Lucha of the Night Forest By Tehlor Kay Mejia
Hardback published by Rabdom House Inc 21st March 2023
ISBN 9780593378366
Summary:
An edge-of-your-seat fantasy about a girl who will do anything to protect her sister even if it
means striking a dangerous bargain. Dark forces, forgotten magic, and a heart-stopping queer romance make this young adult novel a must-read.
A scorned god.
A mysterious acolyte.
A forgetting drug.
A dangerous forest.
One girl caught between the freedom she always wanted and a sister she can’t bear to leave behind.
Under the cover of the Night Forest, will Lucha be able to step into her own power…or will she be consumed by it?
This gorgeous and fast-paced fantasy novel from acclaimed author Tehlor Kay Mejia is brimming with adventure, peril, romance, and family bonds and asks what it means for a teen girl to become fully herself.
MY REVIEW
This is the first fantasy novel that I have read by the author Tehlor Kay Mejia. I was amazed at how the author has a way of words in this fantasy tale that sucked me right in from the start. I found Lucha of the Night Forest a stomach churning story, that left me wondering if Lucha, will ever be able to escape from being captured.
Extract from chapter one page 10/11
“You can’t take me there,” she said through gritted teeth. I told you, I have an appointment with Senor Marquez. Take me to him. He’ll tell you. Lucha bit her tongue before she could say please.
She’d stab him before she begged him. If only she could get her hand free.
The north fence stretched across the road from edge to edge. As they passed through the gates, the soldado wrenched Lucha’s arms back, forcing her to look up at it. It was all metal. Twelve feet tall and topped with vicious spikes.
The soldados never bothered to wash off the blood. Every desperate olvidado who tried to climb it tempted by store houses full of fix left a piece of themselves as a warning.
In Lucha’s chest, feared curled like a leaf of frost. Just take me to Senor Marquez, she repeated, thinking of her sister, alone and hungry. Her mother who had been doing so well. Her captor was indifferent. Even if Lucha screamed, no one would come. She wouldn’t be the first or last victim of soldado cruelty in the north ward tonight.
But you’re not a victim, said a voice inside her. Would you really have made it to sixteen in a place like this if you were? She didn’t think, didn’t plan. Just let her body go limp, forcing him to bear the full weight of her. He was too disciplined to let go, but he grunted with the extra effort, loosening his grip on her arms just enough.
This was madness, and Lucha knew it. She’d never make it out alone. A fight with soldado inside the compound was suicide. But a quick death fighting for her freedom was better than a slow one at the hands of the vicious, greedy men awaiting her.
And if she was lucky or very good she just might avoid both.
She wrenched herself free and drew a knife, sweeping the man’s leg with a low kick. She pressed the sharp edge of the bone blade she carried to the thick vein in his neck.
“You’ll pay for that, puta.” His eyes were murderous, a sheen of sweat on his brow. He lunged before she could act, ignoring the knife, his Hands grasping her throat.
Lucha gasped, the knife clattered uselessly to the ground. The soldado’s grip was iron, and his pitiless eyes told her that Pecado would have been a mercy. That she’d be cocooned by the worm-white roots of the forest before the sun rose.
Beneath her, the roots themselves seemed to agree. The soil swelled, tossing like a wave. Her breath trapped in her chest, caught fire. Lucha’s body, as it scratched and pulled and writhed, felt far away now. No more than a dream. Her gaze, going hazy and strange, sought the tree line like a glimpse of home.
What she saw was much stranger.
A tall slim outline of a man, face pale and sharp as her blade. Long dark hair. Too long for a man’s in Robado.
Lucha remembered the painting, the little girl on the cart lisping and chanting. Had Lucha looked to long? Was he here to collect her soul?
About the author
TEHLOR KAY MEJIA is the author of the critically acclaimed young adult fantasy duology We Set the Dark on Fire and We Unleash the Merciless Storm. Her debut middle-grade series, Paola Santiago and the River of Tears, is in development at Disney as a television series to be produced by Eva Longoria. Tehlor lives with her daughter, partner, and two small dogs in Oregon, where she grows heirloom corn and continues her quest to perfect the vegan tamale.
https://www.tehlorkaymejia.com/
https://www.Instagram.com/tehlorkay
I would like to thank kaleidoscopic blog tours for inviting me to take part in this fantasy blog tour and for arranging a Hardback to be sent to me.
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