Read A Sprinkle of Sorcery free in the Little Reads app.
A Sprinkle of Sorcery by Michelle Harrison is a magical adventure for 8 year olds about sisters searching for a missing child and a hidden island.
Betty, Fliss and Charlie Widdershins live at the Poacher's Pocket inn. A girl arrives needing help. Then Charlie disappears and her sisters must go after her.
Their search takes them across the marshes towards an island nobody can find on a map. There are stories about the magic there. Finding out what to trust is part of the adventure.
Before you meet the sisters, you hear an old tale about a witch and a cruel lord. It has a raven that speaks for her and ordinary objects that may be enchanted. A promise of treasure comes with a warning that choosing badly can bring terrible luck.
If your reader enjoys magical objects with rules attached, that opening gives them plenty to wonder about. Which thing would they pick? Something that looks valuable may not be the thing they need.
The beginning is dark, which is worth knowing. The lord has the witch injured when she refuses to love him. She loses an eye and her tongue, and those events are described in the opening legend.
A child who finds that sort of cruelty upsetting may struggle with it. For a reader who already enjoys darker fairytales, the witch's magic and the danger of making a greedy choice may be what draws them in.
The sisters bring a much chattier feel when their story starts. The prison bell is ringing and everyone in the inn is gossiping. Granny is annoyed with the customers while Charlie is more interested in getting out of her itchy dress.
You get to know them through their teasing and the work they do together. Betty notices what needs doing. Fliss smooths things over when Granny is rude, and Charlie says what she thinks.
If your reader likes following a family into an adventure, those early exchanges give them people to care about. The missing sister matters before the journey has really begun.
For another adventure that takes fairytale danger seriously, The Day I Fell Into a Fairytale is in the library. Lana needs her brother's help in a storybook world where an evil witch is causing trouble.
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