Venom & Vow
by Anna-Marie McLemore and Elliott McLemore
Middle School, High School    Feiwel    336 pp.
5/23    9781250822239    $19.99
e-book ed.  9781250822222    $11.99

Gael, a highly trained assassin, is the male alter ego of Valencia, companion to the ruler of Eliana. Cade is the half-brother of the ruler of Adare, in a war against Eliana. Gael and Cade meet when Gael gets caught behind enemy lines, and Cade (himself in disguise as his royal brother) doesn’t execute him but instead returns him to his own court, taking a first step toward peace. Covert identities and revelations keep readers on their toes: for instance, Cade will not hurt Gael because he’s sworn an oath to “harm not our own,” meaning men and boys who, like him, had not been assigned male at birth. With both Cade and Gael/Valencia skilled in hand-to-hand combat and strategic thinking, their sparring, told from alternating points of view, is always engaging, while an injured knee (Cade) and a hypermobile spine (Gael) humanize them, sympathetically showing athletic characters living with chronic pain. Magic is omnipresent (luminous foxes, quetzals born from tapestries), lending an extrasensory dimension to the tale, and astute readers will pick up on Irish and Mexican elements from the two kingdoms. Everyone’s happily-ever-after is threatened by a climactic revelation, but those hoping for a feel-good ending will not be disappointed.

From the July/August 2023 issue of The Horn Book Magazine.