Blog Archives
The Marigold Bridge
The Marigold Bridge, by Arien Skye, is a young adult paranormal fantasy with mystery, romance, and thriller elements woven through it. The story follows Araceli, a wealthy young woman in San Miguel de Allende, whose life collapses after her father is presumed dead and a dangerous family takes control of her home. As El Día de los Muertos opens the veil between the living and the dead, Araceli must use the spiritual gifts she has resisted to uncover the truth, protect her family, and decide what kind of person she wants to become.
What I appreciated most was how the book lets Araceli begin in a place that is not especially noble. She is spoiled, image-conscious, and used to comfort, but Skye does not flatten her into a cliché. Her fall from privilege is sharp and sometimes messy, but that mess is what makes her interesting. I liked watching her grief change her. Not magically. Not cleanly. It comes through anger, fear, pride, stubborn hope, and the slow realization that power is not the same thing as status.
The story really works when it leans into atmosphere and family. The marigolds, candles, food, perfume oils, ancestral voices, and festival scenes give the book a vivid texture without pulling it away from the plot. I also liked the author’s choice to make Araceli’s gift feel both sacred and inconvenient. The story is big and dramatic with villains who can feel almost operatic and plot turns that move fast. But for this genre, that heightened energy mostly works. It gives the book the feel of a supernatural telenovela mixed with a coming-of-age mystery, and I mean that as a compliment.
I would recommend The Marigold Bridge to readers who enjoy YA paranormal fantasy with strong family stakes, a touch of romance, and a heroine who has to be humbled before she can become brave. It will especially appeal to readers who like stories about ancestral magic, hidden corruption, revenge, and healing after loss. The book is emotional, stylish, and sincere, with enough suspense to keep the pages turning and enough heart to make Araceli’s journey matter.
Pages: 322 | ASIN : B0GX2XVJZQ
Pentagon Pirate Gang & The Poisoned Apple
Pentagon Pirate Gang & The Poisoned Apple, by J W Nelson, is a middle-grade/YA fantasy adventure that returns readers to the School of Fruit Teaching, where Aime, Oro, Semia, Gramon, and Violer find themselves caught in a dangerous mystery involving poisoned students, hidden notebooks, secret orchards, and adults who may not be as trustworthy as they seem. The story begins with alarm and urgency, as Aime and Oro’s parents sense that something terrible has happened to their children, and from there the book unfolds into a school-based adventure full of games, clues, rival houses, strange powers, and a deeper conspiracy tied to Mrs Blackfruit, Mr Thornby, and the mysterious red notebooks.
I enjoyed the way Nelson leans fully into the oddness of his world. SOFT isn’t just a school with a fantasy twist. It has its own rules, sports, rivalries, food-based language, and hidden dangers tucked behind everyday routines. That made the setting feel lively and a little eccentric, like a place where a normal breakfast can suddenly become part of a bigger mystery. The writing is busy, but there is charm in that energy. I could feel the author’s affection for the students, especially in the way the members of the Pentagon Pirate Gang look out for one another even when they are frightened, confused, or keeping secrets they do not fully understand.
I also found myself thinking about the author’s choice to make the adults so central to the danger and the protection in the story. Mrs Blackfruit and Mr Thornby bring real menace to the book, while Mrs Peaches, Mr Figgin, and Mr Tumbleweed give the children just enough support to keep going without taking the adventure away from them. That balance matters in a fantasy adventure for younger readers. The kids still have to be brave. They still have to make choices. They still have to face the emotional cost of secrets, especially near the end when the arrival of the governing body opens old wounds for Gramon and Semia. That final turn surprised me because it shifts the book from mystery and action into something more personal. Suddenly, the adventure is not only about maps and poison. It’s about family, trust, and what children are not told until the truth is standing right in front of them.
I would recommend Pentagon Pirate Gang & The Poisoned Apple to readers who enjoy middle-grade and young YA fantasy adventure with school rivalries, secret societies, hidden maps, strange magic, and a strong team of young heroes at the center. It will especially appeal to readers who like stories that mix playful worldbuilding with danger and who don’t mind a plot that leaves some threads open for the next stage of the journey. It’s imaginative, sincere, and full of movement, with a sense that the orchard still has plenty of secrets left to give.
Pages: 219 | ISBN : 978-1037120787
A Mystical Time
Indigo, The Deep follows a group of people united by the strange magic that gathers around Dipitous Beach during the autumn equinox. What draws you to write for teen and young adult readers?
