brdsk
Written on Jun 14, 2021
Every year, the people of the Protectorate leave a baby as an offering to the witch who lives in the forest. They hope this sacrifice will keep her from terrorizing their town. But the witch, Xan, is kind and gentle. She shares her home with a wise Swamp Monster named Glerk and a Perfectly Tiny Dragon, Fyrian. Xan rescues the abandoned children and delivers them to welcoming families on the other side of the forest, nourishing the babies with starlight on the journey. One year, Xan accidentally feeds a baby moonlight instead of starlight, filling the ordinary child with extraordinary magic. Xan decides she must raise this enmagicked girl, whom she calls Luna, as her own. To keep young Luna safe from her own unwieldy power, Xan locks Luna's magic deep inside her. When Luna approaches her thirteenth birthday, her magic begins to emerge on schedule-but Xan is far away. Meanwhile, a young man from the Protectorate is determined to free his people by killing the witch. Soon, it is up to Luna to protect those who have protected hen-even if it means the end of the loving, safe world she's always known.
- ISBN10 1616205679
- ISBN13 9781616205676
- Publish Date 9 August 2016 (first published 9 June 2016)
- Publish Status Active
- Out of Print 14 March 2023
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Algonquin Books
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 368
- Language English
Reviews
HekArtemis
Written on Apr 10, 2020
I loved that one of the main characters is an old, old, like very old, woman. Not many old woman protagonists around, so I really like that. Plus the swamp monster and who couldn't love the Enormous Dragon? There is a lot to like about this book, and most people don't struggle with the same things I do, so I would say it's one most people would like.
bookperson
Written on Jun 10, 2019
Didn't keep my attention, but gave few ideas for my own story. If you're middlegrade/ya fantasy story lover you'll absolutely will enjoy it!
nannah
Written on Mar 30, 2019
Content warnings:
Ableism!
and maybe mild lying/manipulation to/of a child
Once Upon a Time (basically, how the novel is written) there was a Bog. A great big bog and a bog monster and a poet. They’re all the same, and his name was Glerk. And Glerk loved a witch named Xan--and they all live together with a Perfectly Tiny Dragon named Fyrian. He provides some rather cringy comic relief, to be honest, twirling like a ballerina and acting like a child--or rather, like how an adult who doesn’t know how to write children writes a child:
“‘Why are we up here?’ Fyrian wanted to know. / ‘Hush,’ Luna said. / ‘Why must we hush?’ Fyrian asked. / Luna sighed deeply. ‘I need you to be very, very quiet, Fyrian. So I may concentrate on my drawing.’ / ‘I can be quiet,’ Fyrian chirped, still hovering in front of her face. ‘I can be so quiet. I can be quieter than worms, and worms are very quiet, unless they are convincing you not to eat them, and then they are less quiet, and very convincing, though I usually still eat them because they are delicious.’” … etc.
Anyway, near this bog is a town called the Protectorate, a sad place where its citizens live in fear of the Witch in the woods. Every year they offer the youngest of their babies to it so the Witch won’t terrorize the town. What they don’t know is that there is technically no witch out there devouring or stealing their babies, and that Xan is the one picking them up so the kid doesn’t die. She takes them to a nearby village so they can survive.
Now Luna, the protagonist, is one of these babies, one of these Star Children (because Xan feeds them starlight so they can survive the trip). But by mistake, Xan feeds her moonlight, which Enmagicks her. Because of this, Luna becomes unpredictable and dangerous with magic. To protect her, Xan and Glerk (the bog monster), hide her magic till she’s twelve years old, even if it hurts Luna, and will drain all life and magic from Xan when Luna becomes twelve.
Meanwhile (whew), Antain, a man from the Protectorate, decides to take fate into his own hands and kill the witch so he won’t have to offer up his firstborn child. And that’s where things get messy and Luna’s storyline intertwines with that of the Protectorate’s.
Quite honestly, this book was an easy and fun read, but the two storylines were VERY different in mood and pace. Luna’s was overall pretty silly and fun, with bits and pieces very serious when the PoV swung over to Xan and even Glerk on occasion. But Antain’s was overwhelmingly serious and even grim. And when years passed and he became a married adult, Luna only aged a year; it was jarring.
There were also the villains to consider here: the Grand Elder Gherland (of the Protectorate), who was nearly cartoony, and where the novel was a bit heavy-handed with its morals. I know this is middle grade, but it kind of felt like speaking down to the age group … maybe I’m wrong, but it’s the impression I got.
