The Protégée

Gr 8 Up–This is Ridley’s first foray into YA, after forging a path in adult historical romance. There are threads of that genre, loose historical nods to Industrialist France, and moments of romantic sparks. But overall, the stitches holding the scraps of her teen debut together keep unraveling. Here, poor-but-gifted seamstress Angélique, 18, somehow managed to jump from her dangerous factory job to working for a local Paris modiste. When the same factory proves fatal for most of her family, Angélique begins a murderous vendetta against greedy capitalists. Anyone in the way becomes fodder for her righteous rage. Although it’s a worthy quest in theory, the cartoonish revenge plot falls prey to the deeply unsympathetic characters. As a protagonist, Angélique may have good motives, but they all wear thin against her mindless violence and incessant assertions that enemies must pay. Her myriad antagonists—the evil factory owner and his family, the cruel middle class modiste coworkers—are frustratingly one note, over-the-top braggarts without the slightest hint of an interior life. They’re chess pieces for Angélique to bulldoze to the ground. Her relentless path of destruction is action-packed and constantly moving. It’s a flashy pattern but probably won’t wear for too long.