi’s melodic text synthesizes brilliantly with Henditirto’s expressionistic artwork; alternating vibrant swirls with ominously dark washes, the artist perfectly captures joy and fear alike. An end note explains that Mayuri’s reliance on sound is a form of verbal stimming and points to some Tamil cultural connections.

Vernon’s brother had told him about the witch, but he’s surprised by how much the witch knows about him. Reluctant to talk about his own life, he settles in instead to hear “the scariest story ever told.” In it, a sixth grade Lipan Apache boy named Sean leaves Texas to stay with his cousin, Zeke, in Massachusetts after his mother’s cancer treatment led to bankruptcy. One day, Sean and Zeke find a missing cat and her kittens in an abandoned cliffside house. A girl named Jenny appears, warning of danger—just before the ground collapses, plunging the house to the shoreline below. Trapped by rising tides on an upper floor, the kids encounter a lurking monster. The ocean creature, angry over humans’ destructive, wasteful ways, offers them a deal: If they can guess one of its names, it will return them safely to land, and Sean is reminded of the monster in the Rio Grande from one of his mother’s stories. The cousins’ heritage is integral to this stand-alone series entry that weaves environmental themes into a layered, high-stakes survival story. The characters are caringly developed, adding emotional depth, and genuine tension and scares propel the story.

This graphic novel presents within its very title an intriguing provocation, reflected powerfully in the book’s cover. A woman lingers in a pose somewhere between spiritual possession and magazine pin-up, her eyes an empty white, a dragon reflected in a hand mirror that she holds. It’s beyond compelling before the spine is even cracked. Jac’s feverishly full debut is a fractured confessional of her complicated youth. She spends a substantial amount of the volume on her mother, shown with a trucker cap, bared teeth, and straw-like hair, irrefutably ugly inside and out. Jac takes the reader on a grand tour of her mother’s mental instability, depicting religious fanaticism, dangerous quack medicine, emotional manipulation, and physical abuse. Jac’s corpulent, crass father and her stepmother don’t get a pass—the stepmother is portrayed as openly goading Jac to suicidality at every opportunity, with her father refusing to intervene. As Jac grows older and gains a degree of independence, she turns to visceral vignettes of teenage self-endangerment and articulates an acid-fueled epiphany about the nature of creativity in a capitalistic context, experienced while watching a Miley Cyrus DJ set. The brutal honesty and unresolved fury with which she recounts the particulars of life-altering abuse is deeply uncomfortable but utterly riveting, in no small part because of Jac’s wildly expressive artwork. Embracing the gritty, grotesque aesthetic of 1970s underground comix, her swirling, intensely cross-hatched visions of violence, chaos, and substance abuse underline, highlight, and circle in red ink her psychic pain. The book feels forcefully expelled from the depths of Jac’s psyche, gruesome and glorious at once.

Demagogues have always had a bad rap, understandably, but since the turn of this century, voters throughout the world have elected them to national leadership. Keane, professor of politics at the University of Sydney in Australia and author of The Shortest History of Democracy (2022), asserts that modern autocrats eschew the mass brutality of their 20th-century counterparts. “Those who think despotism is a synonym for repression, fear and raw force are profoundly mistaken,” he writes. “Despotic power can’t properly be understood through similes of hammers and nails; it requires thinking in terms of the attraction of metal filings to magnets.” The author asserts that the U.S. is an empire in decline and no longer the beacon of peace and freedom it once proclaimed. President Trump publicly disparages liberal democracies in Europe; praises autocratic leaders of India, Turkey, Argentina, and the Middle East; and admires Vladimir Putin. The media, including traditional conservative outlets, disapprove, but the majority of Americans who elected Trump in 2024 seem to have no objection. Modern demagogues take advantage of modern communication, especially social media, to fascinate their followers, but their message is ancient, Keane writes: “It’s an old dynamic whose ancestry stretches back to ancient Greece.” Loathsome enemies threaten our nation; together we will smite them—this was the platform of their 20th-century counterparts, and it remains appealing to many. Foreigners (immigrants, nowadays) are depicted as an age-old threat, but today’s demagogues emphasize those supposedly destroying us from within, the author maintains: radical minorities and the America-hating journalists and “elites” who fawn over them.

In this second entry in the author’s Splintered World fantasy saga, readers are transported to the Red Desert / Great Divide Basin area of Wyoming, which has settlements but no modern cities; there is barter and trade but no technology. It’s a place where some people develop superpowers, exerting control over elements like air or water. These “capabilities” range from very simple to powerfully complex, and Moyer’s main characters in the first volume had to learn how to wield these powers, just as they had to learn all the ways of the splintered world: from human dangers, to animal-world predators, to simple wilderness survival. An element carried over from the first volume becomes even more important in the second: Through a very tricky palm-to-palm process, “simple” capabilities can be transferred. Blending even two capabilities can be dangerous, and in this installment, the main character, a young man named Esah, is somehow balancing three. “You should be dead. Or catatonic,” says Hoda, a veteran of this splinter world and instructor of new arrivals. “Or tearing yourself apart as the capabilities fight for dominance.” Ama’s water-oriented capabilities also set her apart in this new world and eventually make her a valuable member of Esah’s community. Along with other allies and friends, they encounter a sinister Authority that’s trafficking in “simples” and artificially limiting the abilities of everybody within their range.

