Theo Tan and the Fox Spirit
by Jesse Q. Sutanto (Author)
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Booktalk: Theo Tan doesn’t want a spirit companion. He just wants to be a normal American kid, playing video games, going to conventions, and using cirth pendants to cast his spells like everyone else. But, when his older brother dies, Theo ends up inheriting Jamie’s fox spirit, Kai.
Kai isn’t happy about this either. Theo is nothing like Jamie, and the two of them have never gotten along. But, when they realize the mysterious journal Jamie left Theo is filled with clues and secret codes, it’s clear that something strange was going on with Jamie’s internship at Reapling Corp.
But the only way onto the campus is the highly competitive “Know Your Roots” summer camp program, a celebration of Chinese and Indian cultures designed to help connect students with their heritage. Theo and Kai will have to put aside their differences long enough to honor Jamie’s last wishes, or the mystery he died for will remain unsolved forever…
Snippet: Hours before my alarm is set to go off for the last day of school, my seventeen-year-old brother shakes me awake.
“Wha?” I mumble, my voice thick with sleep.
“Wake up,” Jamie whispers.
“What’s going on?” I say, only it comes out as “Whas gong?”
“Dress warm. We gotta go.” He leaves my room before I can ask anything else, and the urgency in his voice pushes me out of bed.
I shrug on a hoodie, struggle into a pair of jeans, and creep down the stairs, careful to avoid the creaky step. Jamie’s waiting at the door. I look around for Kai, his companion spirit. She’s usually wrapped around his neck, or hiding somewhere to scare me when I’m least expecting it, but after a while, I realize she really isn’t here, and her absence perks me up a little. It’s been so long since I’ve had one-on-one time with Jamie.
Outside, it’s still so dark that I can see people’s cirth pendants glowing under their shirts. Jamie leads me quietly through the back alleys of Chinatown.
“Where are we going, Jamie?” I say, but Jamie just shushes me and walks faster. I gotta say, as far as quality time with your brother goes, this kind of stinks, and I mean that both literally and figuratively.
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