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Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones

Fantasy Sci-Fi Poetry Non-fiction Autobiographies

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Posted: Nov 18, 2024

Rating: 8/10

Genre: Sci-Fi (Hopepunk)

Summary: Centuries before, robots of Panga gained self-awareness, laid down their tools, wandered, en masse into the wilderness, never to be seen again. They faded into myth and urban legend.

Now the life of the tea monk who tells this story is upended by the arrival of a robot, there to honor the old promise of checking in. The robot cannot go back until the question of "what do people need?" is answered. But the answer to that question depends on who you ask, and how. They will need to ask it a lot. Chambers' series asks: in a world where people have what they want, does having more matter?

Review:

Overall, this is a great book. It's enjoyable, with good writing and relatable characters. The worldbuilding is also very interesting, interspersed throughout the book so it doesn't overwhelm you. The book is overall pretty short, shy of 150 pages, so a good book to start if you've been in a reading slump like I have been.

Some call reading this book like a good cup of tea, and I agree. It's overall a pretty solid book but for the first 2/3rds of the book, there's not much going on beyond the establishmen of the world and the main character, Dex. That's my main gripe with it, I think, that there isn't really any conflict for the first 2/3rds of the book but more on that later.

One of my favorite things about this book is the setting. The novel takes place on continent called Panga on a moon(that I don't think is named) where its essentially a utopia. They have their own religious system that seemed incredibly thought-out, which the main character is a monk of one of the gods, Allalae. The setting is also queer-friendly, the main character themself being a nonbinary monk and there are other multiple other sporadic mentions of queer couples in the book. Dex's gender or sexuality, nor anyone else's, is not the main focal point of the story, just simply a fact. I love, love, love that. Jobs do not seem mandatory in the world but everyone seems to have a job and there are definitely some cultural expectations of having a job and bringing some value to society.

The writing itself, which I cannot describe in any other way, is warm. It reminds me of that feeling of reading books back when I was in childhood, where the world was described with detail, people were good and there was this feeling of nature around you. The characters are relatable and well-written. The deutoragonist, is a wild-built robot named Splendid Speckled Mosscap (Mosscap for short), is so cute as well! They're a good boi who just tries their best :)

Also One thing I want to note that there a lot of themes in the book. Its meant to make you stop and think but to be honest, I don't have that much time to do that right now. University is hard. Maybe I'll come back and edit this part later while my thoughts continue to marinate over the themes.

The one thing I did not like about this book is the lack of conflict for the first two-thirds of the book. The pacing was pretty slow but I'm fine with slow pacing yet while I enjoyed the writing for those first two-thirds, I was not planning on reading the sequel. The real conflict of the book was Dex's internal struggle of what they felt about the value they had to their society. They weren't feeling fulfilled by their role in life and no one else around them understood, which hey I relate to so much. Mosscap, as a robot who grew(?) outside of Dex's environment, provided counterpoints and criticized, argued against Dex's ingrained beliefs about value and worth. AND! One point off because we never even found out if Dex heard their crickets :(

Overall, yes pretty good book and the conflict in the end of the book was definitely worth the pay-off for the set up. I am planning on reading the sequel A Prayer for the Crown-Shy. So um, yeah I would recommend!