Moyer neatly avoids both major dangers of second novels in any series: He smoothly handles recapping the first volume, and he infuses this second story with a fresh and intense narrative energy that shows no signs of the dreaded “sophomore slump.” The workings of the splinter world are further explored in detail as the characters increasingly learn about their own abilities as well as the dark secrets of the splinter world itself. The first volume in the series had the inevitable focus on raw survival; Esah and Ama were desperate to learn the rules of their brutal new surroundings and master the basics of how to live with their burgeoning supernatural abilities. In the second volume, Esah and Ama grow increasingly curious to understand how the oddities of this new world actually work. What are capabilities? Why do so many newly splintered people feel biologically tethered to the area where they first appeared? How does splintering itself actually work? Moyer takes on this job of enhanced worldbuilding with adept pacing and a natural unfolding of plot and character. Likewise, this volume’s threat is an organization called the Authority that uses carefully crafted “suppression stones” to control supernatural capabilities and suppress the unbounded people who call themselves Kindling. “The Authority wants you thinking foundation capabilities make you lesser,” one character explains. “Being Kindling makes you free, but they need you believing advancement means combining elements, compounding.” The fact that the characters are working things out piecemeal for themselves draws readers into the story in a natural way. As the main characters’ curiosity intensifies in the story, readers will also be hooked in, eager for the next volume in the series.

When Mama Opossum goes out foraging, all 10 of her joeys come along for the ride, clinging to her back. When she stumbles and falls, all 10 roll off in different directions. Readers are invited to join Mama Opossum in searching the nighttime forest. (“There’s no time to lose. Let’s get to work!”) She finds Joey One singing silly songs with the porcupines, Joey Two sharing the raccoons’ breakfast, Joey Three listening to Grandma Bat’s stories, and so on. Readers encounter beavers, armadillos, skunks, flying squirrels, hares, white-tailed deer, and, finally, a great horned owl—a predator from whom a joey requires rescuing. With all her joeys back on board, Mother Opossum returns to her hollow-tree burrow…only to find one child too many in their midst. Somewhere along the line, she’s picked up a young mouse—the returning of which will be the opossums’ next adventure. Gallois and Bobrek, who collaborated previously on Opossum Opposites (2020), present a simple but magical tale rooted in nature’s gentler aspects. Gallois narrates in engaging non-rhyming text, describing the creatures encountered and spurring young readers on to pick out the missing joey. Bobrek’s illustrations—a mix of single- and double-page spreads—are dreamy and dark, full of animal personality. An addendum of opossum facts rounds out the story.

Two stories are told in parallel: scenes of a dad with his child, rendered in mostly blue with English dialogue, and scenes depicting a mother and her child, portrayed in a yellow and sepia palette, in Vietnamese. Both kids are learning to ride a bike—a process marked by falls and tears of frustration. Phi’s succinct stanzas are composed entirely of tender dialogue between parent and child. Both kids start out apprehensive, and each even briefly gives up. Yet with the parents’ persistent encouragement, both are eventually able to ride independently, making the kids’ triumph feel all sweeter. Laudably, both adults also give their little ones room to struggle and even fail. The dialogue in both stories is essentially identical, with the mother and child’s Vietnamese followed by English translations in parentheses. It’s only when the father and child walk home that both stories converge, the house being a color blend of both palettes. Bui’s minimalistic illustration style with soft blurred spots of color and lined textures deftly complements the dialogue, creating a tone of warmth. As the child asks Dad who taught him to ride, the picture of the father as a boy with his mom can be seen on a nearby mirror.

“’Twas the night before shinny and all through the woods, / not a maple leaf fluttered, so all was still good.” While several pale-skinned human youngsters are “nestled and snug in their beds,” the animal hockey players gather on the ice, readying themselves for a game of shinny. A blue jay serves as referee, while the chipmunk announcers offer running commentary. But the game proves stressful (“No one is scoring—this is no fun at all!”) until real-life hockey legend Gordie Howe descends on the ice—as magical and mystical as St. Nick himself—and imparts his wisdom. Nicholson’s rhymes mostly work, though there are some clunky and forced pairings that make reading aloud slightly awkward. The story will appeal to hockey fans, with its inclusion of sport-specific terms, but those outside the fandom may not understand or appreciate it as much (particularly the cameo from Howe). Chen’s illustrations, complete with gear-wearing animals, do an excellent job of conveying movement and action. A page featuring a series of overlapping shots puts readers right on the ice. The anthropomorphized animals have expressive faces that convey their frustration and elation alike. The final page includes a brief glossary of hockey terms, more information on Howe, and a checklist of basic equipment.

Doug Fir is eager to change color, hibernate, or migrate; he observes these phenomena around him every autumn and pines for transformation or even transplantation. Unable to cease chlorophyll production, he sadly must be “forever green.” His migrating friend Robin drops the bombshell news that palm trees are evergreens, too, and carries Doug’s letter bemoaning his “cold and boring” life to Queenie the Queen Palm, who lives in Florida. While he’s waiting, “chilly and stuck,” for a spring reply, we see that other critters depend on him. By mail, Queenie counsels Doug to “stick to your roots.” He admits he needs rich soil, not sand; as his “family tree” attests, generations of evergreens have lived in the forest. Still, Doug remains depressed until Queenie observes, “I’m sure you do more than you think,” and Doug realizes that a bear, mushrooms, deer, fir-sprouts, and bats all need him. Doug’s epiphany feels rather abrupt—and readers may wonder if it will last. He’s an appealing figure, with expressive cartoonish eyes, but the tale feels spread thin in its attempt to both convey info on ecology and offer a portrait of a protagonist learning to be satisfied with himself. A final page offers basic stats on four evergreen species.

