The Shifter would be a very good book for grades 4th through all ages, full of excitement and danger. In the three territories there is trouble brewing, the new Luminary at the Healers League is making deals with a pain merchant, which is bad news for Geveg. Nya must make hard choices to save her friends and sister plus all the other Geveg apprentices who have been forced to heal more hurts than they can bear. It’s a really great book and I love it!
--Caitlin Minamiji, age 10
I knew this would be an easy review, if only I could get my hands on the book. The Shifter (The Healing Wars, Book 1), by Janice Hardy arrived while I was trapped on the phone. Opening the mailer, I extended the back cover toward my daughter/assistant reviewer. Caitlin seized the book, read the back cover, opened the dust jacket, read both flaps, and was through chapter two before I had finished hearing about the re-decoration of my mother-in-law’s bathroom.
“I don’t suppose I could have the book back so that I can review it?”
“Nope.” Another page turned.
“Is it good?”
“Yep.” Next page.
We have a winner! Any book that can pass muster with my cynical, bibliophile daughter will not be boring or poorly written. The Shifter is most definitely neither.
According to the author bio, Janice Hardy “has always wondered about the darker side of healing.” In her debut novel, The Shifter, she explores the ethical ramifications of healing and the potential use of healing as a weapon in a fantasy adventure that packs a wallop. The ethical choices brought about in post-war Geveg by a scarcity of pynvium, an enchanted metal that can be used to hold pain, echo concerns that radiate through our real-life consciousness. When medical care becomes rationed, how does society determine who lives and who dies?
For the Gevegians, there is an even darker layer in this ethical quagmire. Pynvium cannot only contain the pain drawn from healed wounds, it may be enchanted to “flash” — to release that pain — as an offensive weapon. In the world of The Healing Wars, the healing of pain yields both salvation and doom.
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