Synopses & Reviews
A Top Ten YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults Selection
A Top Ten ALA Quick Pick
A Kirkus Prize Finalist
An Andre Award Nominee
A
New York Times Notable Children's Book
An NPR Best Book of the Year
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Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year
Sierra Santiago planned an easy summer of making art and hanging out with her friends. But then a corpse crashes their first party. Her stroke-ridden grandfather starts apologizing over and over. And when the murals in her neighborhood begin to weep tears... Well, something more sinister than the usual Brooklyn ruckus is going on.
With the help of a fellow artist named Robbie, Sierra discovers shadowshaping, a magic that infuses ancestral spirits into paintings, music, and stories. But someone is killing the shadowshapers one by one. Now Sierra must unravel her family's past, take down the killer in the present, and save the future of shadowshaping for generations to come.
Review
“...a first-rate example of how representation, diversity and themes of social justice and identity can be skilfully woven into a narrative...so that the story pivots on them in a way that is authentic, exciting, and ultimately satisfying." Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing
Review
"Joyful and assertive and proud, and makes me want to read everything else of Older's, for more of these voices, connections and lives." National Public Radio
Review
" This is a world that readers cannot help wanting to live in and, as with all great urban fantasies, harboring a suspicion that perhaps we already do." Holly Black, New York Times bestselling author of The Coldest Girl in Coldtown and The Iron Trial, in The New York Times Book Review
About the Author
Daniel José Older is a Brooklyn-based writer, editor, workshop facilitator, and composer. Shadowshaper is his first published YA novel. His band Ghost Star gigs regularly around New York, and you can find his thoughts on writing, read dispatches from his decade-long career as an NYC paramedic, and hear his music at ghoststar.net and @djolder.