A cursed girl escapes death and finds herself in a magical world – but is then tested beyond her wildest imagination
Morrigan Crow is cursed. Having been born on Eventide, the unluckiest day for any child to be born, she’s blamed for all local misfortunes, from hailstorms to heart attacks–and, worst of all, the curse means that Morrigan is doomed to die at midnight on her eleventh birthday.
But as Morrigan awaits her fate, a strange and remarkable man named Jupiter North appears. Chased by black-smoke hounds and shadowy hunters on horseback, he whisks her away into the safety of a secret, magical city called Nevermoor.
It’s then that Morrigan discovers Jupiter has chosen her to contend for a place in the city’s most prestigious organization: the Wundrous Society. In order to join, she must compete in four difficult and dangerous trials against hundreds of other children, each boasting an extraordinary talent that sets them apart – an extraordinary talent that Morrigan insists she does not have. To stay in the safety of Nevermoor for good, Morrigan will need to find a way to pass the tests – or she’ll have to leave the city to confront her deadly fate.
What a delightful story. It follows a similar pattern of other children’s/middlegrade fiction. That is, the book can be broken down into separate adventures that Morrigan has—sometimes with others, sometimes without. There’s also symbolism in the setting, such as her new life and the actual plot starting out on Morningtide on a Spring day, ending on a Winter day. There’s a sense that things have come full circle almost, but by the end we and Morrigan are able to view things in a new light. These are, from what I’ve seen, relatively common tropes/stylistic choices in MG fiction. And it’s for a reason: It works. It was done well here and allows for younger readers to have “Aha!” moments.
Nearly everything about this book worked for me. There was just one chapter that I found unnecessary: the one with the Christmas battle. There was maybe one minor plot point revealed here that could have been worked in elsewhere in the book. The chapter felt like it should’ve been included somewhere else as a bonus adventure. Not just Christmas but Hallowmas as well, I found it odd that people in the book celebrated these real-world holidays. It didn’t detract from the book, but I think I would’ve preferred if the holidays in the book simply had different names and figureheads to their real-world counterparts, even if they were similar in every other way.
This was a delightfully magical book. One chapter didn’t impress me, but everything else about it was simply wonderful.
