New Releases by Lindsay Eagar

In a vicious, delicious contemporary novel inspired by Shakespeare’s Richard III, the lauded author of The Family Fortuna lifts the curtain on a high school thespian who’ll stop at nothing to land the lead. Rory is an antihero for the ages. Like Shakespeare’s Richard III, she confides in her audience, telling us exactly the lengths she’ll go to to secure the leading role in Bosworth Academy’s senior musical, confessing without shame that she is charming and conniving and brutally ambitious, that we will watch and root for her even as she manipulates and endangers those around her. And we do. Perhaps it’s because we don’t want to believe that she’s as relentless as she claims. Rory is an underdog, after all, a scholarship kid teased for her weight. Surely there will be redemption? Surely our dread and patience will be rewarded? Intricately plotted with an ingenious narrative that blends multiple viewpoints with script excerpts and an original musical score, Lindsay Eagar’s whip-smart, precision-crafted, and gleefully compulsive page-turner taps into the dark side of high school theater production. A diabolically good read, it forces our complicity as we wince and cheer for an arresting drama queen who just can’t help going full-tilt nasty in the pursuit of her dreams.

"Yes, my angel, what a monster you are!" Beaked. Feathered. Monstrous. Avita was born to be a star. Her circus tent sells out nightly, and every performance incites bloodcurdling screams. She''s the most lucrative act from Texas to Tacoma, the crown jewel of the Family Fortuna. Avita feeds on the fear, the screams, the gasps. But when a handsome young artist is commissioned to create new posters of the performers, Avita is appalled by his rendering of Bird Girl. Is that truly all she is--a hideous monster, all sharp beak and razor teeth, obsidian eyes and ruffled feathers? Avita''s ready to be more. But her father, Arturo Fortuna, proprietor and ringmaster of the Family Fortuna, won''t give up his most popular attraction without a fight. And Avita''s not the only one clamoring to be released from Arturo''s manipulative cage. Her sister, her brother, and even her mother are all tired of sacrificing everything for Arturo''s ambitions and his craving for cash. Will their fragile family ties survive the tension of a circus showdown? Delightful and disturbing, bawdy and breathtaking, horrific and heartfelt, this electric and exquisitely crafted story about a family like no other challenges our every notion of what it means to be different.

"Imbued with real suspense and a gorgeous warmth. . . . An utterly enchanting exploration of family in its many forms." --Booklist (starred review) Fished from the river as an infant and raised by a band of street urchins who call themselves the Crowns, eight-year-old Duck keeps her head down. It''s a rollicking life, thieving and on the run--until the Crowns infiltrate an abandoned cathedral in the city of Odierne and decide to settle down. It''s part of the bold new plan hatched by the Crowns'' fearless leader, Gnat: one of their own will pose as an apprentice to the local baker, relieving Master Griselde of bread and coin to fill the bellies and line the pockets of all the Crowns. But no sooner is she apprenticed to the kindly Griselde than Duck''s allegiances start to blur. Who is she really--a Crown or an apprentice baker? And who does she want to be? Meanwhile, high above the streets of Odierne, on the roof of the unfinished cathedral, an old and ugly gargoyle grows weary of waiting to fulfill his own destiny--to watch and protect. Told in alternating viewpoints, this exquisite novel evokes a timeless tale of love, self-discovery, and what it means to be rescued.

What does it mean to be rescued? Fished from the river as a baby and raised by a band of street urchins who call themselves the Crowns, eight-year-old Duck keeps her head down and her mouth shut. That is, until she''s ordered to pose as an apprentice to the local baker, to steal bread and money. But as time passes, Duck finds herself feeling less like an imposter apprentice and more like the real thing. When forced to choose, will Duck remain loyal to the Crowns - or does her heart now belong to Griselde Baker?

Can a clever young inventor uncover a ruthless pirate’s heart of gold? Thrilling sea adventure takes on a hint of steampunk in the second book by the author of the acclaimed Hour of the Bees. When her parents, the great marine scientists Dr. and Dr. Quail, are killed in a tragic accident, eleven-year-old Fidelia Quail is racked by grief — and guilt. It was a submarine of Fidelia’s invention that her parents were in when they died, and it was she who pressed them to stay out longer when the raging Undertow was looming. But Fidelia is forced out of her mourning when she’s kidnapped by Merrick the Monstrous, a pirate whose list of treasons stretches longer than a ribbon eel. Her task? Use her marine know-how to retrieve his treasure, lost on the ocean floor. But as Fidelia and the pirates close in on the prize, with the navy hot on their heels, she realizes that Merrick doesn’t expect to live long enough to enjoy his loot. Could something other than black-hearted greed be driving him? Will Fidelia be able to master the perils of the ocean without her parents — and piece together the mystery of Merrick the Monstrous before it’s too late?

“Eagar seamlessly blends a twelve-year-old girl’s summer of change with a hefty dose of magical realism in this accomplished debut.” — Publishers Weekly (starred review) While her friends are spending their summers having pool parties and sleepovers, twelve-year-old Carolina — Carol — is spending hers in the New Mexico desert, helping her parents move her grandfather into a home for people with dementia. At first, Carol avoids prickly Grandpa Serge. But as the summer wears on, Carol finds herself drawn to him, fascinated by the crazy stories he tells her about a healing tree, a green-glass lake, and the bees that will bring back the rain and end a hundred years of drought. As the line between magic and reality starts to blur, Carol must decide for herself what is possible — and what it means to be true to her roots.