The book begins by discussing the push by legal scholar Raphael Lemkin, a Polish Jew who was disturbed by the mass murders of Armenians by Ottoman Turks and other atrocities, to have genocide, a term he coined, recognized as a specific war crime. In 1948, the United Nations adopted Lemkin’s proposal. Nardo notes the term’s complexity, as illustrated by controversy over the 2025 UN assessment of Israel’s attacks on Gaza as genocide and the initial UN categorization of mass deaths in Cambodia under Pol Pot as “crimes against humanity” rather than “genocide.” Subsequent chapters describe historical events including the Holocaust, the Trail of Tears (and other campaigns resulting in the devastation of Native American nations), the 1994 killings in Rwanda, and massacres of civilians in Darfur, Sudan. Text boxes highlight topics such as the Nazi murder of roughly 250,000 disabled people, a remarkable story of survival and family reunion from the Armenian genocide, and the role of radio broadcasts in spreading anti-Tutsi propaganda in Rwanda. The writing is accessible, and numerous photos and sidebars punctuate the tragic stories. Nardo’s calm objectivity in the face of his devastating material enhances its impact, granting readers space to have their own emotional reactions.

During the Covid-19 lockdown, a Massachusetts-based writer/professor, whose nerves are frayed from spending too much time cooped up with his family, goes for a drive and ends up on a sandy seashore. There, he finds a large white whale, beached but still alive. He tries talking to it, and the whale surprisingly answers in a “clickety-clack language” that the professor can understand. His story is a familiar one: an obsessive tale of vengeance involving the whaler Ahab, who, in this story, is being pursued by the whale. “Call me…anything. But do not call me Moby Dick,” the whale says to the man, defiantly refusing Ahab’s name for him; he suggests “Hvítur-hval,” the Icelandic word for “white whale.” His story begins optimistically: He and his partner adopt a calf, the endearing Sea-Turtle. The ocean is a magical place, where glowing eels produce lights that are like “twinklings in Sky’s night,” but our hero is not easily distracted: “Nothing of these puny glow-worms interested me in the least.” Hvítur-hval knows that Ahab and the crew of the Pequod have killed his mother, and that Ahab is still out whaling. The whale’s mother’s voice comes back to him in dreams, and he knows he must seek revenge against the man who broke apart his family. Adamo’s action-packed Moby-Dick role-reversal takes place almost totally underwater, and it showcases the author’s research, as in his careful attention to describing whale pods—how they form, and how whales live their everyday lives. The book also has extensive footnotes, some of which are unnecessary, but the prose is energetic and informed; although the narrative arc is not especially engaging, the battle scenes are consistently powerful. Overall, the work should interest those looking for a new spin on the Melville classic.

Opal Opossum falls asleep on her usual trash heap after an adventurous night out at the Moonlight Marauders concert with her best friends, Albin Ferret and Essie Skunk. She’s awakened by the presence of a glowing green taco, which she promptly devours. The next day, her friends notice Opal’s glowing green stomach—as well as her eyes’ new ability to shoot lasers (which she uses to protect Essie from a personal-space-hogging snake), her tail’s extension into a lasso (handy for apprehending pizza-stealing raccoons), and the fact that her pouch now contains infinite space (she stows three extra-large pizzas in there). Each chapter begins with factual information about an animal or idea featured in the story, including skunks and quantum physics. The book is formatted like a graphic novel, with multiple illustrated panels on each page, dialogue balloons coming from the characters’ mouths, and textual asides at the bottoms of some panels (“*all three take a moment to contemplate Earth’s impending doom*”). The illustrations by Possum Mood are extremely basic, with bold lines and minimal detail or shading. Gallois’ story has legitimately funny moments, particularly in the “Fidget Breaks” that appear at each chapter’s conclusion (“Focus! You may have no idea what just happened, but see if you can get back on track so you’re ready for whatever awaits in chapter three. Close your eyes and try to visualize a slowly rotating cow in your mind. Or, if you prefer, count backwards from 23”). Unfortunately, the scattered plot comes across as a string of chaotic events rather than a thought-out story. The general goofiness will likely appeal to young readers, but the stiff dialogue (“You two…You better get gone! And don’t try anything funny!”) and lackluster illustrations ultimately result in an underwhelming production.

In these pages, McDonnell continues to recount his Hollywood adventures alongside his writing partner, Jim Carlson, spanning the 1970s to the 1980s. The author goes into great detail about each project, this time concentrating on children’s programming and entertainment. He describes the shows, puts them in context of the larger industry, breaks down the individual episodes he wrote, and dishes some behind-the-scenes dirt when he’s got a good story to tell. Many of these projects are shows likely to be unknown to most readers—series like the SF cartoons MASK or Spiral Zone—but his editorial commentary still contains plenty of intriguing tidbits. Spiral Zone, for example, was based on a toy line for boys, and McDonnell notes it was darker than anything he and Carlson had ever written for animation: “Based on the show’s premise,” he recalls, “this show was a dystopian series about near-desperation.” The author gives readers an insider’s look at the developmental meetings behind many of these projects (“Nobody cares how you dress,” he observes; “We care about how you do your job”), and he relates with rueful humor the unexpected setbacks he and Carlson encountered, as in the case of Mayday! Mayday!, in which two kids in the Sierra Nevada are menaced by a pack of ostensibly wild dogs who couldn’t stop wagging their tails during filming. “It was hilarious,” he recalls. “They were so adorable, and not one canine in the pack was showing its canines.”

