Brief Synopsis
“Sisters of Glass” is the first in a duology by Naomi Cyprus, and follows the stories of both Nalah and Halan. Nalah is a peasant girl living in New Hadar, where magic is outlawed and she must tread carefully to avoid being found out. Halan is a princess in the magic-filled Magi Kingdom, but she herself is powerless. They must work together to save their world before it is too late.
Content Warnings: Death, Violence (PG)
What Do I Think?
“Sisters of Glass” isn’t my normal cup of tea primarily because it skews a little bit younger than the middle-grade I usually read. Or, at least, it does in the beginning. The start to the novel is quite slow, and normally this wouldn’t be such a big deal. After all, most fantasy stories, unless they are set in some version of our world, have to take their time to worldbuild and establish the setting. But “Sisters of Glass” is exceptionally slow to do so, and I found myself struggling to get through the first quarter of the novel.
Part of this is because while the main characters, Nalah and Halan, are interesting and make both smart decisions and tragic failures, the characters surrounding them are terribly dreary and fail to be anything more than a one-sided trope: an overbearing father (and mother), a snarky sidekick, a possible love interest who obviously isn’t what he seems, and so on. This drags the plot, which is otherwise quite interesting, into a predictable and yawn-inducing thread. It’s a shame that more care wasn’t put into these secondary characters, because otherwise they might have helped to elevate the novel, not drag it down.
On a positive note, the story pulls off a fun twist halfway through that helps to bring energy into the story. Is the twist somewhat predictable to anyone who’s read a story in the last twenty years? Sure! But at the same time, this is a story meant for younger audiences, and it is actually a very well-written twist in that it doesn’t come 100% out of left field – the gradual foreshadowing and worldbuilding actually pays off as a result, which is sadly something not seen often in stories nowadays that attempt story twists like this.
My biggest gripe with this story is not the slow beginning or boring side characters, however, but instead with an intense tonal shift that occurs with the twist that throws the story from much younger territory to being almost into young adult. There is death (indeed, a straight-up murder happens in front of the protagonists), terrible cruelty, and a full-scale battle that happens somewhat out of left field. It isn’t bad – in fact, it is part of what helps make the novel more interesting – but it a strange change that makes me question what genre the story was originally written in.
Overall, “Sisters of Glass” is a perfectly passable novel with fun protagonists and a solid plot. The side characters are a little lacking in depth, and there are certainly some issues with tone, but as a whole the story is a quick, fun romp in an interesting new world.
Jacob Ryckman 