The Summer Prince

by Alaya Dawn Johnson

Overview

The lush city of Palmares Tres shimmers with tech and tradition, with screaming gossip casters and practiced politicians. In the midst of this vibrant metropolis, June Costa creates art that's sure to make her legendary. But her dreams of fame become something more when she meets Enki, the bold new Summer King. The whole city falls in love with him (including June's best friend, Gil). But June sees more to Enki than amber eyes and a lethal samba. She sees a fellow artist.

Together, June and Enki will stage explosive, dramatic projects that Palmares Tres will never forget. They will add fuel to a growing rebellion against the government's strict limits on new tech. And June will fall deeply, unfortunately in love with Enki. Because like all Summer Kings before him, Enki is destined to die.

Pulsing with the beat of futuristic Brazil, burning with the passions of its characters, and overflowing with ideas, this fiery novel will leave you eager for more from Alaya Dawn Johnson.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545417792
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	03/01/2013
Pages:	304
Product dimensions:	5.80(w) x 8.38(h) x 1.03(d)
Lexile:	780L (what's this?)
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Alaya Dawn Johnson’s first novel for young adults, THE SUMMER PRINCE, received three starred reviews, was longlisted for the National Book Award, and was a Kirkus Best Book of the Year. She grew up in Washington, D.C., attended Columbia University, and now lives in New York City.

Editorial Reviews

Eighteen-year-old artist June Costa is a citizen of Palmares Três, a vertically structured city in what was once Brazil, with the rich at the top, the poor at the bottom, and a vital tradition of music and dance. Its centenarian queen keeps a tight rein on the tech—electronic and pharmaceutical—that allows for intensive state security and bodily modification. Privileged but rebellious June and her best friend Gil live on Tier Eight, and when they get involved with Enki, a beautiful bottom-tier resident who will serve a year as the summer king before his ritual sacrifice, her political art gains attention, and things get dangerous. In her YA debut, Johnson (the Spirit Binders series) depicts a future that’s recognizably Brazilian and human—June may have nanohooks, holo screens, and light implants, but 400 years on, teens still resent their parents and find ways to subvert the technology their elders theoretically control. With its complicated history, founding myth, and political structure, Palmares Três is compelling, as is the triple bond between June, Enki, and Gil as they challenge their world’s injustices. Ages 14–up. Agent: Jill Grinberg, Jill Grinberg Literary Management. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

Johnson's post-apocalyptic dystopian science fiction novel tries very hard to achieve many things, but fails on most accounts. Lead character June Acosta has two best friends, Enik and Gil. She loves Gil, but he loves Enik, who is to become the new summer king. The world has ended due to nuclear war, and there are several city-states over the world that house the leftover human population. Technology has allowed these humans to live longer than ever before, and the city-state where June lives (Palmares Tres) is ruled by a queen and a council of Auntie's. After the reign of one year, each summer king is sacrificed (his throat is cut in public), and he chooses the next woman to be queen. The story is confusing, and the reader never really gets a visual picture or enough details to understand the culture and setting. The character development is lacking, and what the author is really trying to achieve with the "plot" or characters is unclear: human rights, social class, importance of art, access to information, sexuality, anarchy, feminism, etc. The "heroine" June is not somebody to root for, and the reader may not even care what happens to her. Due to its lack of thematic clarity, the novel fails as good dystopian science fiction. It is only clear that the author tried to create a Hunger Games or perhaps The Giver, but does not come close. This book will need promotion to appeal even to its intended audience. Reviewer: Karen Sykeny

VOYA - Karen Sykeny

This is, perhaps, the best dystopian novel since Marie Lu's Legend. It succeeds, not just because of strongly realized characters and complex relationships, but because of writing that requires the reader to savor the story. In this apocalyptic future, the southern coast of Brazil is one of the few functioning societies left in the world. Although technologically advanced by our standards, the matriarchal government led by the Aunties has kept control of high tech advances so that exploring new applications is a form of rebellion in the city's slums. Artistic June Costa is a privileged teenager because of the marriage of her mother to her stepmother, Auntie Yaha. In this society, sexuality is fluid as is the case when June and her friend, Gil, both fall in love with the same ill-fated doomed young man, Enki, a bronze Adonis who has been chosen as the Queen's consort who will then be sacrificed at the end of his reigning year. Enki's wildness is both a challenge and a magnet to all who meet him. While Enki at first shows a romantic preference for Gil, his feelings for June unwind as does his hatred for the Aunties. With his sacrifice imminent, June and Enki plan to run away but find that the world beyond their own is a devastated landscape full of gangs and turf warfare. Enki, however, has a secret from June. With the sure knowledge that he can't escape his fate, he plans to elevate June at the time of his death. The unusual location and exotic ethnicities of the characters add to the appeal of the book. In some ways, June's teenage angst and conflicts with her mother are no different from a contemporary teen's problems, but the elevated quality of the writing makes this a necessary purchase. Reviewer: Lois Rubin Gross

