June 25, 2012
When teenager Nora and her friends at school translate some scripts from long dead alchemists, the result leaves a wake of destruction in its path and her boyfriend, Max, on the hook for murder. Now, Nora must piece together what happened and try to clear Max’s name. Narrator Emily Janice Card starts slow—but in the end, she delivers an engaging performance. Card lends a youthful, authentic voice to Nora. And while she reads in a steady, almost disinterested tone during descriptive passages, this works to highlight moments of and adventure. The strongest part of Card’s performance is her pacing: she knows when to adjust her tempo to create tension and suspense. And, she ably handles various languages presented in the text and creates distinct voices for the characters. Ages 12–up. A Knopf hardcover.
Starred review from February 13, 2012
In this polished thriller, Nora, an emotionally scarred teenager, interns with an eccentric college professor who has dedicated his life to decoding the Voynich manuscript, a mysterious (real-life) 15th-century document written in an unknown language. One night, Nora stumbles upon the gruesome murder of her close friend Chris, with his girlfriend, Adriane, crouched catatonic in his blood. Nora’s boyfriend, Max, has disappeared, and the police think he’s the murderer. Nora, investigating on her own, comes to believe that the crime was committed by the Hledaci, an ancient Czech cult dedicated to finding the Lumen Dei, an alchemical machine. With the cult possibly coming for Nora next, she and Adriane head for Prague—the heart of the deadly mystery—to find answers and save Max. Wasserman (the Cold Awakening trilogy) has written an intricate and tense tale that combines code breaking, a well-realized and genuinely creepy Czech background, and plenty of believable action and tragic turns. Readers who enjoy fast-paced, bloody, historically inflected thrillers in the vein of Dan Brown will be riveted. Ages 12–up. Agent: Barry Goldblatt, Barry Goldblatt Literary.