The Spirit Wastes
(Spirit Hollows Book #2)
by P.R. Brewer
Lockegee Books, 2023
367 Pages
Ages 14-17
The Spirit Wastes is the second book in a trilogy, sequel to The Spirit Hollows. I am captivated by P.R. Brewer’s original worldbuilding. Although set in a steampunk-styled alternate history, it is anything but derivative: cut off from the rest of civilization, landscapes of mountains and hollers saturated by spirit beings that might be harmless, may hurt you, or could mean instant death for miles around, (so you’d better be carrying your copy of Nevan McBrain’s Field Guide to the Spirits,) do remind me of that hint of cosmic horror in Babylon 5 when a planet-sized jellyfish floats by, just momentarily passing through our “dimension”.
The author settles the reader into the situation nicely without repeating introductions. As last we saw, Paige Zhu is apprenticed to Darius Epps, spirit researcher, and Zora Coldiron is impatiently biding her time until she becomes sixteen and can officially join her half-brother, Pine Box Prosser, in his spirit-busting business. The evil Evelyn Fontaine fled into the Spirit Wastes at the end of the last book, where surely she would meet a tragic end? No such luck. From the beginning we learn that not only did she find a way to thrive in the wastelands, but she’s back and looking for revenge.
The Hollows receive a mysterious broadcast from The Spirit Wastes, picked up by Abigail Putnam, an expert with 2-way radio, from a place where nothing is supposed to live …but enough deadly spirits to overwhelm any humans wandering there come nightfall. It’s a distress signal from Ram’s Horn. It might be a trap laid by Fontaine, but it doesn’t feel like it. The story is well-paced as our intrepid team braves the Wastes on a rescue mission. Their zeppelin, The Reynardine, flies off with most of the adults left behind thanks to an encounter with a crazed spiritist!
As different types of spirits close in on the party of adventurers, I wished *I* had a guide to remember what they all were from the first book. Then, on a hunch, I flipped to the back… and, sure enough, I found not only an excerpt from Tolliver’s Pocket Spirit Handbook, but an outline of the Hollows’ history waiting. Exactly what I was looking for! (Now we just need an illustrated spirit guide!)
Zora receives a vision. The Harbinger sends her a message just to let her know it has found a way back to the Hollows! And it’s not the only one. Quinn receives a threat letter directly from Evelyn Fontaine. Then, more enigma: Zora has picked up signals from a pirate radio station. With a story filled with prophecy and voices from the ether, I admit I sometimes had a hard time keeping them all straight; card readings, dream visions, psychic cries for help, cryptic radio transmissions, and lost histories of the wastes, but they all come together at the end.
Signe, spirit seer and Quinn’s partner, plays a key role in revealing more about the origin of the Great Wakening. An indigo glow encountered by her mother before she was born may be the source of her power to view spirits. Known as an Eidolon, it appears only during an eclipse, granting in its wake the Mark of The Syzygy. On the way to meet Quinn, she gets a tarot reading from a family for whom she has chased away a school of tangies. The cards reveal the enigmatic symbols of twin birds, a skywheel, and a train hauling a coffin. To try to clarify their meaning, she finds a copy of Ulysses V. Bell’s Revelations From the Veiled Realm… who coincidentally also claimed he heard a secret radio transmission from a pirate station called Peryton One (for a crypto-zoological clue, look up what a peryton is and what shape of horns one has!) Lost on the way to investigate, his tasks seem important to the story arc: unravel the loom’s pattern, track the professor, and find the fiddler’s songbook.
In the wastes we meet the Children of the Ram who bear different gifts akin to Signe’s spirit sight, demonstrated by their blue-tinted skin and their ability to set off Zora’s spirit detectors: Novalyne Martin, who also bears the Mark of the Syzygy, has the ability to hear the spirits or sense when they are near, and her 16 year-old twin Nicholas can hold hounts at bay with his fiddle playing. Will this give Zora a new path to develop stronger sonic weapons against the spirits?
The zeppelin engages in a sky battle during a storm driven by derechos! Misfortunate coincidences occur… is there a saboteur on board? The sky ship crashes and the kids are on their own against a wilderness filled with deadly forces of nature, and someone isn’t fully who they say they are. With a hidden enemy as well as already known ones, it’s a race against nightfall. Expect a two-pronged attack from old enemies.
In order to give depth to the setting, the author uses names culled from the Civil War, Manly Wade Wellman yarns, and even the Salem witch trials. As the adventure ramps up, I feel attached to the characters. I want Novalyne and Paige to find each other. Abigail and Nicholas, too. I am desperate for Signe to find the mystery and legacy of Ulysses Bell, and I want to know where the radio signals are coming from and I am scared of who the infiltrator is who sabotaged The Reynardine. And what is the Loom?
Many new characters are introduced in this sequel without sacrificing the dense mythology of The Hollows. The world is expanded, most significantly with an origin story of the girl with the violin, Jessamine Carter. We are introduced to the Children of the Ram and the Eidolon(s?), indigo-glowing incursions from a third world that lies apart from both the realm of the spirits and The Hollows.
The climax is an exciting journey through the wastes and the Lost City with some great action scenes; a black train straight from Signe’s hex card reading, a railway chase, a planetarium under attack, and a riverboat catastrophe with grappling hooks and a kaiju-sized spirit! The ending is bittersweet, to be continued with the promise of a final showdown with the Harbinger and the hint of a new weapon. I found this to be one of the best books I’ve read this year, so I’m glad to see that Brewer has a third book on the way!