Spell and Spindle by Michelle Schusterman
Release: July 31st 2018
Format: Kindle
Publisher: Random House Books for Young Readers
Source: Netgalley
Spell and Spindle Synopsis:
The Museum of Peculiar Arts holds many oddities–a mechanical heart, a diary bound in its owner’s skin . . . and Penny, a child-size marionette who almost looks alive. Fog clouds Penny’s memories from before the museum, but she catches glimpses here and there: a stage, deep red curtains, long-fingered hands gripping her strings.
One day, a boy named Chance touches Penny’s strings and hears her voice in his head. Penny can listen, and watch, and think?
Now someone else is watching Penny and Chance; a man with a sharp face, a puppeteer who has the tools to change things. A string through a needle. A twist of a spindle. And suddenly Chance is trapped in Penny’s marionette body, while Penny is free to run and dance. She knows that finding a way to switch back is the right thing to do. But this body feels so wonderful, so full of life! How can Penny ever return to her puppet shell?
Review:
A BIG Thank You to Netgalley and Random House Books for Young Readers for providing me a copy of “Spell and Spindle” by Michelle Schusterman in exchange for my review.
The main highlight of this story for me was the characters how the author realistically portrays them. I especially adored how the author made Penny more three dimensional, even though she is only supposed to be a marionette in theory. Though Penny is supposed to be good and heroic, she also makes mistakes, gets scared, and runs away from problems rather than facing them. I loved seeing all these facets in our protagonist, which is very rare in middle grade novels. Another reason why this book was fun was because the author did not stereotype the genders. Penny and Constance are the main brave heroes in this story. Chance is brave at times too, but we also see a vulnerable side to him and he comes across as the damsel in distress here.
The only trouble I had with this “Spell and Spindle” was the villain. Considering how wonderful it was to read about the good guys, I found the villain to be very two dimensional in the mustache-twirling way. I also had trouble understanding the reasons for doing what he did as it didn’t seem very convincing.
Apart from that though, I truly enjoyed this story. I really liked Michelle Schusterman’s style of writing, and would love to pick up some of her other novels. I also found the illustrations by Kathrin Honesta to be cute on each chapter. Also, I loved that each chapter ends in a serialized cliff-hanger and I found myself turning pages to find out what happened next! Spell and Spindle is definitely one of those books that boys and girls would enjoy reading as it has a lot of mystery, adventure and drama in it. Personally, I enjoyed it a lot too and can’t wait to re-read it once it hits the bookstores.
