Gleefully iconoclastic. For that dwindling demographic with a sense of humor about religion, Maeve’s profane skewering of...
Third in Cunningham’s irreverent chronicle of Mary Magdalen (Magdalen Rising, 2007, etc.).
Maeve (aka the Healer Woman, aka Mary of Magdala) is back, as unapologetically lusty and smart-mouthed as ever. This installment considers the aftermath of Mary’s marriage to Jesus. Christ is always with her, but in less corporeal form. Newly resurrected, he’s left a motley crew behind to cobble together Christianity: pregnant Maeve, fractious Apostles, mother-in-law Miriam and friends Martha, Mary of Bethany and Lazarus. Knowing that Peter and James are scheming to appropriate Jesus’ offspring, Maeve flees Jerusalem for her sacred bordello/Temple of Isis in Magdala, Galilee. After giving birth to a girl, Sarah, with golden eyes identical to her father’s, Maeve heads for Celtic territory, Galatia, where she hides out in a mountain shack with baby Sarah and the endearingly loopy Miriam, who hears angel voices and croons litanies to herself. Androgynous Sarah does not welcome puberty. Itinerant, self-appointed Apostle Paul, battered by stoning, is deposited on Maeve’s doorstep, and she administers her healing touch, which includes a brief hook-up with the puritanical future saint. When he orders the Galatian women to be silent and quashes a snake-worshiping fest honoring fertility goddess Brigit, Paul triggers a major brouhaha. Sarah embarks on the trail of her absent-though-omnipresent father, and Maeve follows, too late: The Apostles, fooled by Sarah’s male attire, tried to circumcise her, and now she’s gone to sea. Maeve, sought after by sailors for her ability to manipulate the wind, traverses the Mediterranean in fruitless pursuit. Then, with Miriam, Maeve journeys to Ephesus, shrine of huntress-deity Artemis, the logical place for a band of neo-Amazon pirates led by Sarah to wash up. In Ephesus, Miriam prepares for her Assumption; Paul once again sets precedents for Church-sanctioned sexism; and 50-something Maeve takes a lover—John the Evangelist.
Gleefully iconoclastic. For that dwindling demographic with a sense of humor about religion, Maeve’s profane skewering of the all-too-human foibles of the Church fathers is a hoot.Pub Date: April 1, 2009
ISBN: 978-0-9798828-7-6
Page Count: 474
Publisher: Monkfish
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2009
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.
A tightly wound caseworker is pushed out of his comfort zone when he’s sent to observe a remote orphanage for magical children.
Linus Baker loves rules, which makes him perfectly suited for his job as a midlevel bureaucrat working for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, where he investigates orphanages for children who can do things like make objects float, who have tails or feathers, and even those who are young witches. Linus clings to the notion that his job is about saving children from cruel or dangerous homes, but really he’s a cog in a government machine that treats magical children as second-class citizens. When Extremely Upper Management sends for Linus, he learns that his next assignment is a mission to an island orphanage for especially dangerous kids. He is to stay on the island for a month and write reports for Extremely Upper Management, which warns him to be especially meticulous in his observations. When he reaches the island, he meets extraordinary kids like Talia the gnome, Theodore the wyvern, and Chauncey, an amorphous blob whose parentage is unknown. The proprietor of the orphanage is a strange but charming man named Arthur, who makes it clear to Linus that he will do anything in his power to give his charges a loving home on the island. As Linus spends more time with Arthur and the kids, he starts to question a world that would shun them for being different, and he even develops romantic feelings for Arthur. Lambda Literary Award–winning author Klune (The Art of Breathing, 2019, etc.) has a knack for creating endearing characters, and readers will grow to love Arthur and the orphans alongside Linus. Linus himself is a lovable protagonist despite his prickliness, and Klune aptly handles his evolving feelings and morals. The prose is a touch wooden in places, but fans of quirky fantasy will eat it up.
A breezy and fun contemporary fantasy.Pub Date: March 17, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-250-21728-8
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Tor
Review Posted Online: Nov. 10, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 1, 2019
PERSPECTIVES
A charming and persuasive entry that will leave readers impatiently awaiting the concluding volume.
Book 2 of Hearne's latest fantasy trilogy, The Seven Kennings (A Plague of Giants, 2017), set in a multiracial world thrust into turmoil by an invasion of peculiar giants.
In this world, most races have their own particular magical endowment, or “kenning,” though there are downsides to trying to gain the magic (an excellent chance of being killed instead) and using it (rapid aging and death). Most recently discovered is the sixth kenning, whose beneficiaries can talk to and command animals. The story canters along, although with multiple first-person narrators, it's confusing at times. Some characters are familiar, others are new, most of them with their own problems to solve, all somehow caught up in the grand design. To escape her overbearing father and the unreasoning violence his kind represents, fire-giant Olet Kanek leads her followers into the far north, hoping to found a new city where the races and kennings can peacefully coexist. Joining Olet are young Abhinava Khose, discoverer of the sixth kenning, and, later, Koesha Gansu (kenning: air), captain of an all-female crew shipwrecked by deep-sea monsters. Elsewhere, Hanima, who commands hive insects, struggles to free her city from the iron grip of wealthy, callous merchant monarchists. Other threads focus on the Bone Giants, relentless invaders seeking the still-unknown seventh kenning, whose confidence that this can defeat the other six is deeply disturbing. Under Hearne's light touch, these elements mesh perfectly, presenting an inventive, eye-filling panorama; satisfying (and, where appropriate, well-resolved) plotlines; and tensions between the races and their kennings to supply much of the drama.
A charming and persuasive entry that will leave readers impatiently awaiting the concluding volume.Pub Date: Feb. 4, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-345-54857-3
Page Count: 592
Publisher: Del Rey/Ballantine
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
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