If you know my taste in literature (I tend toward the lyrically written books), it might not surprise you that I am a hardcore Kelly Barnhill fan. I actually jumped on the bandwagon of hardcore fan after she won the Newbery award last year for The Girl Who Drank the Moon; I immediately fell in love with her writing style and her stories.
And thankfully, she had another delightful middle grade book for me to read: The Witch’s Boy. First I borrowed this book from my library, but I loved it so much I had to buy it for my home library, knowing that this is a book I will read again—possibly every year. I loved it at least as much as The Girl who Drank the Moon.
The Witch’s Boy is a middle grade fantasy about magic, kingdoms, and heroism. It was sweet and intriguing and absolutely beautifully written (I’ll share a couple of examples below).
Here are three things I enjoyed most about it:
The language. Of course, as a poet, I’m a sucker for books with beautiful language. Barnhill has such a satisfying style of writing (for me), a lyrical language that sounds like poetry on the page—proving that you don’t actually have to write a novel in verse; all you have to do is infuse poetry into your prose. Her descriptions, her metaphors, the way she encapsulates action in the perfect collection of words…I feel like I’m gushing, so I’ll stop. Just know that it’s beautiful.
The characters. Ned and Áine were such starkly drawn characters, and you wanted them to succeed in whatever they did. They were strong, resourceful, and brave—the kind of heroes you root for when the going gets tough.
The world. Barnhill also has a wonderful imagination and creates these elaborate yet simple worlds with witches, old queens, secret kingdoms, magic stones, bandits marked by tattoos. Spending time in her world is delightfully fun.
Here’s the first line of The Witch’s Boy:
“Once upon a time there were two brothers, as alike to one another as you are to your own reflection. They had the same eyes, the same hands, the same voice, the same insatiable curiosity. And though it was generally agreed that one was slightly quicker, slightly cleverer, slightly more wonderful than the other, no one could tell the boys apart. And even when they thought they could, they were usually wrong.”
I was immediately drawn in to this story, which might possibly be because I’m the parent of identical twins. And what Barnhill writes is entirely true.
Here’s another example of Barnhill’s beautiful language:
“The sun hovered over the edge of the sky, lurid and fat as an overripe peach, before slumping toward night. The light oozed overhead in garish colors; it was a sky that announced itself.”
Can’t you just see it?
Oh, how I love this book. You probably will, too!
The above is an affiliate link. I only recommend books that I personally enjoy. I actually don’t even talk about the books I don’t enjoy, because I’d rather forget I ever wasted time reading them. But if you’re ever curious whether I’ve read a book and whether I liked or disliked it, don’t hesitate to ask.
