kirkusreviews.com
An old forest encloses mysteries both fantastical and personal.
When Elizabeth was small, she cried
out in loneliness and a unicorn came to protect her through the dark night. From
then on, she has had a special ability for finding the creatures and an
affinity for the forest in which they live. Having been abandoned by her
father, Elizabeth and her mother take to scavenging for naturally shed unicorn
horns, using them to make a miraculous medicine they sell to support
themselves. A unicorn brings Elizabeth a sickly foal to raise, and she names her
Sida. When Sida wanders too far into the forest on her own, Elizabeth, now 17, follows
and accidentally discovers a small community of people who speak a different
language and harbor a surprise discovery. In this fantasy world, there are wild
beasts, blooming romance, an uncanny doppelgänger, disjointed time, and a
culture where women are expected to be domestic. Characters seem to default to
white. The story subtly morphs halfway through, once Elizabeth becomes lost in
the forest, and, unfortunately, after that point feels a bit scattered; later
elements don’t always flow naturally from earlier ones and the tale becomes
somewhat disjointed with an unresolved ending.
Readers looking for an escape will
probably tolerate the story’s weaknesses, but there is little here to lift this
beyond run-of-the-mill fantasy. (glossary) (Fantasy. 12-17)
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