Holly Black writes some of the best Young Adult "fairy" stories available. Over the years I've read a large number of her books and loved nearly all of them. So when this one showed up on the library shelves I snagged it. It more than lived up to her previous work.
Hazel and her brother are the children of artists who sometimes forget they have children leaving them to wander the forest surrounding their home town of Fairview. Unfortunately Faeries also wander those same woods. And Hazel and Ben don't necessarily get along with them.
Ben is, depending on your view, blessed or cursed by a fae as a young child to be drawn to music even if he doesn't like it. It gives him a certain power over them, to control them with music. It allows him to help Hazel save herself from a hag as a small child. And as small imaginative children are inclined to do they decide this means they were destined to fight the ones that capture and slaughter a few of the wayward tourists drawn to town by the prince asleep in a glass coffin. The bard and the knight. The fact that Hazel found an enchanted sword didn't hurt either.
Add in a changeling best friend and a quest to save a prince... Ends up being one of the best fantasy-based Young Adult books I've read in years. It took me less than four hours to finish. I've already turned it over to mom to read and would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a good fast paced read.
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