Sparrows Flight

Abandoned by her father and living with her strict mother, Julie plays fantasy games with her new friends and daydreams about being a princess in search of her father.

Grade 8-10-- Sixteen-year-old Julie is lonely at her new school. At home her mother seems determined to control her life. Dreaming about the father who left years ago, she pictures herself as a princess in disguise, searching for her father, the lost King, to end the reign of the evil Priestess, her mother. A chance meeting at school leads Julie to a group of young fantasy buffs, the Clan of the Western Holt, who have created a world of their own complete with Clan names and rituals. (This is likely to cause readers some confusion, as there are a lot of characters, and they all have two names.) Friendship and a tentative romance give Julie the objectivity to turn her daydreams into the beginnings of a novel, entitled Sparrow's Flight. Then two events threaten to undermine her growing strength: a Clan member's attempted suicide and unexpected news of her father. Julie's pain and the alienation of the whole group are convincingly portrayed. The adult characters are less believable, particularly Julie's mother, whose reasons for being so nasty to Julie are not convincing. The issue of violence between Clan members is left unresolved. Dialogue is cliched; in his attempt to capture teen speech, Posner seems to be pandering to kids rather than writing up to them. Alhough lacking enough distance between readers and characters, Posner's rapid-paced style may earn him a readership. --Ruth S. Vose, San Francisco Public Library
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Shy, clumsy Julie, 16, would rather cast herself as the heroine of her fantasies, modeled after the sword-and-sorcery novels she devours, than face up to real life and its problems. She is friendless at her new school until she meets "Darkmoon," the Chieftess of the Clan, a group of fellow fantasy buffs. Thrilled to find she fits in with the group, Julie starts cutting classes and lets her grades slip; her mother (the "Ogress") is less than overjoyed with this development and life at home becomes a pitched battle. Julie escapes the tension by slipping into her favorite fantasy, in which Princess Sparrow fights the Ogress to restore the long-lost king (her father aban doned the family when she was three) to his throne . In the book's tense climax, Julie is forced to confront reality and act for herself. Posner ( Sweet Pain ) presents his characters empathetically, and powerfully conveys the lure of fantasy. He is adept at building anticipation through inference and dialogue, rather than through direct commentary. However, some of the relationships are too sketchily portrayed, and although the story is set in Long Island, N.Y., there is no sense of place. The book is well-paced, though, and Posner's talent for building anticipation and dread will keep readers hooked to the finish. Ages 12-up.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.