What is salt? No one really knows what they mine in Deep Salt; all people know is that once you’re sent there, you never come back. When Hari’s father is captured by Company cronies, Hari will do whatever it takes to get him back — even if it means going to Deep Salt himself. Pearl, on the other hand, is Company, but wants out of that cushy life. She and her extraordinary maid are determined to get out of the city — but escape is as challenging as they’d feared.

What do these two young people have in common? How do their paths cross? What is the terrible thing that is about to be unleashed on their world? I sure enjoyed the answers to those questions; in fact, this was a very intriguing read. Part Lord of the Rings and part Romeo and Juliet, it’s great fantasy. While it moves more slowly than The Hunger Games and has a less romantic plot, I’d say it reverberates with that same adventurous, political feel. It’s a very moral and conscience-based book, a good basis for some ethical discussion.

For those who are interested, it’s the first in a trilogy, but for me, it stands well enough on its own.

Rated: Mild for five uses of moderate language as well as implied teenage sex (a one-sentence mention).