The Girl Who Drank the Moon meets Pax in this fantastical tale of a wolf who forms an unlikely alliance with Baba Yaga to save the forest from a wicked tsar.
Since she was a pup, Zima has been taught to fear humans--especially witches--but when her family is threatened, she has no choice but to seek help from the witch Baba Yaga.
Baba Yaga never does magic for free, but it just so happens that she needs a wolf's keen nose for a secret plan she's brewing . . . Before Zima knows what's happening, the witch has cast a switching spell and run off into the woods, while Zima is left behind in Baba Yaga's hut--and Baba Yaga's body!
Meanwhile, a young village girl named Nadya is also seeking the witch's help, and when she meets Zima (in Baba Yaga's form), they discover that they face a common enemy. With danger closing in, Zima must unite the wolves, the witches and the villagers against an evil that threatens them all.---from the publisher
320 pages 978-0593121658 Ages 8-12
Keywords: adventure, wolf, magic, tsar, witches, 8 year old, 9 year old, 10 year old, 11 year old, 12 year old, fantasy
Other reviews:
“There are books from childhood we love so dearly that they come to define our taste as adults; whenever a manuscript gives me that ‘Ella Enchanted feeling,’ I know it’s special. Like Ella, A Wolf for a Spell is funny and fresh, with all the warmth of a classic fairy tale and a timely reminder that our similarities are greater than our differences. I feel certain kids will gobble it up with the gusto of a hungry wolf at the dining room table.”—Katherine Harrison, senior editor, Knopf Books for Young Readers
Opening: “Fear sank its jaws into Zima as she recognized the smell of magic.
