Another Faust
By Daniel and Dina Nayeri
Series: First in the Another series

When five adopted orphans, Victoria, Christian, Bicé, Belle, and Valentin, along with their beautiful but strange governess, Madame Vileroy, make an impressive entrance at the exclusive Christmas party for Marlowe School in Manhattan tension between the orphans and the students begin and carry over to the new semester. Using “gifts” given to them from Vileroy – the ability to read the inner dialogue of others, manipulate time, beautiful looks, and stealing other’s skills and strengths – the orphans pursue their own greedy obsessions, from sports to debate and writing tournaments to class president elections, no matter what it costs them during the process; and in the case of Madame Vileroy, the cost could be permanent. Brother and sister writing team bring a modern day re-imagining of the classic Doctor Faustus bargaining story. Though the plot may seem a bit repetitive at times as the orphans use their “gifts” to pursue their various obsessions during the semester at Marlowe, the last few chapters contain several surprises that are unpredictable (except for the “main” reveal for readers familiar with the original story) but were always under the surface of previous events that may cause the reader to wonder how they did not see the connection before. While the Another series plans to re-imagine classic works of literature, given the conclusion to this first installment, it is not yet seen by this reader if the series will include the same characters (maybe a minor character’s story will be continued) or will be a series of “stand alone” volumes with different characters (think R. L. Stine's Goosebumps); though, if the same characters are used for the series, this reader predicts Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown may get the Another treatment.