The Lost Heir: an Unruly Royal, an Urchin Queen, and a Quest for Justice (Ari Ara Series - One girl creating a culture of peace in a time of war.)

Read this book!!! It’s both powerful and beautiful. This is high up on the favorites list for a family that reads a LOT.This book is so well written. After being immersed in the worlds of Tolkien, Rowling, and L’Engle, we were doubtful that we’d find another series we loved so much and looked forward to visiting each night. This is one of the best literary discoveries you can make.

Necessary reading for these troubled times. Everyone has a part in this drama that unfolding at an alarming rate. Being aware of your part and stepping into is key. This book may help you in your search for your role.

The Lost Heir is a sequel to Rivera Sun’s earlier work, The Way Between, both books featuring the young Ari Ara, meaning “not this-not that” as the heroine. This story picks up where The Way Between left off, with Ari Ara in the capital city of Mariana, being groomed as the lost heir of a marriage between the King of the Desert and the deceased Queen of Mariana.Ari Ara is a courageous, headstrong twelve year old girl who has a magnanimous heart and is committed to justice and peaceful resolution of problems using “The Way Between,” which is a verbal and physical way of diverting an opponent’s anger and violence using a form of martial arts and mental and verbal techniques. Despite her age, Ari Ara is expert at the method, called Azar, having been taught it by the great warrior Shulen when she first arrived in the capital from her previous home in the mountains, being raised by the mysterious mountain people, the Fanten.Not everyone in the capital wants Ari Ara to assume her rightful role as heir to the throne. A group of nobles oppose her and many others are suspicious of her. She breaks down the suspicions of the Urchin children when she befriends Everill, “Rill,’ the Queen of the Urchins. She champions the Water Workers, who are desert people who must work to gain life-giving water for their families after the water was illegally diverted years before. The House of Thorn nobles go so far as to try to assassinate Ari Ara, but she is protected by Shulen, by the young champion Emir, as well as by Brinelle, the current queen, and by a mysterious master of the haws, Malak from the desert.Ari Ara’s will is tested as she is assaulted and insulted when The Way Between, her method of solving conflicts without violence is gradually accepted by more and more of the population and even the guards and soldiers. Her life is constantly in danger, and her fiery temper is in danger of overcoming her dedication to peace and the peaceful methods of Azar. With the help of Rill, of Malak, of Emir and of Korin, a royal friend, and Minli a crippled orphan who has become a scholar, she withstands all the challenges and, in the end, prevails.The Lost Heir is a true adventure story, filled with action and fantasy. It takes place in a strange land, in which the population is split between different factions occupying different environments and whose suspicion and longstanding hatreds have sowed the seeds of war for years. It is also story of the wisdom of nonviolence and an inspirational tale of the ability of the good side of the human spirit to prevail over the dark side. Both young and older readers will learn about the methods of nonviolent protest and confrontation and how they can be used to oppose evil in a way that upholds the dignity of both sides on issues of difference.Rivera Sun is a poet and her prose is poetic and full of imagery and figurative language, so that the reader is swept up in the story and his or her imagination is ignited by the author’s beautifully descriptive and poetic use of language. She is able to paint pictures with her words.I’ve given my copy of The Way Between to my teenage niece and now that I’m finished reading The Lost Heir, I plan to give it to her also. I want her to learn the lessons the book teaches. And I know she will be swept up by the story the way she was with its predecessor and the way I was.

She's back! The irrepressible young shero Ari Ara (is that a cool name or what?) returns to treat her fans to a new adventure, The Lost Heir. The first volume, The Way Between, introduced us to this intrepid wild child. But author Rivera Sun has more than just fantasy and fun in mind. The fictional Ari Ara is a devotee of the non-violent peace building method known as thew Way Between. Don't look for extended swordplay here; all sabers remain firmly sheathed. Look instead for Ari Ara, along with some impressive allies, to use her wit and and intuition to navigate the viper pit that is a royal court. As the titular lost heir, she will need every ounce of her spunk and courage to bring to an end the unjust social system imposed on the unfortunate desert people living and working in the capital city of Mariana while keeping herself and her friends out of harm's way. You'll cheer along with her, even as Rivera Sun's intent becomes ever clearer: that a new world is possible and doable. Highly recommended.

In the first book of this series, The Way Between, we have an orphan girl, being trained in the non-violent Way Between, discover that she is the lost child of a mother—Queen Alinore of Mariana—and father—Desert King Tahkan Shirar—currently warring clans, and that she is tasked with bringing together those clans in peace and cooperation…that is if she is confirmed by the various royal families as the lost heir.Along the way she meets royals supposedly vehemently opposed to “the impostor,” but who are actually concerned about their fortunes and power that are at stake; urchins who’ve had their livelihoods snatched from them by the slave labor known as desert “water workers” who trade their labor for the necessity of water to drink. All of these groups vying for limited resources must surely remind you of the state of our world today. I admire this author’s ability to weave contemporary problems into her story so that the reader can easily recognize them as such while still enjoying and being engaged in the lives and events on the page.I won’t spoil the ending, not only because readers don’t like that, but also because I’m truly not certain this book is the last in the series. There is a bit of foreshadowing going on, “Thornmar turned purple with anger. Just before he stalked away, he shot Ari Ara a glare of withering hatred. She shivered. The glowering in his eyes stated that she hadn’t seen the last of him.”True fantasy not written for fantasy’s sake, but with a important goal in mind. I like that.