Morbid Curiosities

Gr 8 Up–When scholarship student Aarya receives a surprise invitation to the prestigious Elizabethan Institute, it feels like the culmination of her lifelong dream. Having survived a mysterious childhood illness, she’s determined to prove herself among the privileged “feeder school” students studying the miracle compound zenedine. Paired with rivals both alluring and secretive, Aarya becomes entangled in a web of ambition and questionable research ethics. A series of strange notes, the appearance of a precocious girl named Sofia, and troubling memories pull Aarya into a mystery linking her own past to the institute’s hidden experiments. Hati (And the Sky Bled) constructs a world steeped in scientific intrigue, with chapter openers featuring chemical diagrams, and discussions of transparency and misinformation in research. Yet for all its atmosphere and ambition, the novel leans heavily on the familiar “outsider genius at the elite academy” trope, and its dense exposition may distance readers from the emotional stakes. Characters’ shifting motivations sometimes obscure rather than enrich the story’s ideas about ethics, identity, and belonging. While the story aims for diversity of characters, the portrayal of race and ethnicity can feel uneven. Characters that are Black are explicitly labeled as such, whereas white characters are not, and the Thai characters’ private conversations are portrayed as potentially secretive rather than simply bilingual familial conversation. Despite flashes of imagination and timely questions about scientific responsibility, this uneven mix of mystery and speculative science fiction never quite delivers on its premise.