"John M. Ford is the best writer in America, bar none." --Robert Jordan

"Brilliant is as brilliant does....Whether human, minor Elf nobility (the Ellyon), or Highborn Urthas Elves, Ford's generous cast of characters continually surprises, intrigues, and pulses with life, a tribute to his power as a storyteller. Haunting, puzzling, even unsettling and deliberately obscure, this improvisatory jazzlike riff of good and evil in the context of a most unusual growing-up story is as bittersweet as first love and loss, a minor-key elegy for death of youth and innocence." --Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"Ford's evocation of this transformed Chicago has a magic all its own....Beyond the life-or-death tests and the mind-bending puzzles, this is fundamentally a love story, with a deeply satisfying climax (in every sense of the word)." --The New York Times

"Rasping, succinct, tantalizing, and psychologically complex, as well as powerfully visual...Superb." --Kirkus Reviews (starred review)