Publishers Weekly
11/04/2019
Gay high school junior Kane Montgomery does not remember stealing his father’s car and crashing it into an abandoned mill in East Amity, Conn. But after paramedics pull him from a river—and with a missing person to account for and facing possible arson charges—Kane accepts the help of the frightening, charismatic psychologist Dr. Poesy in uncovering what happened. As the events leading up to the car crash begin to surface, Kane encounters reveries, dreamlike fantasy worlds conjured by East Amity’s citizens, and meets the Others, classmates with the ability to enter and manipulate the reveries. Slowly, Kane discovers his own powers within the reveries, but when the dreams prove unmanageable, threatening the balance between reality and fantasy, Kane must make difficult decisions that affect friends, family, and a new boyfriend. With a nod to Roald Dahl’s The Witches, debut author La Sala weaves compelling tension into the elaborate reveries’ richly drawn, if occasionally overwrought, worlds. Still, La Sala’s portrayal of Kane’s friendship with the Others is heartfelt, and the story’s many LGBTQ characters are prominently represented and powerfully nuanced. Ages 14–up. Agent: Veronica Park, Corvisiero Literary Agency. (Jan.)
From the Publisher
"Joyously, riotously queer... The themes of creating one's own reality and fighting against the rules imposed by the world you're born into will ring powerfully true for many young readers." — Kirkus Reviews
"Smart, sensitive, and unabashedly queer, this atmospheric debut reshaped my heart. Reverie has the makings of a YA sensation." — Amy Rose Capetta, author of The Brilliant Death and The Lost Coast
"Reverie is a dreamy escapist fantasy that will keep you entertained and on your toes. With beautiful prose, fantastic landscapes, and a drag queen sorceress who I'd let step on me any day, you won't want to miss this debut." — Tara Sim, author of the Timekeeper trilogy
"I don't know that I've ever encountered a book quite like Reverie before. It wears its queerness and its narrative weirdness on its sleeve and it paints outside the genre box, even as it gleefully pulls tropes out of that same box and flings them around like confetti. It feels like something fresh and different, and I'll be fascinated to see if it leads the way for a new YA trend. Queer, dream-bending mystery fantasy may well be the next big thing, and I'm here for it!" — NPR.org
"Stunning and terrifying to behold." — Hypable
"La Sala created a work that toys with fantasy — as in dreams contrasted with reality — and the fantasy genre itself, which for so long has had a narrow concept of who gets to be heroes. "Reverie" kicks open the doors to new voices, rainbow fire and all." — The ARTery (WBUR)
"A unique, clever fantasy with a strong protagonist." — Booklist
"This outstanding debut novel will light readers’ imaginations on fire...Imaginative, bold, and full of queer representation, this is a must-purchase for YA collections." — School Library Journal (starred review)
"Forget following your own dreams; follow Ryan La Sala’s into Reverie, a vivid, exciting, and profoundly original tale of identity, imagination, and, of course, villainous drag queen sorcery." — Alex London, bestselling author of Proxy and Black Wings Beating
"Readers will be guessing to the end of this wild and weird and crazy ride, and they'll love every minute of it." — Sam J. Miller, Nebula-Award-winning author of The Art of Starving
"La Sala weaves compelling tension...La Sala’s portrayal of Kane’s friendship with the Others is heartfelt, and the story’s many LGBTQ characters are prominently represented and powerfully nuanced." — Publishers Weekly
"Ryan La Sala’s debut novel is a fever nightmare of epically queer proportions. Told in a commanding voice and with both wit and style, Reverie is the kind of magical, twisty adventure that made me feel at home. This novel is truly a dream come true, and I can’t wait for queer teens to get lost in its hypnotic tale." — Mark Oshiro, author of Anger is a Gift
"Powerful... [La Sala] is a model for what an authentic queer writer can be, and it comes through in his debut." — Medium
"A darkly imagined, riveting fantasy… thrilling." — Shelf Awareness
"Ryan La Sala’s debut is effervescent. Reverie is unlike anything I’ve read." — Zoraida Córdova, award-winning author of Labyrinth Lost
"A unique addition to YA collections that represents diversity in the book’s characters and the author." — School Library Connection
"With its fresh take on a diverse cast, its queer-power narrative, and its unique rendering of dream magic, this fantasy offers readers something wonderfully new and engaging...a gem of a novel that is as affirming as it is entertaining." — The Bulletin of the Center for Children’s Books
"A spectacular, imaginative tale unlike anything you’ve read all year... You don’t want to miss this book!" — Paste Magazine
"Innovative... Featuring magic, monsters, and a drag queen sorceress, Reverie promises to open entirely new vistas in the world of LGBTQ fiction." — Goodreads Blog
"[An] inclusive and dazzling debut." — POPSUGAR
"Reverie is easy to fall in love with. La Sala is an exquisite wordsmith and he puts those talents on display as he crafts the intricacies of the reveries and the astonishment of the rainbow-colored magic battles. Reverie makes a strong, late-season case as one of the best young adult fantasies of the year." — Tor.com
School Library Journal
★ 11/01/2019
Gr 9 Up—La Sala's debut novel captures the magical, enthralling, and sometimes unsettling feelings that can come when our dreamworlds consume us. The story opens after a strange "accident" that leaves Kane Montgomery nearly dead and with no memories of the previous weeks. Kane quickly discovers, however, that nothing that has happened to him was an accident at all, and that reality is much more complicated than most people could fathom. As people's fantasies begin to bend reality in ways that threaten to destroy Kane's loved ones, it is up to him and the Others—a group of friends with extraordinary powers—to unravel these warped realities and save the world as they know it. This outstanding debut novel will light readers' imaginations on fire. La Sala's ability to create not just one fantasy world, but many smaller ones within it, is impressive. In these worlds, or reveries, La Sala cleverly weaves together characters' deepest desires and fears with eccentric and sometimes absurd elements that perfectly capture the way it feels to dream. These worlds would be nothing, of course, without a strong cast of dynamic characters to navigate them. From teen heroes to the evil sorceress, each character in the novel exudes both vulnerability and immense power. VERDICT Imaginative, bold, and full of queer representation, this is a must-purchase for YA collections.—Lauren Hathaway, University of British Columbia
Kirkus Reviews
2019-09-29
A teenager fights to keep a series of baroque fantasy worlds from tearing his reality apart.
Something terrible happened to Kane Montgomery at the old mill in his Connecticut hometown—or he did something terrible there; but with his memory of the night gone, even he couldn't tell you what. Now Kane has to prove that he's stable enough to go back to school, a task made infinitely more difficult by visions of spiderlike monsters and mysterious encounters with a glamorous, overtly queer person named Dr. Poesy. When Kane and his friends—bullied Ursula Abernathy, queen bee Adeline Bishop, golden boy Elliot Levi, and gorgeous, moody Dean Flores—are pulled into a series of immersive fantasy worlds generated by the minds of their town's residents, Kane must figure out whom to trust and whom to save before fantasy destroys reality completely. The narrative and aesthetics are joyously, riotously queer, reveling in moments of sensuality between Kane and other boys as well as in Dr. Poesy's drag-queen ensembles and the over-the-top fantasy worlds. Adeline and Dean are brown-skinned, Elliot is Jewish, and LGBTQ secondary and background characters suffuse the story. While the plot is predictable, the story's many pop-culture influences feel derivative, and the prose often rings hollow and thesaurus-happy, the themes of creating one's own reality and fighting against the rules imposed by the world you're born into will ring powerfully true for many young readers.
A colorful, queer fantasy pastiche. (Contemporary fantasy. 14-18)
