The Girl Who Drank the Moon
Ratings153
Average rating4.1
This tale was very magical and nicely layered with characters to make a intertwining story that is interesting and compelling. You have a town who sacrifices babies to the witch. Then there is Xan, the witch in the woods, who has no idea why the town would abandon these babies and takes them to families to care for them. Luna, a baby Xan rescued, ate some moonlight and she becomes magical and is to be taken care of by Xan. The relationships with the characters feel like a really nice family and have a good dynamic. I feel like a younger reader may get a bit bored, I'd recommend to later elementary and up. ~Ashley
Babies, babies, babies they talk about babies a ton in this book to the point where I got tired of it. Those with tokophobia will probably find it annoying but not frightening.
Summary: The Protectorate is run by some powerful, manipulative people who have convinced the citizens of the town that, every year, they must give one of the town’s babies to a witch in order to keep her from harming them all. Little do they know that the witch really exists, but, contrary to what the elders say, she is a kind old woman who, one year, feeds the sacrificed baby moonlight, causing her to gain magical powers. As the witch raises the child herself, evil forces stir in the Protectorate, and one special citizen decides that he doesn’t like the way things are in the city. This novel is a fantastic story of familial love, enchanting magic, and good rising up against evil.
Lovely little book but the story felt really rushed towards the end after some great character building.
This was SUCH a fun and sweet read!!!!!! While it Did touch on some heavier topics, it was still light-hearted and an overall delightful read!!!!!! I simple ADORED all of the characters!!!!!!!
what an enchanting story. I loved all the characters and just everything about this book. I definitely could see myself reading this to my daughter in the future.
Just finished reading this to my six–year-old; wonderfully realised, lyrical prose, exciting, and heartfelt. The girls would groan whenever we had to stop for the night, and I was right there with them!
“There is no limit to what the heart can carry.”
This is a sweet tale of witches and Simply Enormous Dragons and swamp monsters who love poetry and an eleven year old girl made magic by moonlight. So sweet and compelling, this was a charming fairy tale perfect for days you need a little extra warmth in your life.
3.75 ★
Reminded me of Never Ending Story's feelings while I was reading it.
I will reread that book in the near future.
I absolutely adored this book! I decided to go with the audiobook, and the narrator is amazing!
This is one of my new faves. I need to check out more by this author. I just loved everything about it.
what a weird book... I couldn't understand anything, and I quit just a few pages to end. definitely not what I expected, maybe just my taste, but the author's imagination here was definitely crazy!
This was so beautiful and I can't remember the last time a book made me cry like this.
This is such a fun story. I love the magic, the characters, the dialog and the plot! It's a beautiful story with a great theme. It's reminded me that everyone has their own struggles, and we need to forgive each other more readily.
I really feel like I wanted to like this more than I did, and I can't exactly pinpoint why I didn't. It has a kind of dark fairy tale vibe to it, and memorable characters that I really cared about. I guess it also made me pretty anxious what with people not remembering important things and not communicating with each other? And just somehow didn't feel as magical as I wanted it to be. For me, it didn't have the huge emotional payoff I was hoping it would have, and it was kind of a letdown.
I adore this cover. It was what first caught my eye when people started talking about this book, and then to find out it was a fairytale about a girl, a witch, and a dragon? I was sold. The trouble was getting my hands on it! But it has finally worked its way through the long line of other people who wanted to read it at my library, and I got to check it out. I've labeled it YA Fantasy, but it's actually pretty close to middle-grade Fantasy. Definitely something younger readers could understand, but enough meat in it for older readers who like fairy tales to enjoy it as well.
I would argue that the main character is not, in fact, the titular one, but the forest witch, Xan. Xan has been rescuing the babies left outside the Protectorate for many, many years, thinking the parents were abandoning them willfully, not that they were bullied into “sacrificing” wanted children. She'd cluck, take the babies, and deliver them to towns on the other side of the forest, where the villagers knew and loved her and cherished the children, calling them blessed and Star-Children. Meanwhile, the people of the Protectorate lived their days under a gray haze of misery, ruled by a Council who cared only for themselves and used Xan and the forest as a scare tactic.
Into this world Luna is born, and her mother refuses to give her up to be sacrificed, and goes “mad” when she is forced to. She is imprisoned in a tower, watched by fearsome nuns, while the oblivious Xan spirits her daughter away. On the journey, Xan winds up wandering instead of going straight to a village, and accidentally feeds Luna moonlight instead of starlight. Realizing the girl would be too much for a normal family to raise, she takes her home. (She also can't bear the thought of giving this particular child up.) She raises Luna as a granddaughter.
But Luna's mother wants her back, and some of the people of the Protectorate have started to wise up to the Council's games, and the plot really begins.
I really enjoyed this book - the characters were fun, the emotional conflicts were realistic, and the world-building was cute. This would actually be an excellent book to read to a child as a bedtime story, one chapter a night. (My parents read to us that way, working through Laura Ingalls Wilder, The Chronicles of Narnia, Tolkien, and Anne of Green Gables.) Adorable book, gorgeous cover. Slightly simplistic, but it strikes a perfect balance between a middle-grade read and something adults will still enjoy.
You can find all my reviews at Goddess in the Stacks.
Very enjoyable, and well-written. I listened to the audio book version, and I definitely recommend it, the reader does a very good job and enhances the story.
4.75 stars This is such a beautiful book with a beautiful story about magic, love and family. Highly recommend.
I really enjoyed this one. The separate narratives combined nicely and the fact that there wasn't an exactly neat and tidy ending despite being a younger read was refreshing.
