Winter 2005 Review:

    Boy is a young child who has been working for a master of illusions, Valerian, since the first day he met him years ago. They had met in a church; Boy was an orphan who had tucked himself away in a small space to keep warm when he tumbled out of his spot and landed in front of the magician. Valerian immediately adopted him as his helper for his shows. Valerian performs his acts in a theater almost every night for vast audiences. He's always the closing performance. That's how the theater brought in money, so Korp kept him. Korp is the theater's director. He walked into Madame Beauchance's dressing room to tell her how lovely she sang during her performance before Valerian. She ends up telling Korp that things need to change. When he doesn't understand her assistant, Willow, explains that Madame means Valerian. Madame will stop performing until Valerian is gone. Unfortunately for the theater, Korp will be gone before Valerian.      
       Madame Beauchance had demanded that Willow go back to the theater and get Korp to open up so that she could have her precious hairbrush. She had found the open, and walked in. She sensed something was wrong and walked in the stalls. She was looking at the stage and didn't see anything wrong except for the fact the footlights were on. Then she noticed it was raining ~ inside the theater. It wasn't the cool rain one was used to, it was warm. This caused Willow to look up were she saw Korp's deceased body hanging halfway out of his box window.
       Not to far away, in a bar called the Trumpet, Boy was looking for a man named Green. Valerian said he had something for him. Green walks into the restroom after showing Boy a little music box. Boy decides to follow because Valerian would kill him if walked home empty handed. Inside the restroom is a flash of bright light and an abundance of purple smoke. When the smoke clears, Boy sees Green lying dead with the music box in his hand. Boy takes it and runs. He runs into the blood covered Willow who says Korp is dead. Then, a City Watchman comes and arrests them because he believes that they were involved with the murder of Korp. Valerian illegally gets them out of prison and gets them to help him find this book that will save his life. They end up raiding cemeteries in order to find this book. Walking through the cemeteries aren't bad, it's the disrupting the graves of the dead to find the book. All of this insanity will lead to another death, only this one was preplanned, fifteen years ago...
       I believe this is a wonderful novel. I did feel bad for Boy because he had no idea who his parents were, who he was for that matter. I would highly recommend this book for ages 13 to 20. It is a good book for people who enjoy unexplained death and unburying the dead for certain purposes. I thought this was an outstanding book and is one of many I'll read again.

~ Kayla Aldan, 9th grade, Boardman High School 

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