Besides the addictive opening hook to this story--a gender-bending tale of Vlad the Impaler's history, re-imagined as the female badass, Lada the Impaler--the book does so many things well. Kiersten White is just a solid writer who tells a layered story. And neither the strong female protagonist or her brother, who questions his own sexuality as he discovers his love for another man, feel gimmicky. In fact, all the characters seem completely authentic, and their development is slow--in a good way--and considered.
But what I most want to steal from this book, besides the feel of something epic and gathering, like a storm, is the haunting presence of origin stories. Mehmed, heir to the Ottoman sultan's throne, explains to Lada why he must conquer Constantinople.
He says, "My whole country was founded on a dream. Less than two hundred years ago we were nothing but a tribe, running from the Mongols, with no home of our own. But our leader--my ancestor--Osman Gazi dreamed we could be more. He saw a moon rise from the breast of a great sheikh and descend into his own. From his navel grew a tree, and its branches spread to cover the world" (370).
I want the entire tone of my next work to be that lush mythological imagining.
