Kelcie Murphy and the Academy for the Unbreakable Arts

January 1, 2022
Magical fighting abilities are a must when facing the forces of the Lands of Winter. Kelcie Murphy's field trip to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts is permanently over when her foster care case worker and a police officer suddenly appear and drag her off to the bowels of the museum. Things go from odd to magically creepy when the pair are revealed to be fairies who attempt a mysterious ritual, which leads Kelcie far away to the Lands of Summer. There, she stumbles across the Academy for the Unbreakable Arts, a school that recruits the best of the best to battle fairies and other baddies from the Lands of Winter. Fantasy fans will find a lot of similarities between the academy and another famous magical school, from students' being assigned to color-coded Dens to the mysterious and aloof head. This novel may appeal to some readers, especially those with a love of mythology and folklore, but overall, it feels clich�d. The setting along with the dense text, large cast of characters, and an emphasis on bullying and violence at the school combine to create a banal rendition of Harry Potter as told through the lens of a Celtic-themed Hunger Games. Pale, freckled, redheaded Kelcie is White. The magic of Katniss McPotter, er...Kelcie Murphy falls flat. (glossary) (Fantasy. 9-12)

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Starred review from February 15, 2022
Grades 6-8 *Starred Review* Foster child Kelcie wants more than anything to attend the Academy for the Unbreakable Arts, which trains warriors for the war raging on in her homeland, the Otherworld. But being abandoned in the human world as a child means that Kelcie will have to figure out how to get to this school so that she can train with the best of the best, unlock her latent powers, and unravel the mystery of her birth parents. While books about magical schools and their talented inductees are nothing new in the middle-grade space, Lewis (Game of Shadows, 2017) brings a fresh take on these tropes, incorporating Celtic mythology and lore to craft--quite literally--an Otherworldly hero who will stop at nothing to achieve her goals and who also embodies a relatable persona that readers will undoubtedly connect with. Once Kelcie makes it into the academy, she struggles to fit in--at school, as well as with friends and family. When she learns that she is a Saiga, an ancient being whose roots are connected to an infamous traitor, Kelcie, determined and no stranger to hardship, must continue to persevere with the help of her magic, her wit, and the unshakable desire to pursue her dreams.

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