McDonnell strikes the pitch-perfect note of a smart, sassy underdog throughout, delivering the stories of the shows that went well and the ones that flopped with equal relish. 1988’s Pound Puppies and the Legend of the Big Paw, for instance, made under $600,000 against a budget of $6 million and is widely considered one of the worst animated movies of all time. “After I screened the movie for my dog recently,” the author writes, “he got up and pooped in front of the TV.” The author smoothly relates industry trivia (the grandson of TV’s Captain Kangaroo left a picture of his grandfather on Mount Everest; actor Strother Martin was a champion diver in his teens and taught swimming to the children of Hollywood stars, including Charlie Chaplin), and he warmly recounts meeting living legends like Ray Bradbury and Ray Harryhausen. The specific episode details he discusses will be of interest only to the most obsessively completist fans of programs like Goof Troop or James Bond Jr., the latter a show about the superspy’s nephew that has never been re-aired, but the mixture of wry humor and warm affection that fills these reminiscences will easily win over readers. He writes of writer/director Howard Cohen that their “time together was usually spent in gales of laughter”; the same can be said of working on shows like X-Men: The Animated Series, Beetlejuice, or The Pink Panther. McDonnell explains the inner workings of the show-writing process (both as a writer and as the supervisor of other writers) with skill and insight. He doesn’t shy away from the frustrating or sordid stuff, but the overriding tone is one of gimlet-eyed celebration.

Mama opossum and her three joeys “awaken” as night falls. They “blink,” “clean” their teeth, “dress,” and “emerge” from their treehouse burrow. (While the majority of the text is presented in white font, the verbs are mauve-colored and bolded, catching the reader’s attention as the author proffers examples beginning with each letter of the alphabet.) After stopping to “gather” and “hunt,” the opossums proceed to a subterranean disco (hosted beneath a giant toadstool), where they dance the night away with other nocturnal creatures: “Opossums strut and shake their tails / till sun rays light the skies. / They thank the DJ, rubbing sleep / from tired, droopy eyes.” Gallois narrates in rhyming couplets that, in addition to the alphabetically arranged verbs, render the story somewhat underwhelming, despite the lively concept. Bobrek’s double-page illustrations are masterful, lending storybook personality to anthropomorphized animals (treated more naturalistically in previous Awesome Opossum Stories), offering young readers a recurring character (a frog) to find, and shading each scene with sublime, hazy hues that prove especially striking in the interplay of disco lights. One qualm: The properties of action verbs are never made explicit, and several of the chosen words are actually stative verbs (fail, know, prefer, understand) rather than action verbs.

In what could ostensibly be called a “space opera,” Van Shamrai’s novel gets off to a rip-roaring start as a shuttle carrying astrophysicist Gaag Zorb and cryobiologist Zara Espen suddenly crashes over Arabia. The two protagonists emerge from the wreckage to discover a putrid world of sand and fog inhabited by strange humanoid creatures whom the warring elites of this future Earth couldn’t care less about. Naturally, the tribal peoples who inhabit the place aren’t too keen on outsiders, either. Van Shamrai imagines a society whose members have mastered a method of successfully striding atop the shifting sands using specially designed stilts. As far out as that might initially seem, Van Shamrai’s worldbuilding is actually grounded in the here and now; the exploits of the League of Corporations, the government of the Four Continents, and the Kowloon Empire don’t seem that farfetched. In fact, Van Shamrai’s characters are a lot more grounded than the menagerie of spacefaring malcontents George Lucas populated the Mos Eisley cantina with. The novel does, however, share some of the same DNA with Star Wars, in that both harken back to vintage serial adventures. This aspect is where Van Shamrai shines the brightest, with exciting action and adventure, replete with flaming spears and lasers. It’s all good, giddy fun. Sadly, the author downshifts the narrative to a more deliberate pace, densely packed with lots of palace intrigue involving stolen DNA, who gets to go to Glezar, and what it might be like when they get there. Some of the dialogue also gets a little goofy along the way (“Buzz off, Gaag! You’re as useful as a mosquito screen on a space-craft!”). Sound too silly? Well, this post-apocalyptic yarn also contemplates aspects of Plato’s perfect society, too. And it’s also somehow reassuring to discover that in this strange future Earth, the Rubik’s Cube has survived and evolved into something futuristic but equally puzzling.

Dolly Parton’s humble origins in a two-room Tennessee cabin in the Smoky Mountains with no electricity or running water were a surprising beginning for this global superstar. She was born in 1946 as the fourth of 12 children and her early years were characterized by minimal resources, but, as Parton says, they “were rich in things that money don’t buy…like love and kindness and understanding.” Bill Owens, her musician uncle who wrote songs for luminaries like Loretta Lynn, recognized an 8-year-old Parton’s vocal talents and nurtured her skills, which led to her appearance on a Knoxville radio and television show at age 10. Her career truly took off in 1967, when she appeared on The Porter Wagoner Show and was signed by RCA Records. Parton’s career as a performer and songwriter has been marked by dogged determination and relentless work. Mooney packs a lot of material into her concise biography, covering Parton’s film, television, business, and philanthropic accomplishments in addition to her myriad musical achievements, making this a robust account of a worthy subject. Details about Parton’s integrity, self-assertiveness, and ongoing creative risks will particularly appeal to teen readers, highlighting her bold, admirable departures from expectations. The accessibly written text, ample photographs, and black-and-gold page designs add to the work’s appeal.

