Begone the Raggedy Witches (The Wild Magic Trilogy, Book One)

by Celine Kiernan

Ebook, 2018

Status

Available

Call number

823.92

Publication

Walker Books (2018), 288 pages

Description

"On the night that Aunty dies, the raggedy witches come for Mup's family. Pale, cold, and relentless, the witches will do anything for the tyrannical queen who has outlawed most magic and enforces her laws with terror and cruelty -- and who happens to be Mup's grandmother. When witches carry off her dad, Mup and her mam leave the mundane world to rescue him. But everything is odd in the strange, glittering Witches Borough, even Mam. Even Mup herself. In a world of rhyming crows, talking cats, and golden forests, it's all Mup can do to keep her wits about her. And even if she can save her dad, Mup's not sure if anything will ever be the same again. First in a new trilogy by Irish author Celine Kiernan, this tale of family and forbidden magic charts a fresh path through the landscape of beloved fantasy tradition -- and promises to bewitch any reader in search of stories to love."-- "When witches kidnap her dad, Mup is swept up in a wild tide of magic that carries her to another world. Can she reunite her family and find her way back?"--… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member ladycato
I received a copy of this book via Netgalley.

This utterly charming middle grade novel is bright and dark all at once, embodying a classic fairy tale vibe with a modern approach. Mup is a smart, compassionate young girl. As her aunt is dying in the hospital, she spies raggedy witches gliding from
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tree to tree to chase her family's car. It turns out her mother is the heir to the throne in the witch's realm--and her grandmother is a cruel tyrant. When Mup's father is kidnapped by witches, the entire family launches a rescue operation into a realm that is magical and terrifying.

There are so many things I love about this book. Foremost, Mup. She's a fierce, brilliant spark of a girl. Her chosen attire--a clashing rainbow of clothing, complete with tutu--feels realistic for a child her age. Her compassion is central. Her family sparkles with diversity, too. While her baby brother is pale and blonde like their mom, Mup takes after her father. As she describes it at one point, her father is Irish, too, but his parents came from Nigeria.

Mup's mom is awesome, too, a mother who is not defined by her motherhood alone. She's in an awful spot as she always felt ill-fit in the real world, but realizes much of what she was told about her mother's world wasn't quite right, either. She does take her two young children into a dangerous place and puts a lot of responsibility on Mup, but I like how she does trust Mup in that way. Mup thrives under that sense of respect and independence.

Kiernan has created something special in this book and I am excited that this is the first in a new series.
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LibraryThing member lenamaybooks
Begone the Raggedy Witches is a fun story for middle grade readers. It’s perfect for kids that are just transitioning into chapter books. I read it aloud with my ten year old. Although, it may have been a bit young for her tastes, I still enjoyed it. The writing is simple, the story entertaining.
LibraryThing member lowelibrary
This was a very easy read. The book moved along at a quick pace and kept this reader interested every step of the way.
In today's world the idea of an ethnic child believing that everyone has a voice and a right to be is a much needed gift.
Although this was an Advanced Reader Copy, I do not believe
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any changes need to be made before publication.
I cannot wait for the next one.
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LibraryThing member mtlkch
Begone the Raggedy Witches is one of the most enjoyable books I’ve read lately. I loved it! It’s audience is middle school, so it was a quick read, like I read it in one sitting because it was that good. It was beautiful and magical and fantastical. I loved Mup and her loyalty and bravery. I
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could keep writing sentence after sentence about what I loved because I loved it all. I hope it won’t be a long wait for book two. I received this Early Reviewers copy from LibraryThing.
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LibraryThing member virginiahomeschooler
This is a really engaging story that I think middle grade readers will very much enjoy. The story is fast paced, and it will be loved especially by fans of fantasy tales such as Narnia and Wonderland.
LibraryThing member kimkimkim
Mup, Mam, Tipper and Aunty – I followed them on a magical journey filled with witches, lost clans, and the fight to understand the meaning of family and home.

Mup is a little girl who has the largest moral compass in the world. She is bright enough to ask all the hard questions; “What if no one
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loved me? What if I was all alone… Would I still be important enough to keep safe?” She understands “how much it robbed from someone, to make them bury their feelings in the hunt for the best or safest word.” She wonders if it is OK to “have a warm and comfy life when other people didn’t”. She is committed to making sure that “no one ever, ever, ever gets left behind.” She teaches all of us that we can be much better.

While this is marked middle grade, I think young children would enjoy having this tale read to them. I loved this book and look forward the next book in the series.

Thank you NetGalley and Candlewick Press for a copy
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LibraryThing member erikschreppel
Full disclosure, when I bid on “Begone the Raggedy Witches” by Celine Kiernan I didn’t know it was a children’s book. That being said, this was a really fun and interesting read. Being geared towards much younger readers than I, it obviously had a tone that was different had it been written
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for adults. But Kiernan did a wonderful job creating this world and the dark areas were sufficiently dark to interest an adult reader. The general plot revolves around a secondary world from ours that is populated by witches and other supernatural beings. A woman (Stella) who was spirited away as a child from that world to present day Ireland, is now an adult with her own children and is drawn back into a civil war in the witch’s world.
Kiernan is a very talented world builder, and her main protagonist Mup (child of Stella) is a character that I think children reading this will love and relate to. The language was perfect for middle school children, and the serious nature of the witches war is presented in a way that will scare those readers but not terrify them. This is a Harry Potteresque novel, that is nowhere near that scope but still a fun and quick read.
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LibraryThing member sszkutak
I always get excited for books about magic and witches and I was excited to receive this one. It is the start of a trilogy for Middle Grade readers about a girl named Mup whose father is taken by witches in order to lure her mother back into the magical realm she was born in.

