Shadowshaper by Daniel José Older (New York Time Book Review)
by Holly Black
In
the best urban fantasy, the city is not just a backdrop, but functions
as a character in its own right, offering up parallels between personal
histories and histories of place. That is certainly true in Daniel José
Older’s magnificent “Shadowshaper,” which gives us a Brooklyn that is
vital, authentic and under attack.The
book opens with Sierra Santiago painting an enormous mural of a dragon
on the side of a building. “We hate the Tower,” Manny the Domino King
tells her, explaining why her mural is important. “We spit on the
Tower. Your paint is our nasty loogie, hocked upon the stupidity that is
the Tower.”[…]
It
turns out that Sierra’s mural is important for another reason. Sierra
comes from a long line of shadowshapers — magicians who channel
friendly spirits into art. Given form, those spirits are able to defend
the community. Her discovery of her own ability and the family history
that comes with it is part dynastic intrigue and part cultural
awakening. The story is messy, the people in it behave imperfectly and
Sierra is heir to all the bad stuff as well as the good.Sierra
herself is a compelling, refreshing hero, with a “fro stretched
magnificently around her in a fabulous, unbothered halo.” Along with
her brother Juan, a guitar player in a salsa-thrash band; the enigmatic
Robbie, who draws so compulsively that his art covers “every surface of
his clothes, his backpack, his desk”; her trickster figure of an uncle;
and a collection of clever and funny friends, she has to discover who is
murdering her abuelo’s associates and why other murals all over her
neighborhood are fading.
Kimchi and Justice 