Claws

School Library JournalGr 4–6—A rather alluring cover featuring a black cat silhouetted against a full moon pulls readers into a novel that proves to be an uneasy amalgam of genres: gothic, fantasy, dystopia, and teen rebellion. Emma's older sister has vanished, and her parents have depleted their finances in an attempt to find her. The family moves to a dilapidated trailer park at the edge of a magical forest, but they inhabit a world in which magic is frowned upon rather than celebrated. In fact, Emma is expelled from school when she reveals the claws she's developed since befriending a talking cat that hangs around their trailer. The feline has convinced Emma to swallow a pulsing marble-size object that will give her control over a pride of cats, and it clearly gives her other catlike attributes as well.