Having seen the beautiful and fun movie adaptation from Studio Ghibli, I went into reading Howl’s Moving Castle with the expectation of finding a twee, charming, quaint, light-hearted children’s story with a lot of magic and a little adventure, something in the vein of Peter Pan or Mary Poppins. The story began with a young woman named Sophie bemoaning being the oldest sister working at the family hat shop while her two younger sisters experience big changes in their lives. When the local evil villainess (known as the Witch of the Waste) turns Sophie into an old woman, she is horrified to have had her youth and years stolen, but also finds an excuse to set off on her own adventure.  This setup led me to compare this story to T. Kingfisher’s Nettle and Bone, which I enjoyed reading earlier this year. Unfortunately, I found that once we (i.e. Sophie) meets up with the wizard, Howl, and finds an excuse to move into his moving castle, the story goes into all kinds of unexpected directions, and I had a hard time holding on as we literally jump from place to place and plot to plot.

It was not unexpected that in a kids story, the logical connections and reasons that bring characters together are pretty flimsy, and often we end up with a bunch of random encounters that lead to “let’s be friends” and to an ersatz found family in no time. When Sophie arrives, Howl (a youthful local wizard who apparently does magic for hire) already has an apprentice/assistant/intern named Michael, and Calcifer — a fire demon (i.e. a living, sentient ball of magical fire who actually does a lot of the magic around the place) — as his bondservant/slave. Sophie makes an under-the-table deal with Calcifer to free each other from their respective curses (hers being her unnatural age, and Calcifer’s being the contract to Howl). The story still seems pretty interesting and a lot of classic fairytale tropes still feel engaging, but then we start to focus oddly on Howl’s dating life (he seems to magically make local girls fall for him, then drops them once they fall in love), and Michael also seems to be actively pursuing various girls (who may or may not be the same ones that Howl is courting). In the background, the king of the land is trying to get Howl to work for him, to locate his missing brother, Justin, and his missing wizard, all who may have run afoul of the Witch of the Waste — but Howl keeps trying to get out of it. On top of all that, Howl is an exceedingly petulant and grumpy character (not what I remember from the Ghibli movie) and there are a lot of squabbles at home about his behaviour, and how it clashes with Sophie’s housekeeping (yes, that’s what her cover story is for staying with them).

Along the way, there are many other encounters of all stripes, from local schoolteachers, to talking skulls, to dog men, to former magic teachers, to a bouncing scarecrow. And though in the end there are numerous wrap-ups to explain what significance these all have to the central plot, the revelations all feel like too little too late as I have been reading the whole story without knowing which plot thread or new character I should care about, and what the connections are to the main story arc (if there even is one). At one point we even find a strange window back to our “current” world, making this story something of a portal fantasy (like the Chronicles of Narnia) but that only added to the confusion overall.

In the end, I feel like there were a lot of great elements in this story. The castle itself is really cool (its door can be set to open on various places), and I enjoyed certain unique characters like The Witch of the Waste, and also Calcifer the fire demon. I also really thought the theme of exploring aging, and how we feel about that at various stages in our lives, was a very interesting and provocative one; and I love when it’s discussed through a magical lens. Maybe once I rewatch the movie, I could re-read this book and get a whole lot more from it (especially after having read the ending now). But unfortunately, I think I have other things (and even other rereads) to prioritize over this book. Despite its many enchanting elements, it still did not captivate me enough to warrant that. And if this story has taught me anything, it’s that the remaining days of my life are too precious.

2.5 stars

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