Shortly after, his charismatic aunt Linda shows up at his mother’s home, asking for Jack to accompany her on a special genealogical road trip. One day, Jack forgets to take his medicine and has the best soccer tryout of his life. You’d probably be just a mystified, scared, and angry as Jack Swift.

What if someone told you – an ordinary, small town sixteen year old boy with a congenital heart condition – that you were actually a Warrior? One of the last of a special clan of magical people? That the medicine you had been taking since birth was, in fact, meant to suppress your magical abilities? That you would be hunted down, killed, or sold to the highest bidder in an ancient, twisted power struggle that would culminate in your entering an arena to fight to the death? Chima at BEA, and immediately following that dinner, I *knew* I had to get the Heir books. Last week, Ana and I had the pleasure of meeting the wonderful Ms.

Why did I read this book: I love Cinda Williams Chima’s current high fantasy YA Seven Realms series, and had been eying her earlier works for a good long while. Stand alone or series: Book 1 in the Heir series The winning house rules the Weir.Īs if his bizarre magical heritage isn’t enough, Jack finds out that he’s not just another member of Weirlind-he’s one of the last of the warriors-at a time when both houses are scouting for a player. At the head of this magical society sit the feuding houses of the Red Rose and the White Rose, whose power is determined by playing The Game-a magical tournament in which each house sponsors a warrior to fight to the death. Soon, Jack learns the startling truth about himself: He is Weirlind part of an underground society of magical people who live among us. And it feels great-until he loses control of his own strength and nearly kills another player during soccer team tryouts. Suddenly, he is stronger, fiercer, and more confident than ever before. Only the medicine he has to take daily and the thick scar above his heart set him apart from the other high-schoolers. Publication Date: April 2006 (US)/September 2011 (UK)īefore he knew about the Roses, 16-year-old Jack lived an unremarkable life in the small Ohio town of Trinity. Publisher: Hyperion/Disney (US)/Indigo (UK) Genre: Contemporary/Urban Fantasy, Young Adult

The warrior heir series