This was a fun read
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and it was fairly short. Mup is a wonderful main character for younger readers and her support of others and overall attitude in a time of crisis was encouraging. The story follows her as she goes after her father with her mother who has recently learned she is from this magical place and was taken to live life normally by her aunt. There was drama and magic, and an overall sense of urgency throughout the story so the pacing worked well.

I liked how the world was built and how the readers are able to fall right into it. An added bonus was also that the ending was not a complete cliffhanger so you can read it as a standalone if you so choose to.

Overall I think this will be a fun read for younger readers and since this is the first in a trilogy, there are more stories to come if you enjoy this one.
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LibraryThing member eduscapes
BEGONE THE RAGGEDY WITCHES by Celine Kiernan is the first book in the Wild Magic fantasy trilogy.

After her father is taken hostage by witches, Mup and her family must avoid the raggedy witches to save him from the queen who also happens to be Mup’s grandmother. Along the way, she meets magical
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creatures and people in her quest to find her father.

Librarians will find this intermediate grade fantasy popular with children who enjoy folk fantasy, forbidden magic, and Irish mythology. This quick read can be enjoyed as both a standalone and book one of a trilogy.

Published on September 11, 2018 by Candlewick. ARC courtesy of the publisher.
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LibraryThing member wyvernfriend
I have to admit that I know and like Celine Kiernan and have had a lot of conversations with her. I will be pestering her for more in this series and hoping that someone has commissioned them.

This is a story of a young girl who has to fight for her family when everything changes after her
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great-aunt dies. Some magical creatures steal her father and she has to help her mum negotiate the magical world she came from years ago and deal with a world that is not what they're used for.

Things will never be the same again but maybe they can be okay.

I really liked it and really want to read more set in this world.
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LibraryThing member scarylullabies
Received as ARC
I had never read Celine Kiernan, and now I'm quite excited to get my hands on more of their work. This book has that wonderful very sparse yet very vivid and rich language and description that Irish writers seem to manage so beautifully. The clearest brightest images come to mind
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with every description, and it feels so effortless and lightweight. The exposition and establishment of the characters is equally so. This gives the whole book almost a magical-realism feel, even though it's well and truly a fantasy story. The antagonist appears only briefly and yet is very nicely frightening. I found the villains and the plot to be wonderfully spooky without being the stuff of outright horror, and without being generally too scary for its intended audience - in the same vein as Coraline, if you'd like a point of reference. I would maybe caution the more sensitive young reader to be aware that it is a spooky book.
Overall a quick, gorgeous, and very enjoyable autumn read.
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LibraryThing member derek.stuhan
This book is definitely aimed toward younger-middle school children. Along the lines of the first couple of Harry Potter books, but maybe even a year or two younger than that group. As such, it's not an age group I usually read, but that didn't hurt my opinion of it.

Similar to Potter, this is a
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story with characters steeped in magic and fantasy. Celine Kiernan has written this with a wonderful balance of language that reflects that magical tone, but in a way that children will be able to understand it. Also, the language is just beautiful enough to make this seem "different" to the kids, adding to that fantasy edge.

At the core, Begone the Raggedy Witches has morals about family, equality, and other things kids should know, but it doesn't beat them over the head with it. I can also appreciate a story that has a heroine and (mild spoiler) a dad in peril instead of a 'damsel in distress'. Similar again to the Harry Potter series, there are points in this book that root it in reality, to build that sense of "it can happen to me" in children.

All in all, if you know kids that love magical fantasy stories or are a tad too young to fully grasp Harry Potter (even if they already have read and love Potter), this is a wonderful book. The pacing is quick and will hold even short attention spans with bursts of adventure. Definitely look at it if you get the chance!
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LibraryThing member foggidawn
Mup sees the raggedy witches for the first time on the night her Aunty dies. Aunty's ghost is able to keep the witches away for now, but it's the first taste for Mup of a world she's never imagined, a world that exists right alongside hers . . . a world where her mother is heir to the throne.
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Warring factions want Mup's mother to come back and take the throne. When Mup's father is kidnapped, her mother takes Mup and her little brother into the forest and across the border to this other world. Accompanied by Aunty's ghost and the faithful family dog, Mup will face many adventures and learn new things about herself along the way. And eventually, inevitably, she will have to face the evil queen, her grandmother.

I found this an enjoyable fantasy in the vein of The Girl Who Drank the Moon. Readers who enjoy juvenile fantasy with strong currents of folklore and Faerie will want to pick it up.
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Language

ISBN

9781406378832

Barcode

3618
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