Imagine an impossible choice: decide between saving your friends or your only memories of the beloved mother you’ve lost. How I gasped! The meaning of remembering, the changing nature of grief, and the energy that connects us all is at the heart of this action-packed sequel to Jenna Lee-Yun phenomenal fantasy debut THE LAST RHEE WITCH. Book 2 starts with a fantastic recap of the first story (I will try to leave spoilers out here!) perfectly woven into our return to Camp Foster, only this time for a week of winter fun. Ronnie is excited to see her friends and practice magic, but things go sideways very quickly as the gumiho—the nine-tailed fox—starts to cause trouble by taking people’s gi and leaving them frozen. Gumi wants more life energy and memories to sustain her and challenges Ronnie with that impossible choice of sacrificing her remembering bracelets in order to save her friends. I absolutely LOVE the way Jenna Lee-Yun writes magic and there is so much history, mythology, and cultural discussion here that the world-building is as exciting as the adventure. Plus there is fantastic camp drama and activities, a group of friends figuring out how to work together to save the day, and a moment between Ronnie and her dad that left me bawling. My recommendation is to grab Book 1 now if you haven’t read it yet so you’re reading for this one in May! Highly recommend!!

Middle grade diverse YA series based in Korean mythology and folklore. Suitable for public and school libraries.

I didn't realize this was the second book in the series, which might have reduced my enjoyment of it. Sometimes in series authors feel compelled to make a book where the MC is suddenly highly unappealing, which might have been the case here. My major take away was the MC is incredibly self involved, which made it hard to get into her perspective and made many of her decisions seem like random authorial choices rather than something a real person would do. It also made all of the other characters far more interesting and appealing that the MC, which was sub-optimal given the story is told exclusively through her lens.

Ronnie Miller and her friends return to Camp Foster during winter break. While everyone else is off snowboarding Ronnie is having witch lessons with her coven. But Ronnie expects everything to be the same with her friends. She feels left out and the changes hurt leading her to listen to a mysterious woman in the woods. This leads to all kinds of trouble that only be solved with Ronnie is honest with her friends and understands her own motivations.
I love this mix of camp and Korean mythological characters. The children are so relatable, trying to come to grip with loss and feeling alone. Especially when you are half-dokkaebi and half witch!
Thank you to NetGalley and Disney Publishing Worldwide for this DRC.
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