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Searching... Monmouth Public Library | YA Fic Neumeier, R. 2008 | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
THE KINGDOM'S HEART is the City. The City's heart is the King. The King's heart is the Prince. The Prince is missing.
Ever since the Prince disappeared, nothing has been right in the Kingdom. Something has disturbed the strange, old magic that whispers around its borders . . . something cunning and powerful. And the disturbance extends to the farthest reaches of the Kingdom, including the idyllic village where Timou is learning to be a mage under her father's tutelage.
When Timou's father journeys to the City to help look for the Prince, but never returns, Timou senses that the disturbance in the Kingdom is linked to her--and to the undiscovered heritage of the mother she never knew. She must leave her village, even if it means confronting powers greater than her own, even though what she finds may challenge everything she knows. Even if it means leaving love behind.
Author Notes
RACHEL NEUMEIER is the author of several fantasy novels for both adults and young adults, including The Floating Islands . The City in the Lake was both her first novel and her first YA.
From the Paperback edition.
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 8 Up-King Drustan's heir has vanished. With Prince Cassiel missing, nothing is right: the trees do not bear fruit and babies are stillborn. Attempting to unravel this mystery is Neill, the King's elder son known throughout court as "the Bastard," and Timou, a 17-year-old mage who has learned her art from her father. Though Neill and Timou have never met, they share a common origin: an enigmatic woman with pale hair and dark eyes who bore them to their respective fathers before vanishing. When she does return, this powerful sorceress is bent on using her offspring and her magic to seize control of the Kingdom. This poetically written tale follows its multi-threaded story line through sinister forests, mazes of light, and numerous worlds, including a different facet of the Kingdom-a perfect realm frozen in time and reflected in the lake surrounding the City. Though the how and why of all of this is sometimes vague, Neumeier spins a good tale of two young people coming to terms with a sinister heritage. Give this one to readers who enjoy the dark, dreamlike fantasy of Neil Gaiman.-Christi Esterle, Parker Library, CO (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Neumeier weaves an elaborate, albeit slow, tale of magic, legitimacy and love. The Kingdom is in great despair after Prince Cassiel mysteriously disappears. When the King also goes missing, the Queen accuses Cassiel's half-brother and the King's illegitimate son, Lord Neill, of kidnapping them to gain the throne. Meanwhile, on the other side of the forest, Timou's father, a gifted mage, journeys to the City (I think it is with the heart of the Kingdom that this trouble lies, he tells Timou. I think perhaps the heart has been... lost). When he doesn't return, Timou, who has unique magical abilities, leaves her new lover, and sets out to find her father. Instead she meets her half-brother and learns the terrible truth about her sorceress mother and the power of the City in the Lake. Neumeier creates explosive and dynamic female characters, but unfortunately, some story details are not clear. A slow pace and repetitive lyrical language also make it difficult to follow the complex plot. Ages 12-up. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
A lyrical fantasy weaves several threads and layers together. In the City, mirrored by a parallel, timeless City below the lake, the Prince is missing. The Prince is the heart of the King, the King's the heart of the City and the City's the heart of the Kingdom--so the whole Kingdom is cursed. Mages search behind every slant of light, but the Prince has vanished. Across the countryside, every human and animal baby is stillborn. A young woman named Timou follows her father from their village through an enchanted forest to the City. Lord Bastard, the King's non-heir son, searches for the Prince, but the narrative keeps him at arm's length from the reader, his intentions unknown. Neumeier lovingly details the village scenes with tender simplicity. Unfortunately, intermittent surreal passages that include a thunderous Hunter in the sky and a river of blood flowing through a maze of light slow the plot down. Inconsistently paced, but thoughtful and lovely. (Fantasy. 12 & up) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* The City in the Lake is a robust, prosperous kingdom until Prince Cassiel vanishes. Beloved by all, the prince represents the kingdom's heart, and after his disappearance, life withers throughout the land. In a remote village, 17-year-old Timou's father, a mage, departs for the city to search for the source of the kingdom's malaise, and when he doesn't return, Timou sets off after him. Her journey requires her, for the first time, to draw heavily on her own mage training, and as she circles closer to the kingdom's mysteries, she finds shocking personal connections and, ultimately, love. Neumeier structures her story around archetypal fantasy elements: mages, magic, and a protagonist whose perilous quest serves as her coming-of-age. It's the poetic, shimmering language and fascinating unfolding of worlds that elevates this engrossing story beyond its formula. Layered within each other, the discovered kingdoms pulse with enchantments and ancient laws, and Neumeier's language is particularly poetic in describing her characters' ever-shifting forms, whether shattered planes of light to ethereal columns of smoke. Fans of Sharon Shinn's books will find a similar celebration of the natural world from the dense darkness of a forest to the crystalline music of the stars in this vividly imagined debut.--Engberg, Gillian Copyright 2008 Booklist