Do you miss Eva Ibbotson? Do you weep softly into your handkerchief that she has died and we will never have another one of her books? Do you want to love Eva Ibbotson but she hates fat people too much? BOY DO I HAVE A BOOK REC FOR YOU.
(Castle Hangnail is so cute (but not saccharine!) that I’m going to write the summary in short declarative sentences. If I try to make you read longer sentences about Castle Hangnail‘s plot, the adorability will be too much for you and you will die in the middle.)
Castle Hangnail and its minions desperately need a new master. If they don’t get one, the castle will be decommissioned. Twelve-year-old Molly shows up to be their master. She’s a Wicked Witch! (Sort of.) The minions are dubious. Molly sets about trying to meet the requirements of a castle master. There is also a foe to conquer.
(Really, Jenny? You say you’re going to use short declarative sentences but you can’t get through a paragraph without an if/then construction? No wonder WordPress always gives you a frowny face for readability.)
Much as Eva Ibbotson’s middle grade fantasies, Castle Hangnail has a cast of dear, adorable, strange characters. All the denizens of Castle Hangnail, whom Molly quickly comes to love because nobody could not love them, are absolute cinnamon rolls. Here’s the description that killed me stone dead, of a minion who is not exactly a voodoo doll but sort of (maybe):
Pins lived in a small room over the laundry with a talking goldfish. The goldfish was intensely neurotic and convinced that she was always sickening for something. Pins took very tender care of the fish and was currently knitting her a very small waterproof scarf.
I WOULD DIE FOR PINS.
Castle Hangnail strikes me as the kind of book I would have (loved to have) read at age seven, kept through the years as it became steadily more and more battered, and realized as an adult contained a lot more emotional insight and wisdom than I had realized as a child. It’s the perfect marriage of Eva Ibbotson quirk and charm and Diana Wynne Jones insight. And I’m going to make a controversial statement here: I loved Castle Hangnail better than I loved Which Witch? and Island of the Aunts, my two favorites of Eva Ibbotson’s middle-grade fantasies. YES I DID.
This hasn’t been much of a review, but I feel like that description of Pins and his goldfish is the perfect encapsulation of what this book is. If you liked it, you’ll like Castle Hangnail. If you didn’t, I am confused by you as a person. Castle Hangnail is the adorable, middle-grade antidote to everything that’s wrong with the world. Please buy it and read it as soon as possible.
(PS: Legal Sister bought this for me as a present at WorldCon! Which was so sweet. But even sweeter is that she ran into Ursula Vernon while buying it, and Ursula Vernon signed it for me and wrote “Minions rule!” What a gem. I will treasure it always.)