Coming-of-age stories are where I’ve found joy and consolation throughout my life. Teen stories are the great connectors of the generations. If we’re young, we’re living it; if we’re older, we’ve passed through it, hopefully with a few helpful lessons learned. I love writing about the sparkling energy of teens, reminding all of us to stay curious and embrace new perspectives. After all, life is a bold adventure, laced with grief and pain, but ripe with wonder-filled mysteries and happy surprises, too.
What drew you to setting the story around the autumn equinox and its sense of transformation?
Ah, the changing of the seasons is a mystical time. The shift in light, weather, and tides alters human rhythms, calling us to what we cannot comprehend. Nature smiles, taps us on the shoulder, and whispers in the wind… everything, you know, is always changing. The tide folds, the light blends, shrinking the long light-infused days of summer into the golden days of autumn. During the equinox, the scene is brilliantly set for mystery. The turning of the seasons is when the magic happens!
What did you enjoy most about writing the bond between Condi and Firth?
Condi and Firth are thrown together in an unlikely set of circumstances. When they resist their uncomfortable living situation and see one another as only annoying, a palpable tension arises. I love writing about tension and how it often leads to growth! When Triponica, the wise leader of the Beachlings, points out that Condi and Firth are very much the same, the story begins to change. Firth, fearless and reckless, dives into the deepest of the sea caverns, determined to push his limits. Condi, hoping to mend a broken heart, takes unnecessary risks with her surfing. As the story unwinds, we come to know that Triponica was right. Their bond is unmistakable.
What is the next book you are working on, and when will it be available?
The next book in the series takes us back in time. What the Surf Master Knows explores life in Dipitous Beach in the seventies. Triponica, mysterious leader of the Beachlings, is a young healer. Andy Marshall, the enigmatic surf master, and Grand Ella, Condi’s insightful yoga teacher grandmother, are teens. Once again, they are swept into strange adventures, encountering the ocean’s wild and mercurial magic.
The prospective release date is the summer of 2027.
Author Links: GoodReads | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Instagram | Website | Amazon
Fifteen-year-old Condi Bloom knows the magic will happen again. The autumn equinox is looming. Strange currents are sweeping through her coastal town. Tides are turning wild, and a mercurial mist cloaks the lonely rock tower known as Windy Hollow, long believed to be haunted.
When a silent threat glides into the cove, altering the fragile ecosystem and drawing sharks close to shore, Condi ignores the danger. A fierce surfer, she insists on pushing her skills to the limit, hoping to heal a broken heart. Meanwhile, seventeen-year-old Firth Cristo, a bold free diver, is tormented by a past he cannot reveal. Guided by the Beachlings, the mystical women who teach the secrets of the deep, he dares to explore remote underwater sea caverns, navigating the pulsing tides of a shimmering enchantment.
Inspired by the certainty of wonder and the uncertain nature of time, Condi and Firth dive into their rawest places, discovering that healing-of nature, of others, and of themselves-is found in the bounty of a limitless sea.
Born of Empire
Born of Empire, by S.A. Melia, is a science fiction thriller about power, inheritance, loyalty, and survival inside a richly imagined empire. The story follows Guy Erma, an unregistered Domeside orphan desperate to join the Dome Militant, and Prince Teodor, the young heir whose life is wrapped in politics, danger, and expectation. Around them are fashion houses, alien diplomacy, cyborg soldiers, royal secrets, and a growing sense that the empire’s polished surface is hiding something much darker.
What struck me first was the sheer density of the world. Melia throws the reader into a society that feels strange but lived-in, where military ritual sits beside high fashion, and royal ceremony can turn into a trap before anyone has time to breathe. I liked how the book doesn’t treat its young characters as simple symbols. Guy is proud, hungry, reckless, and easy to root for, even when he makes bad choices. Teodor, meanwhile, carries privilege, fear, grief, and duty in a way that makes him more than just “the prince.” I think that contrast gives the story a solid emotional spine.
I also found myself thinking a lot about the author’s choices. The sci-fi thriller elements work best when the danger feels personal, not just political. The Battle Borgs, the Dome, the kidnapped prince, and the shadowy deals all add tension, but the moments that stayed with me were quieter ones, like Guy holding Teodor’s shoes and realizing what he has seen, or Marline facing the brutal limits of her own future. Those scenes give the book its bite. At times, the worldbuilding is a lot to take in, and I occasionally wanted more room to sit with one thread before another arrived. Still, there is an energy here that kept pulling me forward.
