A Breath of Mischief
MarcyKate Connolly
A by-the-numbers fairy tale
When you open A Breath of Mischief what you find inside is what it says on the label: an upbeat fairy tale about a little girl, Aria, who is (more-or-less -- genetic relationships are never entirely clear) the daughter of the Wind, and whose best friend is Gwyn, a griffling (young gryphon, I gather), on whose back she flies about. One day the Wind vanishes, and Aria and Gwyn go off on a quest to bring them back. She finds that the Wind is being held captive by a sinister alchemist named Worton, who sends her off to find three treasures. (BTW, that's all from the publisher's blurb, so no spoilers.) Thus we have a standard fairy tale quest. On her quest Aria makes new friends. There's an entirely predictable plot twist, etc.
I was less than thrilled by A Breath of Mischief for two reasons: (1) It was predictable, and (2) It had no bite. What I mean by "predictable" is obvious, but what do I mean by "no bite"?
Some books I remember from when I was a 6-12-year-old kid are The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, The Secret Garden, The Wind in the Willows, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Charlotte's Web, A Wrinkle in Time, Harriet the Spy, and so on. These books don't have much in common, but there is this: they have bite. I knew as I read them that what happened mattered. Bad things could happen, and did!
A Breath of Mischief doesn't have bite. Although there is a threat that bad things could happen, it never feels credible. The overall tone is one of such sweetness and light that you never believe, deep in your feels, that anything on the scale of Harriet's being abandoned by her friends is truly in the offing. It feels odd to write that, since almost exactly that happens at one point in Breath of Mischief. But somehow it doesn't feel real. I suspect that this was an intentional choice by Connolly to spare kids strong and possibly painful emotions. But it also has the effect of sparing the kids strong and possibly joyful emotions. Nothing really matters -- everything is very nice.
Well, the marketing for A Breath of Mischief pretty clearly indicates that "very nice" is what's on offer here. For that it gets three stars: it meets expectations.
I thank NetGalley and Sourcebooks kids for an advance reader's copy.