Petra K and the Blackhearts - 9780985062385

Miniaturized show-dragons, automatons with minds of their own, a palace haunted by alchemists, and a neighborhood that is home to criminals and sorcerers alike: Welcome to the world of the Black Hearts, a gang of children bound together by the need to survive in a brutal world where the powers that be are especially cruel to those who do not conform to authoritarian rule. Based on legends of "magic Prague" and on the reality of its former communist regime, Petra K and the Blackhearts focuses on ten-year-old Petra K, the daughter of a shut-in mother, who becomes the master of a dragonka that everyone in the city of Pava wants to get their hands on. In the complicated world of sorceresses, gypsies, child gangs, and secret police, Petra K needs to decide who to trust, and who to betray in order to keep herself and her pet safe. But revolution is in the air, and she is caught up in its pull, becoming separated from her family and aligning herself with the Black Hearts. Magic is banned and personal freedoms are stripped. Only the Black Hearts dare to defy the dictator. Along with the Black Hearts, Petra K faces a murderous pack of mechanical dragonka, a phantom secret agent, and, most harrowing, her own weaknesses as she transforms from an impassive follower into a child revolutionary. Will the Black Hearts' adventures and courage inspire the city's terrified population to rise up again, and return Pava to a place of prosperity, where dragonka run free?