Review: Shadowshaper

Shadowshaper by Daniel José Older
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I've been seeing tons of buzz for this book lately - and for the author himself, because Older always has something topical and intelligent to say. Reading the book, I'm not disappointed by said buzz. Shadowshaper gets a lot of comparisons to The Mortal Instruments, which aren't that far off, and for me, the Columbia University scenes made me think of Raimi's Spider-Man Trilogy too. But what this book really made me think it was, was the missing link between Miss Peregrine before it and Labyrinth Lost after it. It's a unique urban fantasy, in which our main character, Sierra, is inextricably linked to some long, dangerous family history (especially through her grandfather, not unlike Jacob Portman), artistic magic with an Afro-Caribbean twist, salsa-metal (I need to listen to some samples of this particular genre mashup if I can find any), and some well-placed social commentary, particularly in the scene where Sierra calls out her aunt after she gives her one too many racist insults for being, basically, "too black." (Like such a thing even exists.)

Bottom line, I need to finish this series now - and also read some of Older's, uh, older work, because I hear he's got a kickass adult urban fantasy series that comes with Rick Riordan's stamp of approval, among others.

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