Tempests and Slaughter by Tamora Pierce

Arram is studying to be a mage.  He's moving through the grades faster than older students and that gets him harassed.  He doesn't have any friends.  But that's about to change.  He gets a new roommate.  He's the "leftover prince" who will probably never get to be the king; he's too far down the line.  But no one can see the future...

Random House Books for Young Readers sent me an ARC of this book to read for review (thank you).  It will be published February 6th.

This author's words always speak to me.  She writes about magical worlds and powers and she makes her characters human.  I've read her before and when I had this opportunity, I jumped on it.

Arram has power he doesn't know he has.  His teacher mocked him in one of his beginning classes about not being able to do the magic trick of lifting water up and letting fall back into the dish.  She made him so nervous he was failing.  So he drew his power in and made sure he was successful.  He almost drowned the class.  After that, he got private lessons with the masters for the most part.

His roommate has a female friend and Arram likes her.  They agree to take care of each other in this volatile world.  Not everyone is nice.

Arram ends up meeting some of the old tribal gods in his training.  Not all the mages believe in them but some do.  You can tell they will be important in the other books in this trilogy.

The prince is into war and into getting even.  He wants to take out everybody who might have been involved in his father's death.  He doesn't care if some have paid the price already.  He hates everyone of that blood.

This is a fast paced read that deals with issues that sound common to our world today in many ways.  It was a fascinating read and I'll be looking for the next one in this series.