The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill

 The Girl Who Drank the Moon made a splash when it came out. Not a big one, mind you, but a little one. The kind of splash where the ripples grow as they move into great waves. Winning the Newberry helped. A few years back it seemed like everyone I knew was reading it. I wanted to read it, but I had a hard time getting a hold of a copy. It was that popular. 

And then, I forgot about it for a time until a battered water-stained copy showed up on a clearance shelf at Half Price Books. Once I got ahold of it, it didn't take me long to read it.

I can see why everyone was excited by this one. The Girl Who Drank the Moon is a deceptively light read. One the surface, it's something akin to an expanded fairy tale. There's witches, dragons, bog monsters, villages, and magic towers. The story opens with a bedtime story about a witch in the woods and a baby being left as a sacrifice. However, the witch in the woods is quickly recast as the good guy when she rescues the babe and the baby becomes something very special indeed.

The mystery driving the story is why do the villagers think they have to sacrifice a baby every year to witch who has no idea why they are abandoning their babies. There is something sinister going on, but it's not in the forest.

The narrative switches view points and styles. The challenge is in putting the scattered pieces together in a story where half the characters have some form of memory loss. It all comes together in the end.

There were several themes that I really liked in this. First, I like that the ugly old witch isn't evil even though she ugly, and old, and in fact a witch. In fact almost all the fairy tale expectations are turned on their heads. The bog monster is benevolent too. I like that decisions, even when made for the right reasons, have negative consequences and that the characters acknowledge and deal with that fact. I really like the message about death and how sometimes it is just time. Given the target age range, those are all tough ideas and they are handled with a deft touch.

I really liked this one and recommend it. I just have to find a better copy for my classroom library

November List

 Life continues to be. . . interesting and I'm in need for a slightly different approach. More than anything I need engrossing easy reads for a little while. So, here's the deal. I'm closing out series. I'm in the middles of something like 35 series which is ridiculous... even for me. I've listed out 21 of them, it's not all of them, but it's a good start. 

Series literature is great. It lets an author explore a world and it lets the readers wallow in a familiar setting. Instead of doing random picks, I'm knocking out the fewest volumes first. The idea is to just get things off the list.

I also have 20 books on my urgent list which are all pressing in some way. Weirdly though, I'm in the middle of 6 of them which is odd. I will often have a couple books going at a time, but six is unusual.

November List:

1. Shadow and Bone Trilogy by Leigh Bardugo (Series YA)
1. Siege and Storm (Finished 11/29/2022)
2. Ruin and Rising (YA)
2. The Inheritance Games Series by Jennifer Lynn Barnes (YA)
1. The Inheritance Games 
2. The Hawthorne Legacy
3. The Final Gambit
3. Flavia de Luce Series by Alan Bradley
1. A Red Herring Without Mustard
2. I Am Half-Sick of Shadows
3. Speaking from Among the Bones
4. The Dead in Their Vaulted Arches
5. As Chimney Sweepers Come to Dust
6. Thrice the Brindled Cat Hath Mew'd
7. The Grave's a Fine and Private Place
8. The Golden Tresses of the Dead
4. The Bone Witch Series by Rin Chupeco (YA)
1. The Heart Forger
2. The Shadowglass
5. Remembrance of Earth's Past Series by Liu Cixin
1. The Dark Forest
2. Death's End
6. The Expanse Series by James S.A. Corey
1. Abaddon's Gate
2. Cibola Burn
3. Nemesis Games
4. Babylon's Ashes
5. Persepolis Rising
6. Tiamat's Wrath
7. Leviathan Falls
7. The Ropemaker Series by Peter Dickinson (YA)
1. The Rope Maker
2. Angel Isle
8. The Thorne Chronicles Series by K. Eason 
1. How the Multiverse Got Its Revenge (Finished 11/15/2022)
9. Kingsbridge by Ken Follett
1. The Pillars of the Earth
2. World Without End
3. A Column of Fire
10. The Silver Arrow Series by Lev Grossman (YA)
1. The Silver Arrow 
2. The Golden Swift
11. Doctor Dolittle Vol 1 by Hugh Lofting
1. The Voyages of Doctor Dolittle
2. The Story of Doctor Dolittle
3. Doctor Dolittle's Post Office
12. The Dragonriders of Pern by Anne McCaffrey
1. The White Dragon (Finished 11/7/2022)
13. Ghost Roads by Seanan McGuire (YA)
1. Sparrow Hill Road
2. The Girl in the Green Silk Gown
3. Angel of the Overpass
14. Dragonwatch Series by Brandon Mull (YA)
1. Dragonwatch
2. Wrath of the Dragon King
3. Master of the Phantom Isle
4. Champion of the Titan Games
5. Return of the Dragon Slayers
15. The Borrowers by Mary Norton (series YA)
1. The Borrowers
2. The Borrowers Afield
3. The Borrowers Afloat
4. The Borrowers Aloft
5. The Borrowers Avenged
16. Chief Inspector Armand Gamache Series by Louise Penny
1. The Cruelest Month
2. A Rule Against Murder
3. The Brutal Telling
4. Bury Your Dead
5. A Trick of the Light
6. The Beautiful Mystery
7. How the Light Gets In
8. The Long Way Home
17. Brigertons by Julia Quinn
1. It's in His Kiss (Finished 11/21/2022)
2. On the Way to the Wedding (Finished 11/27/202)
18. Villians by V.E. Schwab
1. Vicious 
2. Vengeful 
19. What Goes Around by Courtney Summers (Series YA)
1. Cracked Up to Be
2. Some Girls Are
20. Phantom Dream by Natsuki Takaya (Series YA)
1. Vol 4 (Finished 11/16/2022)
2. Vol 5 (Finished 11/16/2022)
21. Tsubasa by Natsuki Takaya(Series YA)
1. Vol 3 (Finished 11/8/2022)

The Urgent List:

1. The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill (Finished 11/3/2022)
2. The Carnival of Ash by Tom Beckerlegge (had to return it to the library)
3. How to Cook Everything Fast by Mark Bittman (Finished 11/18/2022)
4. Kill All Happies by Rachel Cohn (YA, Library)
5. Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie (borrowed from Dad)
6. Circuit of Heaven by Dennis Danvers (Ryan Pick, because he really wants me to read it)
7. Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Duymas (Classic, finishing up)
8. Nevermore by Neil Gaiman (Finished 11/30/2022)
9. The Chef's Secret by Crystal King (Finished 11/25/2022)
10. The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories by Ken Liu (finishing it up)
11. Monstrous Devices by Damien Love (borrowed from a student)
12. The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna (TBR)
13. Everything Sad is Untrue by Daniel Nayeri (YA, Library)
14. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens (YA, borrowed from Amanda)
15. Life as We Knew It by Susan Beth Pfeffer (YA, Library)
16. The Five Wounds by Kirstin Valdez Quade (old TBR)
17. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid (borrowed from Stephanie)
18. Battle Royale by Koushun Takami (Because I am insanely curious)
19. The Sword in the Stone by T.H. White (Finished 11/9/2022)
20. Gastro Obscura: A Food Adventure's Guide by Cecily Wong and Dylan Thuras (NF, finishing it up)

bold means that I don't actually own the thing.