Happy 4th of July to our charming southern neighbours! I know we sometimes refer to your fine nation as “Canada’s pants”, but we mean it with all the love and respect in the world.
Today’s bit of excitement is a review of Seraphina from Tamora Pierce herself! Back in ancient times, when I worked at Children’s Book World in Haverford, PA, I heard Tamora Pierce talk to a school assembly. She fearlessly engaged the students right off the bat, taking all questions and giving the sharpest, wittiest off-the-cuff answers you ever heard. I was in awe and still am. She was such a charismatic presence up there on that stage. Her books are great, too. 🙂
Here’s her take on mine. Thank you so much, Tamora Pierce. I am moved and humbled and out of words for once.
Edited to add: some folks are finding this review a bit spoiler-y. If you’re spoiler-averse, you may want to hold off on reading this one.
Rachel Hartman 
Fabulous! And a really excellent summary, too!
I think I have been spoiled:-(
At least, there is one fact about Seraphina that has not been revealed in other reviews as yet.
Oh no! I should put up a warning, then. I’m so sorry about that. I am just terrible about spoilers myself, and utterly fail to notice them. It’s a minor miracle I haven’t already spoiled the whole thing myself.
I really wasn’t trying to do spoilers, but it was hard to write a review without tripping on one or two. And I’d read the book intently twice, so I sometimes assumed everyone knew certain things. I’d hang my head, but instead I’ll just hope that people would want to know how things got that way to the point of racing to buy it!
The problem is that unless something reveals the ending, I don’t care about spoilers, because I’ll want to find out how things unfold or how characters develop. It’s the whole book that matters, not particular points, and your whole book, my dear, is quite splendid. Maybe I should read it again. When’s the next one coming out? And when *is* a codpiece not a codpiece?
Tammy Pierce
Aw, hi Tammy!! The next one is coming out as soon as it’s good enough, which I hope is 2013. Spoilers never bother me either, I’m afraid, and it’s very hard for me to tiptoe around other people’s sensitivities in that regard. It’s a minor miracle I haven’t blabbed the whole plot of book two to the entire universe yet.
Regarding your final question, that is exactly the subject of an unpublished philosophical tract I’ve been working on for years about the phenomenology of codpieces. My secret plan is to become a famous YA author, so that I have enough clout and people will willingly read whatever I write. THEN I will subject the world to all my crackpot sartorial theories. See? Fiendishly clever.
I usually give some remarks about what the forthcoming book will have in the coming years. And then, the closer the pub date gets and the more detailed the question, I start to do the bad thing. I say, “I do know the answer to that,” then I give a long pause, and add, in the little kid voice, “And I’m not gonna tell you, nyanh-nah-nah-nah-na-na.” They moan and scream when you do that. It’s wonderful.
You mean I gotta wait for the truth about codpieces! Aiiiieeeeee! You ARE a fiend, Hartman!
(See? Doesn’t that feel good?)