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Book Summary and Reviews of (S)Kin by Ibi Zoboi

(S)Kin by Ibi Zoboi

(S)Kin

by Ibi Zoboi

  • Critics' Consensus (7):
  • Published:
  • Feb 2025, 400 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

From award-winning, New York Times bestselling author Ibi Zoboi comes her groundbreaking contemporary fantasy debut—a novel in verse based on Caribbean folklore—about the power of inherited magic and the price we must pay to live the life we yearn for.

"Our new home with its

thick walls and locked doors

wants me to stay trapped in my skin—

but I am fury and flame."

Fifteen-year-old Marisol is the daughter of a soucouyant. Every new moon, she sheds her skin like the many women before her, shifting into a fireball witch who must fly into the night and slowly sip from the lives of others to sustain her own. But Brooklyn is no place for fireball witches with all its bright lights, shut windows, and bolt-locked doors.… While Marisol hoped they would leave their old traditions behind when they emigrated from the islands, she knows this will never happen while she remains ensnared by the one person who keeps her chained to her magical past—her mother.

Seventeen-year-old Genevieve is the daughter of a college professor and a newly minted older half sister of twins. Her worsening skin condition and the babies' constant wailing keep her up at night, when she stares at the dark sky with a deep longing to inhale it all. She hopes to quench the hunger that gnaws at her, one that seems to reach for some memory of her estranged mother. When a new nanny arrives to help with the twins, a family secret connecting her to Marisol is revealed, and Gen begins to find answers to questions she hasn't even thought to ask.

But the girls soon discover that the very skin keeping their flames locked beneath the surface may be more explosive to the relationships around them than any ancient magic.

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Reviews

Media Reviews

"Using gripping verse, Zoboi delves into each teen's inner turmoil, tackling themes of misogynoir, colorism, and immigration via complicated mother-daughter dynamics. The girls' shifting perspectives appear on alternating sides of the book's pages, only combining once they meet; an ambiguous resolution rounds out this searing exploration of personal growth and self-discovery." —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"The girls' intertwined tales, blurring and shifting over the course of the narrative, unfold in lyrical alternating first-person verse and are cleverly used to discuss beauty ideals and colorism. Readers will enjoy the ways the monstrous characters' human facades shift. A vividly creative, heart-pounding poetic journey infused with Caribbean folklore." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"Bold and exciting. Readers will fly through Zoboi's latest masterpiece and crave more stories featuring Caribbean folklore. An ambitious contemporary fantasy that will grip readers from the first page." —Booklist (starred review)

"The stage is set for secrets and supernatural discoveries. The slow, methodical unraveling of how interwoven the two teenage girls' stories is the treat of this sharp verse narrative." —Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books (starred review)

"Zoboi displays her immense talent in a new genre by creating a first-class, haunting urban fantasy. Will likely be loved by fans of Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi and Blood Scion by Deborah Falaye." —Shelf Awareness

"Ambitious and unapologetic in its rendering, deftly addressing themes of colorism, assimilation, and inheritance. This fast-paced fever dream of a tale crackles and sparks on the page—almost burning the fingertips as it weaves folklore into reality; these dynamic girls reckoning with an inescapable lineage will change the way you look at the night sky." —Amber McBride, National Book Award finalist and author of Me (Moth)

This information about (S)Kin was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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Author Information

Ibi Zoboi Author Biography

Ibi Zoboi holds an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. Her novel American Street was a National Book Award finalist and a New York Times Notable Book. She is also the author of Pride and My Life as an Ice Cream Sandwich, a New York Times bestseller. She is the editor of the anthology Black Enough. Born in Haiti and raised in New York City, she now lives in New Jersey with her husband and their three children.

Author Interview
Link to Ibi Zoboi's Website

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