I, Coriander

I, Coriander is set in mid-seventeenth-century London, under Cromwell and then the Restoration. While it benefits from its historical setting – the language, dress, attitudes and politics well-reflected by Gardner and giving the story a romantic edge – the addition of magic and mystery makes it a winner for many readers. Coriander’s mother dies when she is a child but not before Coriander has already had a mysterious encounter with a pair of silver shoes. What other worlds might be just around the corner and where might her mother be from? Once her mother is dead and her father has remarried, Coriander’s life becomes miserable and unbearable. It is her discovery that there are other worlds beyond our own that saves her, and through which she then saves others.

This is Gardner’s first book for older readers and it’s a wonderful mixture of history (Puritans, Restoration, attitudes to witches, position of women), adventure, romance and magic. Coriander grows up quite fast in it and it ends with the prospect of marriage and motherhood with her other-world prince, which probably means there is unlikely to be a sequel, which is a shame – Coriander is a character who could be developed for a series of books, much like Alanna, the girl knight books by Tamora Pierce.