I would recommend Born of Empire to readers who enjoy science fiction thrillers with royal intrigue, political danger, young heroes under pressure, and a world that feels big enough to keep unfolding after the final page. Fans of space opera, dystopian power struggles, and stories about outsiders trying to claim a place in a rigged system will likely find a lot to enjoy here. It is ambitious, fast-moving, and full of sharp edges.
Pages: 259 | ASIN : B0BY7QBQJF
The Kikiloa Chronicles
The Kikiloa Chronicles: Book One, by Erik D. Larson, is a young adult science fiction/fantasy adventure about Hazel, an ordinary San Francisco teen whose strange friend Kiki turns out to be anything but ordinary. Kiki is ancient, playful, wounded, and tangled in time, and she pulls Hazel, Lee, Peter, and others into a story that stretches from the present day to deep prehistory, Hawaiʻi, possible futures, and branching versions of reality. This is a genre-blending book about friendship, justice, choice, and whether love can still be love when it tries too hard to control the outcome.
What stood out to me first was the energy of the writing. Larson gives the book a quick, bright pulse. One moment, it feels like a teen adventure with jokes, awkward crushes, and friends trying to make sense of the impossible. The next, it opens wide into something much older and stranger, with scenes that move across oceans, extinction, violence, grief, and human history. Kiki’s voice is especially interesting because she can be funny and reckless on the surface, but underneath that spark is someone carrying an almost unbearable amount of memory. She’s charming, but she’s not simple. That made me keep watching her closely.
I also found myself thinking about the author’s choices around power and responsibility. The time travel and multiverse elements are fun, but the book isn’t only interested in clever mechanics. It keeps circling back to moral questions. What does it mean to help someone? When does protection become manipulation? Can you claim to be acting out of love while taking away another person’s choice? Those ideas gave the story weight. The book takes big swings, moving from playful banter to deep reflection very quickly. For me, that ambition was part of the appeal. The story feels restless in a good way, like it’s always reaching for a larger pattern.
I would recommend The Kikiloa Chronicles: Book One to readers who enjoy young adult speculative fiction with time travel, found family, philosophical questions, and a strong emotional core. It’ll especially appeal to people who like science fiction and fantasy that mixes humor with heavier themes and doesn’t mind a story that asks them to think while the adventure is unfolding. It’s imaginative, sincere, and bigger on the inside than it first appears.
Pages: 401 | ASIN : B0GX314D3J
Indigo, The Deep
Indigo, the Deep is a coastal fantasy about young people, old healers, marine life, grief, courage, and the strange magic that gathers around Dipitous Beach during the autumn equinox. Kellye Abernathy builds the story around the ocean as both a setting and a living force. The cove has dolphins, tide pools, sea caves, a research sanctuary, surfboards with mysterious marks, and a looming biomedical ship that threatens the balance of the water. At the center are Condi, Firth, Marley, Isaac, Tad, Lorelei, Kait, and the Beachlings, each tied to the sea in a different way.
The book has a dreamy, sensory style that fits its world well. The ocean is never just scenery. It teaches, warns, hides, reveals, and heals. One of the simplest lines captures the book’s whole rhythm: “The sea will do what the sea will do.” That idea runs through the story as characters learn that control is limited, but attention, trust, and bravery still matter. Abernathy’s descriptions are lush without feeling detached from the plot, especially when the story moves through caverns, reefs, storms, and underwater passages.
Firth and Condi give the book much of its emotional pull. Their bond grows through risk, stubbornness, rescue, and shared wonder, and their different ways of meeting the water make them interesting together. Firth’s free diving and connection to Triponica bring in the book’s healing traditions, while Condi’s surfing and grief connect her to the past and to the people she’s still learning how to love. The supporting characters add warmth too, especially Tad, whose emotional colors give his scenes a tender honesty.
What makes the novel feel distinct is the way it blends environmental danger with personal healing. The threat from the pharmaceutical ship gives the story urgency, but the book is just as invested in quieter battles: letting go, growing up, protecting someone vulnerable, and making peace with loss. The line “The people that we love never leave us” sums up the heart of the novel without flattening it. Love in this book isn’t simple comfort. It’s a current that keeps moving, sometimes pulling characters into hard truths before carrying them forward.
