Especially dragons, and Monstrous has a great one. There’s no shortage of fantasy stories set in vaguely-Germanic worlds, but I’ll admit to being a sucker for palaces and dark forests and dragons.

Monstrous draws on a variety of fairy-tale themes, and is obviously influenced by classics like Frankenstein and The Hunchback of Notre Dame, but the characters and story are very much their own creature. Kymera might have to battle the threat herself, even if it means exposing her true nature to the boy who trusted her. It might take more to defeat the wizard than the rescue of his victims.

But as she discovers more about the people who live in the city she wants to protect, doubts and hidden memories start to trouble her mind. She learns about Bryre and the evil that troubles it. With her abnormalities hidden away under a cloak, Kym and Ren slowly become friends. She meets Ren, a boy who is also out after curfew. They have a happy life in the forest, but a girl needs friends as well as family.įeeling like one of the locked-up princesses in her beloved fairy tales, Kymera starts to dawdle on her night-time rescue missions to Byre. Kymera’s stinging tail, her wings, and her animal senses keep her safe, but they also prevent her from befriending any human other than her father. With her father’s knowledge of science and her special skills, they intend to bring the sick girls to the safety of Belladoma. Now she’s unrecognizable and has lost nearly all memories of her previous life. But Kymera and her father want to stop him – after all, the wizard killed the human Kymera once was. A sickness rages through the city, infecting only young girls, who the wizard then kidnaps for his own nefarious purposes. After all, he’s the one who made her – reanimated from different body parts – and gave her a mission to rescue girls in the nearby city from the clutches of a dangerous wizard. Speaking of unnatural things… Kymera, the patchwork girl-creature in Monstrous, thinks she is a monster: not human but not any one beast, feared by the people of Byre for her predatory instincts and frightening abilities. It’s been a while since I reviewed any children’s books, and that’s just not natural. (Be it known that I read an ARC of Monstrous and a few details may have changed since publication.)

Monstrous by marcykate connolly