Aldridge, Athan M. EstrangedAugust 7th 2018 by HarperCollins
ARC provided by publisher at ALA Midwinter
In the World Below, Childe is a status symbol for his royal parents, an oddity because he is human rather than Fae. Edmund, with whom he changed places, lives in the human world but has trouble connecting to it. When the two meet and figure out their past histories, both of their lives make more sense. Unfortunately, Edmund's parents have been transformed into rats by the evil Hawthorne, which has forced Childe to travel to the world above. The two get to know each other's world for a while, but there is evil encroaching, and they must find a way to stop it. With the help of Alexis, their sister, they have quite an adventure.Accompanied by Whicks, a servant Childe has created, they buy a map, find out how many magic powers they have, restore the true love of a witch, and try to locate Hawthorne and put her in her place. In the meantime, the boys try to decide what their own identities and places in the worlds should be.
Strengths: This is certainly a very beautiful graphic novel with an interesting story about personal identity. I did enjoy Alexis a lot, as well as her assertion that BOTH boys were her brothers. The adventures are solid, the villains nicely evil, and the World Below sufficiently dark and creepy. A must have for fans of Nimona or other speculative fiction literary graphic novels.
Weaknesses: I've been so spoiled with all of the fantastic new multicultural fantasies lately that returning to the British/Celtic/dragon-based tales of Fae seemed sort of ordinary and boring!
What I really think: If this is available in prebind, I will purchase it. With full color illustrations, the pages would be falling out of this in a week, otherwise!
Oooh, pretty! Oooh, my library has it!
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