The Crow

✍ Scribed by Alison Croggon

• Publisher: Penguin Books;Candlewick Press
• Year: 2006;2007
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 463 KB
• Edition: 1st Candlewick ed
• Category: Fiction
• ISBN: 0143002147

✦ Synopsis

Review

Croggon backtracks along her time line to chronicle Hem's grueling and poignant struggles during The Riddle (2006). Hem's in Turbansk, lonely and belligerent, resisting his Bard schooling. The poisonous Dark threatens the Suderain, and the Black Army marches on Turbansk. As battle begins and the city is besieged, Saliman allows Hem to stay rather than fleeing with the other children. Hem's healing powers emerge, and readers see that he, too, has a predestined role in saving Edil-Amarandh--fully as cryptic as Maerad's role. Escaping the city, living in caves and training in spy techniques all help Hem when he secretly joins a rank of child-slave warriors. By the end, Hem is scarred and saddened forever, but an Elidhu has given him luminous new knowledge in the form of music that may help Maerad complete the Treesong. Saliman's love sustains Hem through these oppressively grim times. This serious penultimate epic, filled with Tolkien-like images, is emotionally astute and brimming with vivid detail. (map, pronunciation key, appendices) (Fantasy. YA) -- Kirkus Reviews, September 1, 2007

Product Description

As this enthralling epic nears its climax, the young heroine’s brother discovers his own hidden gift — and the role he must play in battling the Dark.

Hem is a weary orphan whose struggle for survival ends when he is reunited with his lost sister, Maerad. But Maerad has a destiny to fulfill, and Hem is sent to the golden city of Turbansk, where he learns the ways of the Bards and befriends a mysterious white crow. When the forces of the Dark threaten, Hem flees with his protector, Saliman, and an orphan girl named Zelika to join the Light’s resistance forces. It is there that Hem has a vision and learns that he, too, has a part to play in Maerad’s quest to solve the Riddle of the Treesong. As THE CROW continues the epic tale begun with THE NAMING and THE RIDDLE, Alison Croggon creates a world of astounding beauty overshadowed by a terrifying darkness, a world where Maerad and Hem must prepare to wage their final battle for the Light.