Read for the 2011 YA Reading Challenge.
Evvy had left her home in Chammur to become an apprentice Stone Mage at the Winding Circle school. For the most part, her life is good, but she ends up on a trip to the far away Battle Islands after she pushes too far in a fight with some of the school bullies. Her mentor Rosethorn knows that getting her away from the school will cool things down.
They’ve been summoned to the Battle Islands because something has been poisoning the lakes and some of the fields on Starns Island. What they soon find when they get that is that this is because the volcano that formed Starns Island is active again, and Evvy will need to use her magic to save all the people of Starns.
I really liked the portrayal of the spirits within the volcano that cause it to erupt – it was an interesting anthropomorphic idea that totally worked within the world of this story.
Readers of previous books in this series might be a little disappointed to not have the four main characters from the prior two series actually in the story – they’re only mentioned in passing, but it’s a great story on its own, and I hope the author will give us more.