Saturday, March 28, 2009

Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay



3 stars

Fourteen year old Ned Marriner finds himself in Aix-en-Provence on a shoot with his famous photographer father. While his father and his team are shooting photos of an ancient cathedral, Ned meets Kate, an American exchange student about his age. While Ned and Kate are hanging out together in the cathedral, they meet a very strange man with a knife that threatens them. After the confrontation with the man, Ned gets a very disturbing feeling that overwhelms him while he's looking at a carving of what's supposed to be The Queen of Sheba on a pillar inside the cathedral. These two events set in motion a story that's been going on for centuries and Ned and Kate are now in the middle of it.

I found Ysabel to be a quick, interesting read. I thought the story was quite good, but for some reason, I just felt it could be a little better. Maybe I felt that way because the story had such a young adult feel to it but there were so many elements that could have made it an even better adult story had the author chosen to go in that direction. I would recommend the story to fans of historical fiction with a fantasy or supernatural element to it.

3 comments:

susan said...

It wasn't good because it had a young adult feel? You don't mean to say all YA is lacking are you, Jenn? Or was it disappointing because you expected the novel to be more complex and literary?

Jennifer said...

No. I actually like young adult a lot. Some young adult, like "The Giver" is on my all time favorites list. I just didn't think this one worked as well as a young adult novel as it would have as an adult novel. Maybe I should go back and reword that review, huh?

Jenny Girl said...

Sounds like an adventure. Good for me. Nice review.