It begins! My annual attempt to put up reviews of my favorite finalists from this year’s Round 2 of the Cybils Awards, in which I participated as a judge for Young Adult Speculative Fiction. Some years I’m better at this than others.
Anyway, on to magic and zombies! the first finalist I’m going to post about (these are in no particular order) is Robin Wasley’s engaging fantasy novel Dead Things Are Closer Than They Appear. I quite enjoyed this one–the idea of the undead being created by a failure of magical wards was an intriguing twist, and narrator Sid Spencer was highly relatable. A Korean adoptee, she’s one of very few Asian Americans in her small town (heh, ask my spouse about what that’s like) and, what’s more, she’s one of the few without a magical power to call her own. That’s pretty embarrassing in a town built to protect a magical fault line. Then things start falling apart–literally. Her brother mysteriously disappears, and one of the Guardians of the fault line is murdered, unleashing chaos on the town. Desperate to find her brother, Sid braves the undead, scary vigilantes, a magical forest, and–gasp–friendships and crushes (as if the other stuff wasn’t enough) to help save her world.
The story was action-packed from start to finish, with enough (but not too much) romance and nicely complex friendship and family themes to round it out. The idea of a power changing as the person changes, and being in some way reflective of the person’s soul, is something I really loved. The main character’s background as a Korean adoptee was well handled—not the focus of the story, but still important, and depicted with nuance. Sid’s brother is also a Korean adoptee but is not related to her by blood, and they have a sibling who’s a biological child of their parents. Having known families that are similarly composed of both adopted/foster and biological children, I suspect this is a more common occurrence than people might think, and it deserves representation in books for young readers. Dead Things presented this sensitively and relatably, depicting the idea of family in a number of different ways, from adopted siblings to half-siblings and blended families and step-parents.
I really liked this book overall—I was absorbed by both the ordinary and extraordinary plot developments, and the story’s premise hooked me pretty quickly. Where I got hung up just a little was with respect to how the magic system worked; I had moments of confusion, and occasional questions would pop up in my mind as I read, which is something that tends to take me out of a story. However, that was something that affected me more as a Cybils judge than as a reader, if that makes sense–if I’d just picked this up as a regular reader, it might not have been something to remark upon. (Having said that, this book slipped past my radar last year, so I’m really glad that it was brought to my attention as a finalist!) So, yes, I liked it a lot and think it would appeal to fans of magical fantasy in contemporary settings, as well as readers who enjoy the trope of the ordinary girl who saves the world. (*Raises hand*)
