Uncommon Sense

by Heidi Moone

For talented young medico, March, life is far from a fairy tale. She’s a serious student of the healing arts, and her skills are in high demand in River’s Turn. A beast made of shadows is roaming the countryside, capable of destroying entire cottages and vanishing with every soul and scrap of metal within. As the beast begins to close in, the township withdraws behind the stout walls of the Del’Terre manor house, where they will make their stand. Inside, March and her family encounter not just the bright and challenging Del’Terre siblings, but mysterious travellers with stories of phantom Kingdoms, missing royals, and a daring plan for the beast.

But as she works, March grows a sense so keen it’s enervating, and must concede life may not be as cut and dried as she once believed. In fact, it may take an uncommon sense to save them all.

If you like books based on classical fairy tales, like Beastly, by Alex Flinn, or Wicked, by Gregory Maguire, try this book!

225 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 25, 2019

Reviews

[Tracy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This isn't my first time through this fantasy book. What it does, it does well. It's essentially a mystery set in a fairy tale landscape, complete with a shadowy monster that strikes without warning and leaves devastation in its wake. The capper on this one, for me isn't even the isolation of River's Turn, a town in the snowy mountains. It's the hero, who is a 'Medico', or a doctor in training, trying to unravel these events.

What I like: The way the shadowy attacks remind me of the historical Beast of Gévaudan (in France in the 1760s); the young medical trainee who begins to develop the keen 'Sense' that puts a pin in the mystery; the clear relationship (obvious from the cover) between this book and the Fairy Tale 'The Princess and the Pea'. Those are, unless I'm mistaken, pea leaves she's touching on the cover. Great romp and a quick read that I hope will result in another book in this unusual series.