YA Fantasy Panel

Reviewed by S Dickinson

Annaliese Avery - Author of The Immortal Games and Ann Sei Lin - Author of Rebel Skies & Rebel Fire, held together a fun and greatly interesting panel where they dove into their writing processes and gave us an understanding behind how they developed their characters and how their plots were formed.

Annaliese Avery’s book, The Immortal Games is Greek Mythology, meets Astrology, meets The Hunger Games. In this book, the Greek Gods randomly choose one human, represented by a zodiac sign to compete in deathly challenges. It’s a true game of life and death.

Ann Sei Lin’s books, Rebel Skies & Rebel Fire are set in a fantasy version of Japan which has cities in the sky and creatures made from origami. The main character, Kurara, has the ability to bring paper to life – this is called being a ‘crafter’ and they hunt the origami creatures called Shikigami. These books hold great adventures and will not let you down.

Throughout the whole panel they kept the conversation flowing and gave the room a fun, welcoming atmosphere which made the time spent there very enjoyable. Both authors captivated us with stories about their books and how they came to be. They managed to keep us thoroughly enthralled by adding some comedy to their panel which put a lot of smiles on our faces.

However, what impressed me the most about this panel was how I enjoyed every second of it; there wasn’t a single moment where I thought it was boring and when the panel ended, myself and almost everyone else there bought one of their books. I really enjoyed listening to these authors and would recommend them to any young people interested in the fantasy genre.