Magic, Music, War and Friendship

My subject line, Magic, Music, War and Friendship, is from the cover liner of The Wrinkled Crown, by Anne Nesbet.

I had to smile when I copied it—minus the music, it could well describe Piper Pan and Her Merry Band! In fact there are a number of similarities between this imaginative tale and my own: girl hero, fantasy setting, deep friendships, destiny, magic, and the possibility of healing worlds.

Here’s the summary of The Wrinkled Crown:

“Twelve-year-old Linny embarks on an epic quest to save her best friend and discovers that she is the link between the magical and logical halves of her world.”

One of the unique and compelling concepts in this story is that in the “wrinkled” (magical) part of the world, stories, thoughts, and sayings have a way of bringing things into being. Linny is, in fact, someone her mother came to the Wrinkled land to conjure. Linny is the hero the world needs in order to heal, because her mother intended it. This isn’t to say Linny is leading the life her mother wants her to lead—nothing so manipulative or codependent. Rather it’s a story about our power to manifest what we deeply desire.

Another compelling thing about Linny: she is breaking all the rules held in her world for girls (and children). The author depicts the weight and the fear involved in knowingly breaking rules like these, and in following one’s gut while feeling terrified about what it will mean to do so. Linny is a round peg in a square hole, and courageous enough to stay “round” all the same!

Anne Nesbet has some gorgeous, inventive, and playful ways in which her worlds mirror our own. I don’t know if the metaphors are conscious or not. For my part as a writer, I find meaning in my stories in places where I didn’t consciously intend it—Sincoraz draining the life from the Neverland because of Captain L’il Jack’s greed is certainly a metaphor for the way we’ve overused our planet’s resources, but when I wrote it I didn’t have that parallel in mind.

For my part, The Wrinkled Crown lives up to its promise of being a masterful tale of magic, music, war, and friendship.

Happy Reading!