We think it's a richly built world with a compelling protagonist. It's a story about a kid, Oscar, who wants to be the apprentice to a magician, but while he's terrific at magic and charms he's not as good with people. It's about magic and humanity and what it means to be a real person. It brings up such interesting questions about when you have enormous magical power, what does it mean to know when you should know when to use that power, or even know when not using it is the wisest course.

National Book Award Longlist 2014 Bank Street Children's Book Committee Best Book of the Year "Beautifully written and elegantly structured, this fantasy is as real as it gets."Franny Billingsley, author of Chime The Real Boy, Anne Ursu's follow-up to her widely acclaimed and beloved middle grade fantasy Breadcrumbs, is a spellbinding tale of the power we all wield, great and small. On an island on the edge of an immense sea there is a city, a forest, and a boy named Oscar. Oscar is a shop boy for the most powerful magician in the village, and spends his days in a small room in the dark cellar of his master's shop grinding herbs and dreaming of the wizards who once lived on the island generations ago. Oscar's world is small, but he likes it that way. The real world is vast, strange, and unpredictable. And Oscar does not quite fit in it. But now that world is changing. Children in the city are falling ill, and something sinister lurks in the forest. Oscar has long been content to stay in his small room in the cellar, comforted in the knowledge that the magic that flows from the forest will keep his island safe. Now, even magic may not be enough to save it.

What a protagonist, what a set-up! We love this book because there's something incredibly compelling about someone who has had a really terrible life, suddenly being thrust into the position of incredible privilege — a life where they get everything and anything. Because they're not used to it, they feel uncomfortable with it, and we experience both their discomfort and also the pleasure of seeing someone who's been denied everything get everything. Of course there are thorns among the roses, and delicious intrigue to boot.

The youngest, half-goblin son of the Emperor has lived his entire life in exile, distant from the Imperial Court and the deadly intrigue that suffuses it. But when his father and three sons in line for the throne are killed in an "accident," he has no choice but to take his place as the only surviving rightful heir. Entirely unschooled in the art of court politics, he has no friends, no advisors, and the sure knowledge that whoever assassinated his father and brothers could make an attempt on his life at any moment. Surrounded by sycophants eager to curry favor with the naive new emperor, and overwhelmed by the burdens of his new life, he can trust nobody. Amid the swirl of plots to depose him, offers of arranged marriages, and the specter of the unknown conspirators who lurk in the shadows, he must quickly adjust to life as the Goblin Emperor. All the while, he is alone, and trying to find even a single friend . . . and hoping for the possibility of romance, yet also vigilant against the unseen enemies that threaten him, lest he lose his throne-or his life. Katherine Addison's The Goblin Emperor is an exciting fantasy novel, set against the pageantry and color of a fascinating, unique world, is a memorable debut for a great new talent.

We're putting these two together because the hardest thing about writing a series is writing a satisfying ending, and these trilogy closers both do that. They raise the stakes while simultaneously pulling together all the threads that have been left undone in previous books and wrapping them up cleverly but not too neatly. Even magicians have messiness in their lives. In fact, maybe they have more than most.

What power can bruise the sky? Two worlds are poised on the brink of a vicious war. By way of a staggering deception, Karou has taken control of the chimaera's rebellion and is intent on steering its course away from dead-end vengeance. The future rests on her. When the brutal angel emperor brings his army to the human world, Karou and Akiva are finally reunited--not in love, but in tentative alliance against their common enemy. It is a twisted version of their long-ago dream, and they begin to hope that it might forge a way forward for their people. And, perhaps, for themselves. But with even bigger threats on the horizon, are Karou and Akiva strong enough to stand among the gods and monsters? The New York Times bestselling Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy comes to a stunning conclusion as--from the streets of Rome to the caves of the Kirin and beyond--humans, chimaera, and seraphim strive, love, and die in an epic theater that transcends good and evil, right and wrong, friend and enemy.