Drawing much of his material from the annals of both the Nobel Prize and its real (much funnier) offspring, the Ig Nobel Prizes, Kallen dishes up a lively, if sometimes also revolting, smorgasbord of scientific highs and lows. Some of the latter are downright disturbing—such as 1950s CIA experiments that involved administering LSD to unwitting volunteers and a 2014 Harvard research project in which students chose to give themselves electric shocks rather than sit alone without sources of entertainment for 15 minutes. Still, the general drift tends toward amusing and occasionally world-changing discoveries, like 19th-century physician Ignaz Semmelweis’ then-bizarre notion that doctors should wash their hands between patients and a 2010 trial that showed the remarkable efficacy of the placebo effect in subjects who knew they were taking sugar pills. Readers will be entertained by a study (helpful to prospective cannibals) of a human body’s caloric content, as well as one confirming the pizza preferences of Togo’s rainbow lizards. Researchers studying slime molds, fatbergs, and whale snot explain the surprisingly broad goals and implications of their work. The stock photos are more decorative than illuminating, but the work is entertaining enough to persuade skeptical readers to engage with the sciences.

In an alternate version of the mid-2020s, global famine, mass extinctions, and the mysterious exhaustion of soil and water all threaten humankind. A corporate-run fascist American government concocted a profitable formula to increase crop production and now holds a world food monopoly—but cancers and birth defects have spiked both at home and abroad. In Minneapolis, 26-year-old Caitlyn Svendsen defiantly tries to unravel the government’s secret formula and fight what the docile public accepts: “The health crisis was camouflaged as the new normal. As if a sixty-three percent cancer rate among the population could possibly be normal.” The rest of the planet is not so willing to ignore the crisis. Russia spearheads an alliance (including Mexico, Japan, and Israel) to blitzkrieg the American coasts, wipe out Food Traitors (a group based in Washington, D.C.), and seize the heartland. Russian hackers have been monitoring Caitlyn and her suppressed research; Commander Kaleb Volkov, a legendary operative of the fearsome Spetsnaz special forces, and his team are to infiltrate Minnesota and bring Caitlyn to Moscow to brew up a cure. But Kaleb, masquerading as an American officer, has become infatuated with Caitlyn (whom he calls his “Viking princess”), as she turns out to be fierce, indomitable, and good with guns. But Caitlyn despises Kaleb, despite his declarations of devotion and protection, and she demands sanctuary in neutral Canada. This is high-octane plot material that’s bracing in its portrayal of both the United States and Russia as nests of evil and corruption. The novel may not satisfy a readership that may be hoping for epic-scale combat ops; instead, the work is closer to a thriller-romance with its genre-mainstay enemies-to-lovers arc. (Readers will likely visualize an Arnold Schwarzenegger type as the muscular Kaleb.) The book does feature some occasional violence, including torture, plus weighty themes of betrayal, guilt, Eastern European folklore, and fatalism, all of which add a kick to this killer-boy-meets-tough-girl dystopian series opener.

It’s March of 1942. Ireland is determined to maintain its neutrality in the war, which the government refers to as the “Emergency.” But there’s dissension all around; some favor the Germans, believing that they offer the best road to a reunited Ireland. Others favor alliance with the Allies. Mixed into this chaotic cauldron is a diverse cohort of spies and conspirators. They include Julia Winter, who’s half German and half Irish and is working for German intelligence; American reporter Virginia Payne, who’s recruited by American intelligence; various government officials of questionable allegiance; and Karl Degler, a captured U-boat commander planning an escape. Fergus Finnan, a seasoned Dublin detective with a reputation for indulging in women and alcohol, is now a lieutenant colonel in Irish military intelligence. He grills Peter Moynihan, a member of the Irish Republican Army whose brother has just been executed for the murder of a garda (national police) detective. To save himself from the hangman, Peter reveals that the IRA is expecting a shipment of weapons from the Germans. A hunt for the shipment begins, and Fergus finds himself in the center of a dangerous web of competing conspiracies. Chadwick’s intricate narrative, inspired by real events, contains a hefty assortment of secondary characters—readers will have to stay on their toes to keep track of them all. There are two romantic entanglements, one between Julia and Fergus and another between Virginia and Karl, relationships further complicated by the fact that both Julia and Karl are operating under aliases. The twisty plotline overflows with intriguing behind-the-scenes trickery and betrayals—fortunately, Chadwick is a skillful storyteller. His descriptions of life and death in Dublin have a visceral impact, and the battle at sea between Karl’s U-boat and British destroyers is riveting, filled with mechanical details and daring maneuvers that bring the action to life: “The diesel engines sent a shiver along the sleek hull, making the boat seem alive, eager for the hunt.”

“Like food, songs too can speak without words,” writes the Seattle-based author at one point in this offbeat memoir. “A melody stirs a memory as a dish summons nostalgia. Both speak the language of the heart.” This creative book isn’t merely about the author’s love of music, though, but also her love of cooking, and how she found her way back to culinary masterworks that she experienced in childhood (she immigrated from Hong Kong to the United States nearly 50 years ago). She also discovered that her passion for writing, which she’d put aside decades ago, was not a dying dream but an awakening of herself and her talent. This rediscovery of who she was occurred unexpectedly when she witnessed a Macanese singer on a Hong Kong singing competition show called Midlife, Sing & Shine! His talent and passion for his art touched the author greatly, she says; she goes on to explain how she came to learn more about the singer, German Ku, and found that his career somewhat paralleled hers, especially in how they both faced adversity, yet never quit. Cheng takes a philosophical perspective on what she sees as the similarities between music, food, and writing, and how this insight led her to delve deeply into Macanese culture and cuisine, creating a kind of homecoming for her. She was inspired to express herself in a cookbook, which she’s crafted in a highly original style in these page. The philosophical interludes do tend to be a bit repetitive at times, but she effectively expresses how she’s “come to see Macanese cuisine not merely as food but as a language that speaks of resilience and adaptability.” She not only expresses to readers how she found her joy again, but also how, more broadly, “Joy matters.”

