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Critics' Opinion:
Readers' Opinion:
First Published:
Mar 2005, 377 pages
Paperback:
May 2006, 400 pages
Book Reviewed by:
BookBrowse Review Team
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Michael Gruber has created a world that is at once deceptively familiar and stunningly original, a world of cruelty, beauty, legend, truth, and above all, wonder. Readers will delight in the author's ingenious retelling of classic fairy tales and will marvel at the stunning new tale of a boy raised by a witch, a cat, a bear, and a demon. Ages 11+.
A wondrous journey through the realms of magic
They call him Lump. Ugly, misshapen -- more goblin than human child --
abandoned as an infant and taken in by a witch, he is nursed by a bear,
tutored by a djinn; his only playmates are the creatures of the forest,
whose language he learns to speak.
But when Lump inevitably stumbles into the human world, his innocence
is
no match for the depths of people's cruelty, which turns his heart to stone,
and fuels a vengeance that places him and his witch mother in deadly peril.
Yet these disasters also send Lump on a journey of self-discovery, to realms
deep within the earth and far beyond mortal imagination.
In this stunning fantasy debut, Michael Gruber has created a world that
is at once deceptively familiar and stunningly original, a world of cruelty,
beauty, legend, truth, and above all, wonder. Readers will delight in the
author's ingenious retelling of classic fairy tales and will marvel at the
stunning new tale of a boy raised by a witch, a cat, a bear, and a demon.
Witch
Once upon a time, in a faraway country, there was a woman who
lived by herself in the middle of a great forest. She had a little cottage and
kept a garden and a large gray cat. In appearance, she was neither fair nor
ugly, neither young nor old, and she dressed herself modestly in the colors of
stones. None of the folk who lived nearby (not the oldest of them) could tell
how long she had dwelt in that place.
One spring morning, the woman set off to collect some plants she
needed. As she glided silently along, she studied a list she had made, for she
tended to be absentminded about small things. She passed the old oak tree,
lightning killed and half hollow, where the local people were accustomed to
leave things for her, and there she heard an odd little cry. She stopped and
looked, and saw that in the hollow was a wicker basket. Have they left me a
piglet? she wondered. But when she came closer, the basket shook and she heard
the unmistakable cry of a...
I was particularly keen to read Gruber's book with
the children (aged 9 and 11) because the opinions of the
mainstream reviewers are quite mixed. For example, Booklist gives
it a starred review saying 'from the hypnotic mask on the cover
to its perfect fairy-tale ending, this astonishing fantasy compels
readers onward,,' and the Guardian (UK) describes it as 'a
brilliantly woven plot for ages 12-16. However, Publishers
Weekly felt that 'the languorous pace and muddled message will
likely make it off-putting to teens', and Kirkus thought the
main character to be 'one of the least sympathetic characters
readers will ever meet in literature' - which isn't a
criticism per se, but equally will not have people rushing out to
buy a copy!
We listened to The Witch's Boy as an 8 hour audio book read
beautifully by Denis O'Hare. Undoubtedly a good reader can turn
literary straw into gold, so part of our opinion is probably
colored by the exceptional reading. However, even without this I
believe we would have been hooked by this elegantly plotted story
that can be understood at many levels, and thus can be enjoyed by
many ages - and yes, I can well imagine many teenagers will see a
bit of themselves in Lump, and perhaps that's not such a bad
thing! I wholeheartedly recommend The Witch's Boy for
young teens and also, as we discovered, it's an excellent choice
for family car journeys (most audio books get passed on but we'll
be keeping this one to listen to again)...continued
Full Review
(354 words)
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(Reviewed by BookBrowse Review Team).
Although Tropic of Night was his
first book in his own name, Gruber was
Robert Tanenbaum's ghost-writer for many
years (they are cousins). However, his credit was limited to a thank you
on the acknowledgements page so eventually the relationship
dissolved - Resolve (2003) was the last Tanebaum book
Gruber wrote.
In 1996 he started to write The Witch's Boy but was
unable to find a publisher, so he turned to adult fiction,
publishing
Tropic of Night and
Valley of Bones, which were both well received.
In 2005, almost 10 years after he first wrote it, The Witch'...
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