The Shadow Queen: Ravenspire, Book 1

Parents need to know that The Shadow Queen is the first book in the magic-heavy, fairy tale-influenced Ravenspire series by the author of the popular Defiance trilogy. This is a straight-up teen fantasy novel with a little kissing, a little drinking, and much fantasy action/violence. The most jarring scene is not fantasy violence, however, involving a mother killing her young children and then herself with a knife because her family is starving to death. Also, close family members of main characters die, and one of the characters loses family twice as evil magic kills them and flees helplessly both times. The other hears about the deaths of three family members and attends their funerals. The rest of the violence is all about spells causing explosions and all kinds of creatures to attack. People die in prisons, and one heart is taken out -- luckily the victim has a spare. The main characters are both strong and willing to make big sacrifices to defeat evil. It's the female hero who wields the most power with her magic and the male hero who works through the most internal struggles, to believe in himself and fight off magically enhanced instincts that tell him to do harm.