As World War II winds down in 1945, Commander M.T. Kwan returns from serving with the British to his war-ravaged hometown of Guilin, China. As the Japanese pull back, Kwan—aka The Dragon—hopes to retrieve his family from where they’ve taken refuge farther inland. Colonel Lindsay Ride, his commandant with the British Army Aid Group, shows up at his family estate. He wants Kwan to scout occupied Hong Kong and determine the intentions of the Japanese, the Nationalists, the Communists, and the residential Hongkongers. Since no one knows when the Japanese surrender will come, Ride wants Kwan to leave immediately. Kwan is conflicted, but he finds another reason to go: It gives him an opportunity to locate his long-lost love, Iris, who last lived in Hong Kong. Once there, Kwan meets with and assesses the motivations of all the involved parties, assisted by James Chua, his loyal aide-de-camp, and Leck, a recalcitrant local BAAG agent. He also reunites with Iris, but he later learns that she has a secret that may keep them apart. The atomic bombs falling on Japan speed up Kwan’s timetable as he seeks some way to keep Hong Kong in British hands. Daniel’s experience as a banking executive in London and Asia (including two tours in Hong Kong) informs the textured background of this gripping spy novel. In this prequel to Follow the Dragon (2024), the first volume of his Dragon series, the author delves deeply into Kwan’s history, explaining how he came to land in Hong Kong and how he learns to balance his Anglophilic and Chinese sides. He introduces a colorful cast of characters, with Kwan struggling to determine who agrees with British rule and who is likely against it. The narrative’s pace is frenetic as Kwan races against the clock while in unfamiliar territory. Ultimately, Daniel skillfully captures a period of time that would change the face of China for another half century.

In Hopkins’ series opening debut, 11-year-old Astrid Crossley, who has “paper-white” skin and “white-blonde” hair, knows no life beyond the dark rhubarb shed where she’s kept safe from unspecified dangers by her mother. Her desperation to see the stars leads to her discovery by Mrs. Wairi, one of the winged Librae. Claiming Astrid is a Librae on the cusp of fledging, Mrs. Wairi whisks her away to a fantastical city above London, which is invisible to unauthorized people. But something is rotten in London Overhead. At Starminster school, unfledged children are treated as lesser. When they stage a protest, the ruthless Headmaster expels them, then exploits them as free labor. Meanwhile, Mama mobilizes London Underfoot to find Astrid, who learns that other children are missing—but where are they? Astrid is a resilient, poignant character who’s struggling with big questions. How could her loving Mama steal her childhood? Why do London Overhead’s mysterious Luddite Overlords treat some citizens so cruelly? Kurtz’ opening two-page spread sketches the city of stone, marble, and flower-shaped buildings hovering above London, but readers may wish for additional illustrations to clarify aspects of the intricately imagined world described in Hopkins’ vivid prose. The story features a multicultural cast, and an appendix describes the birds from around the world whose wings appear on various Librae.

As a teenager, Arden suddenly becomes invisible. After running away in a fit of anger, she wishes she could disappear, and discovers when she returns home that she has done just that. Ten lonely years pass in this way, bringing tragedy after tragedy, while Arden stays close to the friends and family who can’t see her, and tries to find and confront the witch who cursed her. But her mundane, unseen existence is upended when she comes back from a walk to find that her entire village has been razed by dragons, and then confronts the four she finds amid the ashes. These dragons claim that her town’s destruction was not their doing, and insist on taking her back to their den so she can’t reveal their secret. It’s here that Arden starts to feel attraction for the pack’s alpha, Tage, even as she dreams of running away from them to finally reverse the curse she lives under. But even though it’s clear that Tage is just as attracted to Arden, their situation becomes more complicated than either could have imagined when they first met. The third volume in Jordan’s Fire in the Sky series is, unfortunately, disappointing in comparison to her other books, due to overwrought prose and an uneven plot. The first third of the book is entirely focused on Arden’s miserable solitude, and Tage doesn’t even appear until Page 125; from there, the story progresses unevenly, with most of the action saved for the final chapters. Fans who remember Jordan’s Firelight series fondly may enjoy the story anyway, thanks to Arden’s interesting character arc and her steamy insta-chemistry with Tage, but they’ll need to make it halfway through the book to get there.

With only two years left before she turns 18 and ages out, Jonty Blay is determined to win a national championship with her competitive cheerleading team, the Exalted Ones. Now that she’s captain, she’s sure this is the year she’ll achieve her deceased mother’s own dream of winning a National Cheerleaders Association medal with the Exalted Ones. But everything falls apart at the first practice of the season, when Jonty’s teammate Tommie Taylor is found dead. Jonty and her co-captain, Adam Ibrahim, are suspected of murdering her: They were seen having a contentious conversation with Tommie following the captain vote, and physical evidence ties Jonty to the crime scene. With some parents keeping their kids away from the gym out of caution, Jonty and Adam need to figure out how they’ll compete—and also clear their names. Between demanding practices, schoolwork, and amateur sleuthing, Jonty’s cheer season and relationships with her grandmother and friends start to unravel. This captivating story centering on a Black cast is well-paced, with suspense, mystery, drama, and authentic emotions. The novel explores the intensity and pressure of the sport of cheerleading. Jonty also struggles with her identity: Her life has revolved around cheerleading and living up to her mother’s unrealized cheerleading ambitions.

