The Castle Behind Thorns

At first I didn’t want to read the book because the chapters were pretty long, but the opening scene where a teen named Sand wakes up in a fireplace in a sundered castle surrounded by thorns was pretty interesting. And the book got more and more interesting as each chapter went along and I didn’t mind how long the chapters were and I wanted to keep reading more chapters. After waking in the fireplace, Sand, which is short for Alexander, explores the castle and tries to leave, but is stopped by the thorns. They are enchanted thorns that move and can’t be cut or burned. Once Sand realizes he’s stuck in the castle, he starts to mend the things that have been broken so that he can survive in the castle. And everything in the castle has been broken. As he goes about mending, he learns about blacksmithing and other trades, but more than that he learns about friendship, loss, and forgiveness.

I think boys and girls who like mysteries about death and life would like this book.