Thirteenth Child, by Patricia Wrede

Thirteenth Child, by Patricia Wrede
Young Adult, 2009

From fantasticfiction.co.uk:
Eff was born a thirteenth child. Her twin brother, Lan, is the seventh son of a seventh son. This means he's supposed to possess amazing talent -- and she's supposed to bring only bad things to her family and her town. Undeterred, her family moves to the frontier, where her father will be a professor of magic at a school perilously close to the magical divide that separates settlers from the beasts of the wild.
Trackgeek: I think that Wrede did an interesting job of introducing an entirely new twist on the traditional way that Victorian era magic is handled by moving the story to America in the expanding west. While at times it seems that the plot plods a little bit, it makes sense in terms of the perspective that the story is told from (more of a life history that highlights important bits of time leading up to the end of the story). I felt like Eff's character development was pretty good, but the romance element was weak (but this will probably be explored more in the rest of the Frontier Magic books). Grade B+
Raspberry: I'm afraid this was a Failed to Finish for me, but I'll probably give it another shot at some point.