The book opens with unspoken wishes on Tolly’s 13th birthday. Her family is shattered—it’s been six months since her 16-year-old sister, Sunny, died. Tolly grapples with the strangeness of yearning for a “normal” birthday and with the reason that her sister got in a fatal car accident. Tolly, who presents white, wonders whether it was her fault—and whether her parents blame her. Riddled with guilt, the rising eighth grader tries to piece together Sunny’s last day, but for that she needs to find her sister’s phone. Even as the friendships around her change, Tolly is entrusted with running the new Luddite Club at school; although she really wants a phone, she’s one of the rare students not to have one (she lost hers in the aftermath of Sunny’s death). This powerful verse novel brims with poignancy, intricate details, and beautiful sentences, painting a portrait of a guilt-ridden teenager and a family coming to grips with tragedy. Between Tolly’s Luddite Club activities, which lead to unexpected growth, and her need to search her sister’s phone for answers, technology becomes central to the story. A focus on the outdoors, particularly trees—a special interest of Sunny’s—balances the technology element. Divided into four parts, the book is thoughtfully rendered, with complex characters and a plot that etches out the inevitable feeling of lingering guilt that comes in the aftermath of loss.

Siblings Marion and Robert-John Connolly live on an island in the fictional Neagh Archipelago, nicknamed the Ark, a smattering of islands in Lough Neagh exposed by the partial draining of the lake—even in this alternate history, the plan is botched. They are the children of the late RJ Connolly, a renowned anthropologist who moved his family to the Ark in 1972 so he could study the “modern ‘utopia’” that had sprung up there. Shielded from the violence of the Troubles, this community came to house people persecuted on the Mainland, including Catholic-Protestant couples, people of color, and LGBTQ+ people. But when childhood resident and early-career anthropologist Alex Anderson returns in 2016 to conduct research for a book on the Ark, it’s in sharp decline. The lake is polluted by a growing film of toxic algae, and the government wants the cheapest fix: Flood the lake to wash the algae out to sea and resubmerge the islands. The Connollys think Alex’s book could be the godsend they need to save their home. Carson has a talent for crafting uniquely neurotic characters, and the gnarled dynamics between them generate a compelling critique of gender roles and ecological decline in Northern Ireland and beyond. The book’s supernatural elements—including souls in a kind of bardo, women literally comatose with grief, and an island that eats dumped items—seem almost true to life set against the absurdity of the real-life drainage scheme, while also acting as moving manifestations of the idea that buried sins will always find a way to haunt the living.

Generations ago, immortals were cast out of the mortal realm of Gaia and into the Skein. The witches, Lykae, vampires, and Berserkers have all created heavily fortified settlements as bulwarks against invasions from other immortal factions in their new, violent world. Now, the Accession is looming, an intense cycle of warfare and matchmaking that happens every 500 years. The reader is quickly introduced to more than a dozen point-of-view characters. Eight of them quickly develop romantic entanglements that may or may not last through the coming Accession: A young female vampire determined to flee her evil family is paired with a Berserker; her vampire servant bargains with an incubus sent to spy on the vampire clan; a Lykae king recognizes a high priestess from the witch coven as his mate; and the witch and Lykae seconds-in-command drift into an affair. Other primary characters include a pair of Valkyrie sisters as well as assorted allies or enemies across the clans. Cole sinks her considerable storytelling energy into describing the setting and landscape of the Skein and introducing a truly dizzying number of characters, but she makes almost no attempt to create a coherent, overarching plot. Eventually, each of the subplots coalesces and drives toward a single point on the timeline, an upcoming full moon when it’s foretold that a portal to Gaia will open. Cole’s writing is sharp and entertaining, but the sheer number of subplots results in too many characters, and the book feels both rushed and underdeveloped. Cliffhanger endings for each of the plotlines promise to be picked up in future books in the series.

Long before she became the visionary artist Rosie Lee Tompkins, Effie was one of 15 children in a loving, faith-filled family of Black sharecroppers. Fieldwork was grueling, but sewing—taught by her mama—offered refuge. Effie dreamed of leaving the segregated South, where African American children were denied the same education and access as white youths. At 22, Effie moved to California, where she became a nurse, a wife, and a mother. After a mental health crisis led to hospitalization, she returned to sewing as a source of safety and healing. Using unconventional materials like velvet, charmeuse, and even old T-shirts, she broke from traditional quilting conventions to create bold, deeply personal and political works rooted in Black life, faith, memory, and survival. Eventually, collector Leon Eli began sharing Effie’s work with the world under the now-famous name Rosie Lee Tompkins, helping preserve her privacy. While the sparsely worded poetic format makes weighty topics like mental illness and segregation more accessible for younger readers, it leaves less room to dive into what made her quilt designs so groundbreaking and reflect on the broader impact of her work. Moore’s stunningly tactile gouache, watercolor, and collage illustrations are what set this book apart: Richly textured, they echo the layered, improvisational beauty of Effie’s quilts.