Children's Literature - Lois Rubin Gross

An art project, a rebellion and a sacrifice make up this nuanced, original cyberpunk adventure. June, 17, remembers the last sacrifice of the Summer King, nine years before. In a future Brazil, after climate change, wars, natural disasters and plague have devastated the world, Palmares Três is a peaceful and just city, technologically supported with holos, nanohooks and bots. Beneath the city's glittering facade, however, there's another reality. Youth is stifled while the governing Aunties keep Palmares Três static in a class-stratified society centuries behind the rest of the developed world. June and best friend Gil, both relatively privileged artists, happily spend their spring dancing, creating public art and voting for the newest Summer King to be sacrificed for the city's prosperity after a year. When gorgeous, dark-skinned Enki is elected, both June and Gil fall for him--but it's Gil he takes as a lover, and June he takes as an artistic collaborator. Their love triangle, in a city with no gender-based limitations on romantic or sexual partnerships, is multifaceted, not the usual heroine-chooses-between-two-boys dynamic. As the trio dances--often literally--around one another, June must negotiate between the extremes of stasis and post-humanism, learn to see beyond herself, discover the meaning of integrity, and maybe even save her rotten-at-the-core and best-beloved city. Luminous. (Science fiction. 14-18)

Kirkus Reviews

“In her YA debut, Johnson (the Spirit Binders series) depicts a future that's recognizably Brazilian and human…With its complicated history, founding myth, and political structure, Palmares Três is compelling, as is the triple bond between June, Enki, and Gil as they challenge their world's injustices.” -- Publishers Weekly, starred review

“As the trio dances-often literally-around one another, June must negotiate between the extremes of stasis and post-humanism, learn to see beyond herself, discover the meaning of integrity, and maybe even save her rotten-at-the-core and best-beloved city. Luminous.” -- Kirkus Reviews, starred review

“In this YA debut, Johnson paints a brilliant picture of a seemingly lush paradise hiding a core rotted by class stratification, creative stagnation, and disenfranchisement. Evocative, disturbing, and exhilarating, this story leaves much for the reader to ponder, from the nuanced characters to fascinating central themes, including the impact of technology and the role of isolationism in a perilous world. Like leaping into cold water on a hot day, this original dystopian novel takes the breath away, refreshes, challenges, and leaves the reader shivering but yearning for another plunge.” -- Booklist, starred review

“In precise prose Johnson evokes an utterly foreign setting, complete with technologies that push at the limits of what it means to be human, and the relationships that delineate the social landscape are intriguingly unconventional and startling in their intensity. The story itself is thematically rich, encompassing the political nature of art in a time of vast upheaval, the potential of power to corrupt, the tension between tradition and innovation, and the toils and rewards of underground creative expression…. An imaginative and thoroughly realized addition to the sci-fi genre.” -- Horn Book

"There's a great, fresh audacity to Johnson's YA debut." -- Entertainment Weekly

“Rife with political turmoil and seeped in culture, this unique and highly fantastical dystopian romance is both intriguing and imaginative. Johnson excels at building rich and gorgeously complex worlds, and her prose shines with a sophistication that's uncommon in YA literature. This beautifully written novel will likely find a home with fans of Alison Croggon and Rachel Hartman.” -- School Library Journal

From the Publisher

Gr 9 Up—Four hundred years earlier, the Y Plague nearly decimated the world's male population. Upon the ruins of Brazil, Queen Odete constructed the pyramid city of Palmares Três. Here artist June Costa, 16, dreams of greatness, but instead finds herself tangled in an unusual and tragic love triangle involving her friend Gil and Enki, the rebellious Summer King who must die at year's end so the city and its complex matrilineal political system can continue to thrive. While Enki chooses Gil as his lover, he is impressed with June's daring, and they collaborate to create groundbreakingly memorable artwork. But as Enki's inevitable sacrifice draws near, the two flee Palmares Três, a move that will shake the very foundation of their city's future. Rife with political turmoil and seeped in culture, this unique and highly fantastical dystopian romance is both intriguing and imaginative. Johnson excels at building rich and gorgeously complex worlds, and her prose shines with a sophistication that's uncommon in YA literature. This beautifully written novel will likely find a home with fans of Alison Croggon and Rachel Hartman.—Alissa J. Bach, Oxford Public Library, MI

School Library Journal