Amos Daragon: the key to Braha by Bryan Perro
181 pgs.
Target audience:  Ages 8-12
Rating: Griffin

 In his second mission as Mask Wearer, Amos receives a gift from a mysterious young girl ending his life and  allowing him to travel into Braha, the City of the Dead, where souls await to be judged for heaven or hell. The Gods have shut the doors leading in either direction and Braha is overcrowded with souls needing to move on. His mission is to find the key to Braha and unlock the doors. The key’s whereabouts are unknown and Amos must rely on his wits and cleverness to follow the clues since his mask powers are useless there. The key can only be retrieved by someone who has died and come back to life. Amos is lured into this quest by factions in Braha wanting the key for themselves. He is aided and tricked by a kaleidoscope of stock and mythological characters. The main storyline gets bogged down in the petty rivalry between the gods and ruling powers in Braha making it a little confusing. Aside from Amos and his best friend, Beorf,  who are wonderfully fun heroes and easy to identify with, the secondary characters are one dimensional and don’t add much to the story. Although this story is fairly predictable and simplistic, young readers will delight in Amos’s adventure and the many fun mythological characters that appear. The author includes a mythological lexicon.  This would be a good series for kids who are testing the waters of the fantasy genre for the first time. (This book provided for review by Children's Lit www.childrenslit.com)

Another Jekyll, Another Hyde by Daniel and Dina Nayeri
249 pgs.
Target audience: Young Adult
Rating: Wizard

Nicola is a demon and immortal as long as she gets the souls she needs, but her immortality is at risk. She must find another appropriate human vessel for her son, Edward, whom she murdered centuries before, thereby ensuring the continuity of her line. Thomas is the son of a New York banker with a very precise life plan, he's going to be a Manhattan lawyer. His well ordered existence spirals into depression after Belle Faust, his gorgeous girlfriend, dumps him and then promptly disappears. Things get stranger still when out of the blue his dad marries the Faust family's French governess, Nicola Vileroy. One night at a club, Thomas tries a designer drug and suddenly his life spins utterly out of control. He starts having blackouts and hearing a strange voice in his head. Thomas realizes in horror that his blackouts coincide with a series of hate crimes at his school, that his new stepmom is even more sinister than he thought and that he as Edward attacked the kids. Loosely based on the Jekyll and Hyde story, it primarily focuses on Thomas and his struggle. The preludes to each chapter catch the reader up on Nicola's past and current motivations. The fast pace and suspense will keep readers interested until the twist at the end. There is a confusing attempt to include a bit of backstory but the story stands better on it's own. Readers may want to go back and read the previous titles in this series. Deliciously gothic and hard to put down, this book is a truly satisfying read.