Wedge, an award-winning journalist and Boston Herald veteran, opens in media res: It is just past 1 a.m. on January 29, 2022, a nor’easter is burying the South Shore of Massachusetts, and Read is drunk, screaming into O’Keefe’s voicemail. By dawn, he will be found dead in the snow outside a house in Canton owned by a well-connected fellow Boston cop. The question at the center of two trials—did Read strike him with her Lexus SUV, or was he beaten inside the house, attacked by a dog, and dragged out to die?—has never been answered. Wedge is quick to give his credentials to tell this story: He grew up on the South Shore, still calls it home, and has covered the case since the story broke. His dual portraits of the two people at its center are meticulous. O’Keefe, a “forty-six-year-old serial dater” who was “fond of blondes” and not the marrying type, emerges as a complicated, beloved figure—a guy’s guy who nonetheless dropped everything to adopt his niece and nephew after his sister and brother-in-law died just weeks apart in 2013 and 2014. Read, 41 and possessed of a jealous streak, is rendered with equal complexity. The author is at his sharpest, though, cataloguing the media circus that swallowed the proceedings, particularly the role of the “rogue blogger” known as Turtleboy whose controversial and relentless coverage ignited a “Free Karen Read” movement. Most impressively, Wedge keeps the book from tipping into tabloid territory while never losing his grip on the reader; his access to O’Keefe’s family lends the narrative a moral gravity that feels sincere.

Embry Woodcross, who has blue eyes and curly blond hair, is the queen bee at Raven’s Head School for the Magically Gifted. There, Embry works hard to make potions to help her fellow students, as well as playing matchmaker whenever possible. When a new student, “petite and pale” platinum blond vampire Oakley Riddle enrolls in senior year, Embry is instantly intrigued. The work Embry and her best friend, Amethyst Oberon, who’s also a senior prefect, put into making Oakley an it girl comes to a screeching halt when Oakley is found murdered—and Embry is the prime suspect. Suspended from school, Embry turns to the (literal) boy next door, blond, green-eyed Rye Knighton, for help clearing her name. In addition to the many elements that closely follow beats from the film Clueless, Henning’s magical world, in which all sorts of magical creatures from werewolves to zombies to selkies attend a magical school, will feel familiar to fans of the show Wednesday. The writing is fluid, the banter among the friends is fun, and the mystery surrounding Oakley’s death and Embry’s potential involvement make for a good story. There’s some racial diversity among the supporting cast members, including Ames, who has curly black hair and “flawless dark brown skin.”

Ever since an event he’d rather not think about, Adam Gibbons has been afraid of pumpkins. He and his family have relocated to give him a fresh start; unfortunately, his new town is home to a huge annual Halloween celebration featuring pumpkins galore. Bummer. Even worse, Adam is assigned to help his classmate Molly plan this year’s Friday Night Fright Night, a middle school lock-in held the evening before the yearly Pumpkin Festival and which requires a lot of talking about, you guessed it, pumpkins. Molly’s Gramps also owns the farm where the Pumpkin Festival is held, and there’s something odd about this year’s prize pumpkin, the Big-Un. The kids must also contend with Bruce, who thinks Molly sabotaged him in last year’s pumpkin carving contest. Though gourds have always been a popular topic of conversation here, teachers and students start praising the pumpkins with a bizarre fervor—could they be possessed by the pumpkins? Despite his fear, Adam sticks with Molly, her neighbor James, and James' cousin A.J. as they fight to break the evil spell for good. Though the premise is utterly goofy, Payne pulls it off, aided by a quick pace, disgustingly gooey descriptions, and action scenes straight out of classic zombie movies. Adam, Bruce, and Molly read white, while James and A.J. present Black.

When Burke Weathers, Garrett Weathers’ rich and famous author grandfather, dies, his will includes an unusual stipulation: Garrett and his mother will only inherit if they spend a week at Inkwell Point, Burke’s home. When they arrive, 13-year-old Garrett soon learns why locals call it “the Doll House.” Eccentric Burke spent his solitary later years creating a series of wooden marionettes in his attic workshop and hanging their body parts from his back porch. Events soon move from the merely unsettling (finding a marionette in a closet, attached to wires “like a levitating scarecrow”) to the unexplainable (a typewriter producing messages for Garrett without anyone touching the keys) to the outright terrifying (an encounter with whatever that thing is in the basement). But the house has a strange effect on Garrett—he’s seemingly unable to stop himself from helping to bring his grandfather’s diabolical plans to fruition. Even seasoned horror readers will find something new here to give them the creeps; twists on the haunted doll trope abound. White-presenting Garrett’s first-person narration, which occasionally addresses readers directly (“if you’re going to stick with me for this whole story, you’ll have to get on board for some weirdness”), plunges right into the heart of the action.

Between her autism and her fury at Alissa for the suicide, Evie knows she’s not expressing grief in the ways everyone around her expects. Only Alissa’s brother, Ash, seems to understand what Evie needs. He doesn’t mind that she’s skipping track practices and checking out at school. When Ash talks to her about Alissa’s favorite game, the media tie-in Children of Hypnos Online, Evie decides to give it a try. “I get to be somewhere else. I get to be someone else,” Ash says, and to grieving Evie, that sounds perfect. Yet Evie is still very much herself when she plays CoH: studious, determined, and competitive as hell. Classwork and track can wait, because Evie cares only about going on raids with a high-level CoH clan. Between gaming with Ash and sharing his weed gummies, plus their developing romance, Evie’s got all she needs in this post-Alissa world where nothing matters anyway. She rapidly becomes a star player, and Zappia’s illustrations of the CoH characters help make the players’ online world feel real. Evie’s disassociation and carefully cultivated apathy ring painfully true as she recovers from being left behind, coping with a senseless world by burying herself in the video game. Evie, Ash, and Alissa present white.