Indigo, the Deep is a warm, mystical, ocean-soaked story with a strong sense of place and a generous heart. It’s the kind of book that invites readers to slow down and listen, not only to the characters but to the tides, animals, dreams, and old stories around them. Abernathy gives Dipitous Beach the feeling of a place where ordinary life and wonder keep brushing against each other, and by the end, that wonder feels earned.
Pages: 298 | ASIN : B0H3M8TGHD
Mari’s Light Burning Bright
Kaitlyn Marquart’s Mari’s Light Burning Bright is a young adult contemporary fiction novel about Mari, a teenage girl trying to live with memories of childhood abuse, self-harm, a family move, and the fear that she may never feel whole again. As the sequel to Amber Luna My Bright Light, the book follows Mari after Camp Evergreen as she enters Northstar Wellness Center, meets other young people carrying their own pain, and slowly begins to understand that healing is not a straight path. It is messy. It is brave. And sometimes it starts with simply letting someone sit beside you.
Mari’s voice is raw without feeling forced, and Marquart gives her room to be angry, funny, scared, judgmental, tender, and wrong. I appreciated that. Teenagers are not tidy people, especially teenagers in crisis, and the book does not try to polish Mari into someone instantly inspirational. Her thoughts loop, flare, retreat, and return. That rhythm felt honest to me. The scenes at Northstar could have easily become heavy in a flat way, but the author balances them with small flashes of humor and human detail, like Scrabble games, awkward meals, and characters who are much more than the reasons they are there.
I also found myself thinking a lot about the author’s choices around faith, family, and recovery. Mari’s Mormon background is not treated as a simple answer or a simple problem, which makes the story more interesting. Her family loves her, but they often miss what she is trying to say. That hurt to read because it felt real. People can care and still fail to understand. The book is candid about pain, but it is careful with it. It doesn’t turn Mari’s suffering into a spectacle. Instead, it keeps asking a quieter question: what does it take for someone to believe she is worth saving when shame has been speaking louder than everyone else? The answer comes slowly, through therapy, friendship, memory, music, and the fragile courage to try again.
I would recommend Mari’s Light Burning Bright to readers who appreciate reflective young adult fiction with emotional depth, especially stories about mental health, trauma recovery, friendship, and finding a voice after silence. It’s not a light read, and readers sensitive to self-harm or childhood abuse should approach it with care. But for those who value hopeful, character-driven fiction that understands healing as a long walk rather than a sudden rescue, this book has a steady glow.
Pages: 153 | ASIN : B0H56ZX1V8
The Great Contagion: A Merliss Tale
The Great Contagion is a fantasy novel about Merliss, an ancient and sharp-witted cat with a human soul, who helps a cunning man and his apprentice face a deadly sickness spreading through the Westerlands. As the illness worsens, Merliss and Fendrel are pulled into a dangerous mix of plague, politics, old magic, monsters, and fear. At its heart, this is a fantasy adventure about healing, survival, and the strange loyalty that can grow between people and creatures who do not always understand each other.
What I enjoyed most was how grounded the fantasy feels. Jeff Chapman gives the world a lived-in texture, with herb jars, river paths, sickrooms, sheep farms, old grudges, and weather that seems to press against every scene. The magical elements are there, of course, with pookas, ley gates, goblins, and blood magic, but they don’t t float above the story. They feel rooted in the dirt. Merliss is the reason the book works as well as it does for me. She’s funny, proud, wounded, and practical, and seeing the world through her senses gives the story a fresh angle. A plague story could easily become grim in a flat way, but Merliss keeps it alert and alive.
I also appreciated the author’s choice to let the danger come from several directions at once. The contagion is frightening, but so are suspicion, class cruelty, political power, and ordinary selfishness. The Lord Sheriff’s harshness and the villagers’ fear make the sickness feel bigger than medicine alone. That said, the book asks for patience. It spends time on travel, observation, and small exchanges, and not every reader will want that slower, watchful pace. I did. There were moments when I wanted the plot to tighten, but I also understood the tradeoff. The story is built like a cat moving through tall grass, stopping, listening, circling, then suddenly striking.
I would recommend The Great Contagion to readers who enjoy character-driven fantasy with folklore, healing lore, animal perspectives, and a medieval atmosphere. It will especially appeal to those who like their fantasy thoughtful rather than flashy, with danger that feels physical and moral at the same time. Readers looking for nonstop action may find it measured, but readers who enjoy a strange and clever heroine and a world full of old magic will likely settle in and stay.
Pages: 347 | ASIN : B082F32BHF
