Boarding school magic

New Zealand comic and fiction writer Karen Healey’s debut novel Guardian of the Dead has been released. Guardian of the Dead is a young adult fantasy novel set around a boarding school in Christchurch, where the protagonist, Ellie, is finishing her final year. An experienced martial artist, Ellie agrees to help choreograph the fights in a local university theatre production, and finds herself pulled into the world of magic and myth that lurks at the fringes of everyday life. Australian-based Healey says though the book draws heavily on Maori myth; for her American readers she has included a glossary and extra-text summaries where necessary. “On the whole, I think teenagers are smarter and pay more attention that a lot of people like to give them credit for,” Healey says. Healey is currently revising her second young adult fantasy novel, Summerton, which is out in 2011. It is set in a fictional small town on the West Coast, where three teenagers try to find the real cause of their older brothers’ apparent suicides.