Title: The Witch's Boy Author: Kelly Barnhill
Published: September 16, 2014
Genre(s): Fantasy
Page Count: 384
Rating:
Summary from Goodreads:When Ned and his identical twin brother Tam tumble from their raft into a raging, bewitched river, only Ned survives. Villagers are convinced the wrong boy lived. Sure enough, Ned grows up weak and slow, and stays as much as possible within the safe boundaries of his family’s cottage and yard. But when a Bandit King comes to steal the magic that Ned’s mother, a witch, is meant to protect, it's Ned who safeguards the magic and summons the strength to protect his family and community.
In the meantime, in another kingdom across the forest that borders Ned’s village lives Áine, the resourceful and pragmatic daughter of the Bandit King. She is haunted by her mother’s last words to her: “The wrong boy will save your life and you will save his.” But when Áine and Ned’s paths cross, can they trust each other long enough to make their way through the treacherous woods and stop the war about to boil over?
Ned is the wrong boy. He’s the twin who should have died, and no one will let him forget it. He’s weak, can’t read, can barely speak: useless, incompetent, stupid. The wrong boy. But when bandits come in search of the magic Ned’s mother keeps in a clay pot, Ned has no choice but to act, wrong boy or no. And as author Kelly Barnhill shows over the course of The Witch’s Boy, there might be more to Ned than meets the eye…
Well, there is more to Ned than his neighbors think, but it’s awful hard to find. For the duration of the story, Ned continues to be a blundering, spineless boy, and though as a reader I wanted to root for him and see beyond outward appearances, Barnhill made it pretty hard. For around 80% of the book, Ned stammers and stumbles his way through things, but then towards the climax: poof!—Ned suddenly loses all of his problems and disabilities. Because magic.
Talk about the easy way out of character development.
The Witch’s Boy, in general, was frustrating for me because it so clearly wants to be good, but isn’t able to quite manage the feat. I like the story—underestimated boy becomes hero. I like Barnhill’s take on magic—slippery, sneaky, and ultimately corrupting. I love the author’s prose—not too florid, but yet poignant and full of imagery. All these positive aspects, and yet The Witch’s Boy was often a disappointment.
Usually, pacing was to blame. Even as I enjoyed the author’s turn of phrase, I was constantly bored and found it difficult to engage with the text. The first half of the book drags on and on, most unnecessarily. It isn’t even until the halfway point that Ned and the other protagonist, Áine, even meet. This is followed by a brief, very rushed transition period; Áine goes from wanting to kill Ned to claiming him as a “best friend” far too quickly. The final 20% of The Witch’s Boy was actually paced quite well (and it was exciting to boot), but it took Barnhill way too long to find that rhythm.
I did mention that I very much enjoyed the magic system and lore attached to it in The Witch’s Boy. Basically, Ned’s magic can be commanded for good purposes, but it will ultimately corrupt and twist the soul of the wielder. However, the history of that magic—honestly, of this entire pseudo-medieval world—wasn’t fleshed out nearly enough. Often the author would repeat the same few details two or three times, in different situations, but that was redundant more than actually informative. I like fantasy as a genre for the chance at new settings and worlds it promises, but The Witch’s Boy offered a very limited, often conventional, glimpse of Ned and Áine’s world.
Another question regarding world-building that I constantly had was about the author’s deliberate use of masculine terms for professions. Áine’s mother, the reader is told several times, was a “fisherman”. Not a “fisher” or a “sailor”—a “fisherman“. Another exmple: Ned’s father remarks that a certain woman would make a good “woodsman”. Not a “woodcutter” or a “forester”—a “woodsman“. It’s a small thing in the bigger picture, sure, but for me it raised a lot of questions. Barnhill created this world entirely from her imagination, albeit influenced by pre-existing cultures and genre conventions, and in this new world there are women who are soldiers, woodcutters, and fishers. But she chose to designate them with masculine nouns, though perfectly acceptable gender-neutral terms already exist in the English language. Why? Is that just too logical? As we have seen from the miraculous healing of Ned’s stammer and timidity, this book often shies from the logical.
But to return to our protagonist Ned. I wanted more of his growth and his journey; I wanted to see development in his character over a period of time, not poof-boom easy fixes. Even with many smaller disappointments, The Witch’s Boy let me down most in this particular area. I wanted a story about a boy whose actions saved the day, not a boy whose problems were magicked away in a single paragraph. That, for me, does not make a good story.
