Mandy tries to figure out what kind of future she wants for herself as she struggles with teenage insecurities and bullying, her relationship with her mom, and her budding friendship (or is it something more?) with her new class project partner, Claire. Mandy’s best friend, Lincoln, whose parents were born in Vietnam, insightfully summarizes this rift as being down to an intergenerational divide that occurs whether parents and children come from different countries or different planets. Mandy dyes her hair and dresses in all black to further call out how different they are.

Sixteen-year-old Mandy considers herself the anti-Starfire: Unlike her scantily clad superhero mother, she doesn’t have superpowers, can’t fly, and doesn’t even own a bathing suit. As long as Ava does the bloody work, she and her loved ones are left alone-but what happens when Venus demands something Ava simply won’t do? Ava’s exhausted despair, her love for her found family and her coldly practical choices are pre-existing conditions, and the moral decisions she makes are surprisingly nuanced.ĭeeply enmeshed with a magical world and its impossible choices before readers ever meet her, Ava and her wholly believable despair are a refreshing change from the endless parade of naïve heroines found elsewhere Ava, Ezra, a werefox, and Lock, a handsome dryad, are Venus’ enforcers, putting down any supernaturals foolish enough to challenge Venus’ power. Along with her two best friends, also unwilling Coterie employees, Ava’s an unpaid assassin. She’s allowed to stay in Maine only on the condition of her loyalty to Venus, the Coterie’s bloodthirsty vampire leader. Orphaned, Ava lives with her mother’s human childhood sweetheart in rural Maine. But nobody escapes the Coterie alive, and Ava’s mom was no exception. When Ava’s firebug mother became pregnant, she did the unthinkable and fled from the supernatural mob, raising Ava on the road for years, always in hiding. An indentured magical assassin just wants a little peace with her chosen family.įirebug Ava, who can set fires with her mind, has been on the run her whole life.

Firebug by Lish McBride