The other villain is maybe a spoiler, but they're involved in the climax, which was extremely anticlimactic. It was basically saying to the villain but don’t you remember loving someone, too? And having the villain break down crying -- and that was the end of that. I’m all for non-incredibly-violent climaxes too, but this was just way too easy.
ALSO: I'm soooo done with characters called/labeled/whatever the "madwoman". Descriptions were "she was, in fact, quite mad" etc. Can we just ... be done with that sort of thing, collectively, as a society, etc? Using this trope to further the plot is just ableist and hurtful to everyone (ESPECIALLY CHILDREN WITH MENTAL ILLNESSES). Just ... full stop.
I’m getting really negative here, but I didn’t … not enjoy it? It just wasn’t overwhelmingly good. Just kind of … eh, an okay read in an interesting world. The mythology of the world and its Bog was probably my favorite part.
Kat @ Novels & Waffles
Written on Jul 3, 2018
I haven't dived into a Middle Grade book for quite some time now, but a friend of mine who's a librarian (Yes, I have a librarian friend. That's when you know you've made it big, folks) highly recommended this one to me. And as is so often the case with librarians, she was right. This book was, as the Perfectly Tiny Dragon in it states, a "joyful joyness." You read that correctly – a Perfectly Tiny Dragon. Imagine, a dragon that fits in your pocket and likes to cuddle on your lap! Well, that's Fyrian for you. And he might as well be called a Perfectly Cute Dragon, because man, he made me want to pick him up and pinch his cheeks (Can you pinch a dragon's cheeks? Do they even have cheeks? I dunno, but Fyrian made me want to do it!).
If an adorable miniature dragon isn't enough of an incentive for you to read this book, then an overview of the rest of the cast might just change your mind: we've got a Swamp Monster, a Witch, a Madwoman with an army of paper birds, a talking crow, and an accidentally-turned-magic little girl who is way too energetic for her own (and her Grandmother's) good. That's quite the lineup!
This book was pure magic. It could have very well been made of starlight and moonlight itself. The writing was whimsical, with a sort of fairy-tale-esque feel to it, and is exactly the sort of book that I want to read aloud to my son one day. I loved how it posed serious questions for the reader in sometimes silly ways: Is it okay to lie, if you only do so to protect the ones you love? How can you deal with sorrow? Why is it important to remember the past?
The characters are entertaining, engaging, and endearing. The plot cleverly brought those same seemingly unconnected characters together in surprising ways that had me laughing out loud and wondering what would happen next. Although clearly meant for readers on the younger side of the spectrum, this book is a great read for any age, especially if you are in the mood for something lighthearted, fun, and full of the fantastical.
Terri M. LeBlanc
Written on Aug 18, 2017
“A story can tell the truth, she knew, but a story can also lie. Stories can bend and twist and obfuscate. Controlling stories is power indeed. And who would benefit most from such a power?”
“How many feelings can one heart hold? She looked at her grandmother. At her mother. At the man protecting his family. Infinite, Luna thought. The way the universe is infinite. It is light and dark and endless motion; it is space and time, and space within space, and time within time. And she knew: there is no limit to what the heart can carry.”
writehollydavis
Written on Mar 5, 2017
layawaydragon
Written on Aug 12, 2016
Briana @ Pages Unbound
Written on May 5, 2016
Barnhill tells this story with movingly lyrical to prose and an attention to detail that any fantasy author would be proud of. The sense that the world in the novel is real, that it has people and religion and a full history just waiting to be uncovered permeates the tale. Barnhill shows great care in creation but leaves enough to reader's imagination that the worldbuilding doesn't distract from the plot.
Richly imagined characters also populate this world, each with their own history and desires and beliefs. Barnhill touches on all the subjects that make us human, including incredibly thoughtful commentary on pregnancy and family--a topic that often doesn't make it in children's or YA literature. The downside is that the ostensible main characters (you know, "the girl who drank the moon") is perhaps one of the least interesting people in the novel, but everyone else is so fascinating it's not a real problem. There's also a adorable animal sidekick--Fyrian, who basically has Olaf's personality (of Frozen fame) in a dragon's body.
The plot intricately weaves the stories of these various characters together, forming a literary tapestry that shows how lives intersect in unexpected ways. Heroes, villains, and ordinary people all come together in one larger story. The result is amazingly beautiful tale.
Recommended for fans of Gail Carson Levine, Shannon Hale, and Natalie Lloyd.