Thirteen Orphans: Breaking the Wall

Thirteen Orphans: Breaking the Wall by Jane Lindskold

Thirteen Orphans
ISBN# 978-0-7653-1700-1
Available now
Published by Tor
Format: hardcover, 367 pages
Genres: fiction, urban fantasy

Jane Lindskold is the author of over 18 novels including the Wolf series.  Thirteen Orphans: Breaking the Wall is my first book by this author, but I'm already eager for book two in the series to come out.  This book has a modern day setting, but because these "orphans" have been exiled into our world from a far away land that doesn't even exist in our reality there's definitely more of an epic fantasy feel to the story.  Before you go and hunt this book down be aware that the magical system in this series is closely tied into the game of mah jong (at least for the exiled orphans).  If you aren't at least passingly familiar with the game parts of the books, especially the spell work, may be a little hard to follow.

Most family secrets consist of illegitimate births, adoptions, or ill-gotten gains, and Brenda Morris would probably find any of those more believable than what's about to come out of her father's mouth.  When the original Thirteen were exiled from the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice they bound their magic and knowledge into the game of mah-jong.  That meant it couldn't be taken away easily and they had a better way to teach the next generation.  Now, a couple generations later, the orphans have grown complacent with some of them thinking the stories of their ancestry nothing more than fairy tales and completely unaware of their magic.  Whether they're ready or not someone has come to challenge them and is taking them down one at a time.  If the orphans were simply killed their magic and ties to the earthly branches of the Chinese zodiac (the Monkey, the Rat, the Dragon, etc.) would simply pass on to an heir, but their hunter has found a way around this.  Their unknown aggressor is simply stripping away every memory to do with the orphans, effectively locking them away from their magic and preventing the power from moving on because they are still alive.  By the time the remainder of the Thirteen figure out that something very wrong is going on there's only five of them left.  Brenda is the Rat's heir, but if they don't find who's behind these attacks and some way to reverse the spell there may not be an inheritance for her or anyone else, at least in our realm.

As with most first books in series this one is mostly set-up for future books complete with characters gathering, and some of them meeting for the first time.  Brenda is completely new to magic and the story of the Thirteen with Riprap knowing only a little more so we get history and magic lessons through them.  I really liked this book because it's very character driven and most of the characters do have their flaws and idiosyncrasies which makes them seem more real and unique.  The only problem I did have was Brenda being a little more naive than can be believed as a college student.  In this book she meets her first black person ever fully expecting lots of jewelry and possible gang affiliation.  Exactly how small is her college?  She also has her first "birds and the bees" talk.  Is her college run by nuns or something?  Was she home-schooled until college?  Other than that I think this book, because of the writing style, would be a great crossover for fantasy fans looking to try urban fantasy and vice versa because sooner or later the cast will be moving to the Lands Born from Smoke and Sacrifice.

Zhye