Beneath a Sugar Sky, by Seanan McGuire

Beneath the Sugar Sky by Seanan McGuire

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I can just barely give this book three stars. It's sort of fun to read, but it's definitely the kind of YA novel that made me avoid YA novels like the plague when I was actually a YA. It's a very formulaic quest book, with the point of the quest being a stop on the way to something else. We are also hit over the head repeatedly with the moral messages (the true pitfall of YA novels--the belief that they have to be so direct. Youth are not as obtuse as adults when it comes to getting a moral point that applies to themselves. They get a lot of practice at it).

Seanan McGuire is very talented at executing a story. I have seen this kind of devolution before (in the Feed series) where the plots just kind of run out of steam. The trick is to stop writing before you run out of things to say. Or come up with more things. It's gotten several award nominations, but that may say more about the state of the written word in F&SF than its quality.



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