A skinful of shadows

Format:

Book

Title:

A skinful of shadows

Author:

Hardinge, Frances author

ISBN:

9781419725722

9781419733765

Publication:

New York : Amulet Books, [2017]

Physical Description:

415 pages ; 22 cm

General Note:

Originally published in hardcover by Macmillan Publishers Limited, United Kingdom, in 2017.

Summary:

In the 1640s during the English Civil War, the twelve-year-old illegitimate daughter of an aristocratic family shares their unique hereditary gift: the capacity to be possessed by ghosts.

1640s, during the English Civil War. The illegitimate daughter of the aristocratic Fellmotte family, Makepeace shares their unique hereditary gift: the capacity to be possessed by ghosts. She is reluctant to accept this destiny, and flees across war-torn England. Accumulating a motley crew including outcasts, misfits, criminals, and one extremely angry dead bear, she must decide which is worse: possession-- or death.

Reading Level:

HL800L Lexile.

Program Information:

Accelerated Reader 5.9.

Subject(s):

Spirit possession -- Juvenile fiction.

Girls -- Juvenile fiction.

Family secrets -- Juvenile fiction.

Friendship -- Juvenile fiction.

Fantasy.

Spirit possession -- Fiction.

Supernatural -- Fiction.

Ghosts -- Fiction.

Families -- Fiction.

Inheritance and succession -- Fiction.

Identity -- Fiction.

Great Britain -- History -- Civil War, 1642-1649 -- Juvenile fiction.

Great Britain -- History -- Civil War, 1642-1649 -- Fiction.

Geographic Term:

Great Britain -- History -- Civil War, 1642-1649 -- Juvenile fiction.

Great Britain -- History -- Civil War, 1642-1649 -- Fiction.

Genre:

Holds:

Available:*

Library	Call Number	Status
Searching... Salem Main Library	TEEN Hardinge, F.	Searching... Unknown
Searching... Silver Falls Library	YA HARDINGE	Searching... Unknown
Searching... Willamina Public Library	YA Hardinge, F.	Searching... Unknown

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Summary

From the award-winning author of The Lie Tree , Frances Hardinge offers "a delicious combination of historical adventure, coming-of-age tale, and supernatural intrigue" ( Publishers Weekly , starred review).

Sometimes, when a person dies, their spirit goes looking for somewhere to hide. Some people have space within them, perfect for hiding.

Young Makepeace has learned to defend herself from the ghosts that try to possess her in the night, desperate for refuge, but one day a dreadful event causes her to drop her guard. And now there's a spirit inside her. The spirit is wild, brutish, and strong, and it may be her only defense when she is sent to live with her father's rich and powerful family. There is talk of civil war, and they need people like her to protect their dark and terrible family secret. But as she plans to escape and heads out into a country torn apart by war, Makepeace must decide which is worse: possession--or death.

"Darkly splendid . . . a wonderful, resonant narrative whose subtlety and insight will challenge, entertain and enchant." -- The Guardian

" A Skinful of Shadows is outlandishly creative and thoroughly blood-chilling. Her storytelling is visceral and unfurls at an exciting pace, making this novel a wonderful, weird and terrifying addition to her body of work." -- Shelf Awareness (starred review)

"A book that only Hardinge could write . . . [a] masterful and spooky historical fantasy." -- School Library Journal (starred review)

"Hardinge's writing is stunning, and readers will be taken hostage by its intensity, fascinating developments, and the fierce, compassionate girl leading the charge." -- Booklist (starred review)

"Deliberate, impeccable, and extraordinary." -- Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

Author Notes

Frances Hardinge was born in 1973 in the United Kingdom. Her first novel, Fly By Night, won the Bradford Boase Award in 2006. Her other books include Verdigris Deep / Well Witched, Twilight Robbery, and A Face Like Glass. Cuckoo Song won the Robert Holdstock Award for Best Novel at the British Fantasy Awards in 2015 and The Lie Tree won the 2015 Costa Book of the Year award.

(Bowker Author Biography)

Reviews (3)

Publisher's Weekly Review

As the English Civil War gains momentum, a girl named Makepeace Lightfoot attempts to uncover the shadowy secrets of her family history after her mother is killed. To do so, she travels to Grizehayes, the ancestral home of the father she never knew, where she learns that the aristocratic Fellmottes are able to possess ghosts within them, bringing them preternatural knowledge and strength. Thanks to her Fellmotte lineage, Makepeace comes to harbor several spirits within her, and she takes on as many external personas-servant, spy, medic, prophet-as she attempts to escape (and eventually bring down) the Fellmottes, who see her little more than a vessel. Hardinge, whose The Lie Tree was the 2015 Costa Book of the Year, crafts a delicious combination of historical adventure, coming-of-age tale, and supernatural intrigue, set amid power struggles that reshaped 17th-century England. Makepeace's evolving relationships with the ghosts embodied within her are fascinating and moving (differentiated fonts make these internal conversations easy to follow), highlighting her growing compassion despite being given few reasons to trust anyone in her young life. Ages 13-up. (Oct.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

Kirkus Review

In 17th-century England, a girl faces civil unrest, conflicting Christianities, and a family inheritance more horrific than she could have dreamed.Makepeace has nightmares, so Mother banishes her to an abandoned chapel to practice fighting off the dead people who are trying to enter her mind. Upon Mother's death, Makepeace is sent to the Fellmottes, family of the father she never knew. Grizehayes is a "graceless and vast" house, the wealthy family's "arrogance made stone.proof of their centuries." The Fellmottes treat her as a servant and prevent her escape: they need her as a spare receptacle for generations of family ghosts. But if Makepeace's body inherits the ghosts, her own consciousness may not survive. Doggedly ingenious and stolid, Makepeace grabs every scrap of agency she can findeven when ghosts do share her mind, invited or not, human or beast. She escapes Grizehayes, but the Fellmottes hunt her through city and countryside, through both sides of the unfolding English civil war, through the disguises she keeps changing. Powerlessness, poverty, and integrity are major themes, built on a subtle yet stubborn underlying warmth. Hardinge's plot is both unpredictable and rock-solid, her settings full of smells, her imagery vivid: "A shocked silence pooled like blood." All characters are white and English.Deliberate, impeccable, and extraordinary. (Historical fantasy. 12-15) Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Booklist Review

*Starred Review* In her first novel since The Lie Tree (2016), Hardinge again summons history and fantasy, intermingling them in a most unusual way. Set against a backdrop of the English Civil War, the story opens in a small Puritan village, where a girl named Makepeace wrestles with vivid nightmares. When her mother is accidentally killed, the girl is sent to her father's family, of whom she knows nothing. The Fellmottes, it turns out, are an old aristocratic clan with an insidious secret they are able to house the spirits of the dead, a gift they have twisted, and the inherited cause of Makepeace's clawing nightmares. The narrative opens slowly as Hardinge lays deliberate groundwork and conjures a palpably eerie atmosphere, which mounts in horror as the story progresses. It picks up after Makepeace, now 15, has spent two years as a kitchen girl at the Fellmotte estate, gathering information about the family. The plot becomes populated by spymistresses whose ranks Makepeace fleetingly joins and vengeful spirits, and is punctuated by her escape attempts and wartime battles. Yet much of the action unfolds in Makepeace's head, as she acquires her own coterie of ghosts, most memorably that of an ill-treated bear. Hardinge's writing is stunning, and readers will be taken hostage by its intensity, fascinating developments, and the fierce, compassionate girl leading the charge.--Smith, Julia Copyright 2017 Booklist