On Hidden Wings by Adare Elyse tells a wonderful story about courage for middle grade/YA against a fantasy backdrop.
Becca, age 15, and her mother hide in plain sight in a country where their kind is banned. They stay because they are hoping to find Becca’s missing father. Everywhere there is animosity against their shape-shifting kind. In this country, the shape-shifters are outlawed, and when one is outed, he or she is killed, sent to prison, or banished.
Becca looks like a human only with effort, effort she can’t sustain for too long. When she tires, her true self shows: a winged centaur. Her mother is a seraphim. Her father is a centaur. So not only is she unwelcome in the human country because she is a shape shifter; she is unwelcome in the other countries as well, the one for seraphim and the one for centaurs. Their little family has no place to go.
When Becca’s mother gets a weaving job and must go to the palace, Becca finds out more about how the nobility live. Later, she sneaks into the library in the palace to find out where her father is being imprisoned, and there meets a strange human boy: Ryandru, the crown prince, age 12.
Ryandru has much to hide as well. The two form an unlikely team as they search for Becca’s father.
I found On Hidden Wings by Adare Elyse to be very well written, with well developed characters and a meaty, character-building plot that isn’t at all predictable. One thing I especially liked was the positive portrayal of the parents in the story, as the story unfolds and motives are revealed. The book won the Realm Award for Middle Grade, Christian fiction, which is why it came to my attention. A well deserved award!
