Vanya and the Wild Hunt plays it safe for the mglit crowd

Vanya and the Wild Hunt is a tale of two books and follows a trail of breadcrumbs that mglit audiences except and appreciate. A young girl has mysterious parents. Something happens to her, or her parents, which reveals her proclivity towards magic and a quest ensues. There are elements of these patterns or tropes that have existed in literature for the past 100 years. Vanya and the Wild Hunt know their audience. The core audience for this book is fifth-grade through eighth-grade girls. There will always be outliers, but if 100 copies of this book were in various people’s hands, the vast majority would fit in that demographic.

I say that, because it is ok. Elementary-aged boys will mainly read graphic novels where the protagonist farts, has farting superpowers or makes jokes about other kids who fart. Upper-elementary girls have graduated to mglit, where the chapters revolve around girls who are magical, girls who have magical pets or girls who have a magical family, but haven’t realized their abilities yet. Vanya and the Wild Hunt nicely fits into that final category.

As a non-elementary school girl, I enjoyed the first half of the book. It has elements that its contemporaries don’t have and sets up the main storyline very well. Vanya is an 11-year old British Indian girl who feels like she’s never fit into society. She can speak to books, and they can speak back to her, often in witty ways that makes older readers wish that they played a bigger part in the story. Older readers will also struggle to reconcile the fact that a British Indian feels like an outsider in London. A kid who feels like they’re on the outskirts of normal because they have conversations with book? That is legitimate.

The first two chapters establish the monsters and the alternate reality very well. Vanya’s family gets attacked by a monster at their house. Her mother quickly fights off the monster with a variety of knives and weapons that were hidden in plain sight in their living room. The books in the room are talking to her and things get creative and freaky. This amazes and bewilders Vanya who always suspected that her family pedigree was different and now she has proof that things are amiss. Her father and mother are confused because they mention something about a ‘truce’ that’s been in effect for a long time and “why would they break it now?”

Soon the gig is up and Vanya is told about an alternate reality where archwitches, archlings exist and all of the youth go to a special school. Yeah, I’ve had it up to here with special schools and alternate dimensions in mglit, but the first two chapters were really good, so I’m still on board. She crosses through the porthole with Jasper, her guide and the two start their quest. There’s a magical library, a school Felicorn tournament that’s played on giant rabbits with antlers while the bi-pedal people joust on their backs and more.

To the older reader, all of this will seem too familiar. Wait, let me guess, one of Vanya’s parents is actually doing something bad, but for a good reason? To the upper-elementary through the middle part of middle-school it will be a bit familiar too. Our protagonist does have ADHD, but it’s only referenced a handful of times in the book, as it should be. I have a theory that this year’s pronoun-of-the-day issue will be characters in books that are neurodivergent. That is awesome as it could provide a role model for youth who fall into that category. However, much like pin the tail on the pronoun, it could be overused and included in various books just to check off the cause of the moment, rather than adding to the plot.

In Vanya and the Wild Hunt it doesn’t add to the plot. There’s an instance where Vanya is feeling down and spacey, having just unsuccessfully mounted a felicorn. A schoolmate comforts her and alludes to the fact that you can learn multiple lessons through failure, before encouraging her to hop on the back of a nearby horse creature. As the book’s climax comes into view readers discover that Vanya’s mother may, or may not have had a pivotal role in all of this and just might be the big baddie.

Vanya and the Wild Hunt is mglit squarely aimed at girls aged 8-12. These are girls that want to read about familiar stories with just a little bit different in the plot department. It’s comfort reading for fast readers that burn through books and want to dig into more of what they just read. Those princess girls who are on their way to middle Earth will enjoy the book, but outside of that mglit readers will feel as though they’ve been down this road once too often.

Vanya and the Wild Hunt is by Sangu Mandanna and is available on Roaring Book Press, an imprint of Mackids.

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