(2) YA Breathmarked series. Honor, family, respect, ambition -- familiar values are embedded in this Chinese-inspired fantasy set in a world with a long, winding Snake Wall separating East and West. Some children are "breathmarked," born with a patch of dragon scales on their skin indicating an innate talent. East-born twins Sai and Jun have always shared everything, except that Sai is breathmarked and specially chosen to train to protect the East. Jun, who has been illegally training in martial arts for years, betrays his own secret in a fit of jealousy, which tears their family apart; Jun and his father are banished to the West, while Sai and his mother remain in the East. Resentful but undeterred, Jun runs away to fight in a tournament to restore his family's honor. He soon discovers that political corruption has transformed the tournament into a deadly battle against reunification, and he must decide what he is willing to risk. Sensory details plunge readers into the danger and splendor of the tournament as well as Jun's poignant inner conflicts. A page-turning adventure and coming-of-age tale steeped in fantastical myth.

Reviewer: J. Elizabeth Mills | Horn Book Magazine Issue: March, 2025

(3) YA After being kidnapped by human terrorist group Sapience, Donovan (Exo) is back among his fellow exos, humans grafted with impenetrable armor by the extraterrestrial zhree. Now, after one hundred–plus years of peaceful colonization, the zhree are leaving Earth; they'll take select Hardened humans along, and the rest will fend for themselves on the now-vulnerable planet. This sequel continues a nuanced exploration of colonial relations and equality.

Reviewer: Jeannie Coutant

(3) YA More than a century after aliens colonized Earth, seventeen-year-old Donovan is an exo (a human "Hardened" with alien zhree technology) in the "cooperationist" human government. His kidnapping by resistance group Sapience threatens the uneasy truce. The fully realized world is painted in shades of gray; no group has the clear moral ground. Sympathetic characters take opposing sides in this absorbing, unpredictable coming-of-age drama propelled by high-stakes action.

Reviewer: Claire E. Gross