I'm a bit behind on my blogging, teaching two online classes and no snow days last week left me kinda too busy to blog. I promised myself if I actually got a snow day this week, I'd get my book blogged. And I have two to blog about, but I'll just do this one today, so let's see how much I remember.
We start the books off learning about 5 children who are all about 10 years old. Four of them all want something more than they have. One night, they all disappear. Five years later they reappear in New York at a very exclusive school with their "governness," Madame Vileroy. Madame Vileroy has given them all gifts, but she expects something in return. Whether it be inside information about wealthy people, or to sabotage even each other's goals. Victoria can read people's thoughts, she calls it "cheating," to find out what she needs. And what she wants is to win all the awards, be the smartest, be the best. Bice and Belle are twins, who look NOTHING alike. Because what Belle wants is to be beautiful. As a girl, everyone always fawned over Bice, and Belle just wanted to be pretty, but no one fawned over her, because she was so plain as a girl. Christian wants to never have to be homeless or steal, which is what we saw him doing at the beginning of the book. And his dream is to be an athlete to do this. So his gift is that he can steal from other people, their energy, skills, etc. But he hates himself for doing this, because he doesn't want to steal. And Valentin can stop time and go back and do things over and over to try to get what he wants to happen, or get the best outcome he can. What he wants is to be a poet, a good one. Bice, she only wants to hide and learn as many languages as she can. Her gift is to slow time down so she can learn what she wants.
Madame Vileroy wants their souls, and they must decide if their gifts are worth giving up their souls and doing the evil things she wants.
I enjoyed the story. I think it had some clever twists and ideas in it. I liked it enough to go ahead and start reading the 2nd in the series, Another Pan. Unfortunately, I had to turn the Nook back into the store, and we didn't have any copies of the book in the store, so while I wanted to read both and post one blog about both, I will just have to wait until I get the other book to finish it.
