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Reviewed by: Heather Maneiro, High School Librarian Title: The Wild Huntress
Author: Emily Lloyd-Jones
Publisher: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Year: 2024 Good for Grades: 7-12 Genre/Type of Book: Fantasy
Content Warnings, or things that other School Librarians should be aware of: Magic
Recommended for a school library: Yes Reason(s) for choosing the book: Book of the Month YA Selection
If you were tasked by the publisher with writing a short quote for the back cover of this book, what would it be: How would you choose the crew you go to battle with or would they choose you?
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Review:
Abstract and Mini-Review An “accident” occurred when Branwen’s mother was assisting in a folk birth. Branwen is able to get by with a meager existence once her mother falls ill and can no longer serve as a midwife by using the “skill” this accident has enabled – an ability to see magic and thus hunt magical creatures.
Branwen is enlisted as a hunter by Gwydion. From a magical family, Gwydion should indeed have an advantage, but he is simply a tamer of plants and a trickster. In enlisting Branwen, he certainly intended only a huntress who could help him win, he did not anticipate the relationship that blossomed from there.
Pryderi joins our band unexpectedly. After all, who would anticipate a prince joining this rag-tag team. However, the life of a prince is new to Pryderi who was actually raised by a monster. He may have more in common with Branwen and Gwydion than they could ever imagine.
So happy for a true YA fantasy that I can put on my shelves. My one struggle was the Welsh spellings I kept struggling with (until I finally looked it up and got the context right on it). There were some slower burn parts, but the ending soared.
Recommendation Justification
Not sure what happened with SLJ and Kirkus but both Booklist and Publishers Weekly starred this one and it is earning one of my rare five star reviews!
Uses in the Library/Classroom
A great choice for sustained silent reading. I can also see using texts such as this when discussing spelling and word origins and usage especially in choosing alternatives in own story creations. You can break all of the rules in writing (when you do them well!)
Appropriateness of Artwork
The cover did not draw me in☹ I chose this as my Book of the Month Selection because it was the YA title for this month.
Number of party hats:
