The Wolf Hour

Magia wants to be a woodcutter like her father, Tata, in the enticing wild and deep Puszcza forest, but Magia's mother wants her to be a singer. Unfortunately, Magia is ejected from her first music lesson with Miss Grand, but not before discovering the eerie bone flutes the music teacher has been using to ensorcel the townspeople. Afterward, nothing goes right for Magia's family: she and her siblings are accused of harming a girl they find wandering, confused, following a wolf attack; Tata's business dries up; her pregnant mother loses the baby and goes into a decline. When Tata returns from a visit to Miss Grand with an eerie bone-wound clock, the improvement in Magia's mother is dramatic, but the price might be more than Magia can bear to pay. The strongly Eastern European-flavored setting is a good medium for the tale's mysterious elements, including three pigs and a series of wolves all bound up in "human Stories," which carry strange power and are "everywhere in the forest." Holmes treats the Stories with a light touch, keeping their power in the background until Magia attempts to change her own--and save the young wolf she's befriended. Quirky and original, this re-casting of traditional folklore will capture readers with its vivid setting, dreamlike internal logic, and hopeful ending. anita l. burkam