Fox & Phoenix (review)

After Kai and his gang of ragtag misfits helped Long City's princess to achieve her heart's desire and scored some serious cash in the process, Kai was pretty sure he had an easy life ahead of him. He did not, however, expect it to be so boring: with his group disbanded to follow their own dreams, Kai is left as apprentice to his mother (a rather intimidating sorceress), executing all sorts of mundane tasks while trying to ignore his growing feelings for Yun, his fellow worker and former best friend. Adventure calls again, though, when the king of Long City falls ill, Kai's mother goes missing, and a ghost dragon entrusts Kai with the task of traveling to the Phoenix Empire to retrieve Princess Lian so she can save her father and thus fend off a power-hungry emperor. His journey through the land reveals Bernobich's intricately built world: blending fantasy and science fiction, the author offers up a place that is strikingly familiar to modern-day readers with its "talk-phones" and "vid screens" but that is powered entirely by a force called the "magic flux." Enigmatic spirit companions and ferocious ghost dragons call up images of Chinese culture, and the result is a fascinating amalgam of ancient magic and modern technology. Unfortunately, references to Kai's previous adventure (a short story in Berman's Magic in the Mirrorstone, BCCB 4/08) make it clear to readers that they came in at the middle of a story, and the characters' emotional resonance is dependent on knowledge of their history; the complicated romance between Yun and Kai will be particularly perplexing to those unfamiliar with the previous work. Despite this, Kai is eminently likable as the trouble-seeking hero, and the intriguing setting makes this an adventure that may appeal to both fantasy and techno-geeks alike.