The story plunges forward with irresistible narrative drive toward the climactic battle scene. Even readers drawn to the series for its deftly drawn characters and setting may find themselves caught up in the action. A fine entry in the increasingly popular Ranger’s Apprentice series.

Fans of the series will eagerly devour this one and wait impatiently for the next . . . A sure bet for fantasy fans.

Flanagan expertly juggles the overall plot line . . . with a logically constructed campaign that culminates in a hard, suspenseful battle.

The Jane Austen of the 20th century

Stella is stellar

Stella Gibbons’s gift is very special

A beautiful, atmospheric novel sustained by Murakami's flair for philosophical mediation at its most human

A wise and beautiful book.

A probing meditation on human fragility, the grip of obsession, and the impenetrable, erotically charged enigma that is the other.

Brilliant. . . . A mesmerizing new example of Murakami's deeply original fiction.

Lovely, deceptively simple. . . . A novel of existential romance.

His most deeply moving novel.

Mesmerizing. . . . This is a harrowing, a disturbing, a hauntingly brilliant tale.

A fine, almost delicate book about what is unfathomable about us.

Portrayed in a fluid language that veers from the vernacular . . . to the surprisingly poetic.