Mistwood »

Leah Cypess has been writing since the fourth grade, but before becoming a full-time writer, she earned her law degree from Columbia Law School. She worked for two years at a large New York City law firm, then moved to Boston, where she now lives with her husband and two young children. This is her first novel.

The Shifter is an immortal creature bound by an ancient spell to protect the kings of Samorna. When the realm is peaceful, she retreats to the Mistwood. But when she is needed she always comes.

Isabel remembers nothing. Nothing before the prince rode into her forest to take her back to the castle. Nothing about who she is supposed to be, or the powers she is supposed to have.

Prince Rokan needs Isabel to be his Shifter. He needs her ability to shift to animal form, to wind, to mist. He needs her lethal speed and superhuman strength. And he needs her loyalty—because without it, she may be his greatest threat.

Isabel knows that her prince is lying to her, but she can't help wanting to protect him from the dangers and intrigues of the court . . . until a deadly truth shatters the bond between them.

Now Isabel faces a choice that threatens her loyalty, her heart . . . and everything she thought she knew.

Publishers Weekly

Sustained ignorance, hostility, and confusion are difficult narrative materials, and debut novelist Cypess does not always succeed in controlling them. Her heroine, Isabel, is the Shifter, a legendary shape-shifting protector of the king; she vanishes every generation or so and must be sought anew. Brought back to the court from her lair in the Mistwood, Isabel finds that her social skills rapidly return, but not her thousand-year-old memory. King Rokan claims to know from an oracle that he is in danger, but can't--or won't--reveal where the danger lies. Isabel must negotiate the intrigues of an adversarial court and glean what knowledge she can before the warning comes to fruition. The plot has some fundamental holes--how, for example, can a creature born of a magical culture ever have functioned as a bodyguard if she is sometimes unable to sense magic being used? Still, it's evident that Cypess is an able writer: the premise is novel, her characterizations ring true, and the emotional bond that develops between Isabel and Rokan will for many readers be the most important part of the story. Ages 12–up. (May)