Ophelia and the Marvelous Boy

February 24, 2014
In Foxlee’s take on “The Snow Queen,” 11-year-old Ophelia Jane Worthington-Whittard, who is still grieving her mother’s death, travels to an unnamed snowy city where her father has taken a job at a strange museum. There, Ophelia meets a boy in a locked room. The Marvelous Boy has been a prisoner of the Snow Queen for years, and he asks Ophelia to help him save the world. Narrator Entwistle shines in this entertaining audio edition. With an accented voice, steady pacing, and a crisp delivery, Entwistle ably captures the magic and fun of Foxlee’s tale. The voices Entwistle lends Ophelia and the Marvelous Boy are spot-on, while she also produces a host of distinct and appropriate voices for the book’s other characters. Ages 8-12. A Knopf hardcover.

Starred review from November 11, 2013
In this appropriately frosty take on The Snow Queen, Foxlee (The Midnight Dress) introduces 11-year-old Ophelia Jane Worthington-Whittard, who’s asthmatic, pragmatic, curious, and braver than she realizes. Ophelia’s family, shattered after her mother’s death, is visiting an unnamed snowy city so her father can curate an exhibition of swords. Exploring the strange, icy, and nearly empty museum, Ophelia discovers the long-imprisoned Marvelous Boy, who recruits her to help him save the world from the Snow Queen; she also turns up a cluster of deadly “misery birds” and a roomful of the ghosts of numerous girls. Foxlee’s writing is elegant and accessible, with a pervading melancholy; this is as much a story of loss as it is an adventure. Certain elements, such as the identity of the Snow Queen, aren’t really surprises, but it’s in Foxlee’s evocation of the museum’s unsettling dangers, as well as Ophelia’s eventual willingness to reconcile what she knows in her mind with what she feels in her heart, that this story shines. Ages 8–12. Author’s agent: Catherine Drayton, Inkwell Management. Illustrator’s agent: Steven Malk, Writers House.