THE CHAOS COURT

In this middle-grade debut, a girl leaves her country home for the city and learns about a secret faction of mischief-makers.

Patience Fell has seven siblings. On her 12th birthday, she leaves the family farm to lighten the burden on her parents and to find her place in the world. Armed with only a broom, she rides a turnip cart to the bustling town of Whosebourne. In an alley beside The Crock and Dice inn, she finds a girl crying on a kitchen stoop. When Patience asks if she can help, the girl cryptically replies, “You’re all mad and I won’t fix it!” Suddenly, a whirlwind of trash approaches. While the girl runs away, Patience tries to fend off the trash with her broom. An extended battle reveals a “tiny filthy man” inside the whirlwind. This is the offaltosser. Patience is spared too much thought on this strange phenomenon by the inn’s cook, Miss Alys, who hires her as broom girl. Her first task is to bring breakfast to Miss Crowquill, a poet who lives in the attic. The madwoman possesses a book called The Chaos Court by Johnny Factotum, which describes the offaltosser and other strange creatures. A week later, Patience is picked up by a man in fancy-but-frayed dress named Reynard, who drives her to Pennywhack Manor. She meets the man who runs Whosebourne, the intimidating Keyreeve. In his office, under glass, is “The Key to the Town.” He also owns a copy of The Chaos Court. As far as Patience’s seeing the offaltosser, Keyreeve insists that she repeat, “I saw nothing unusual at all.”

Burnett brings a bit of Dickensian flair to his fantasy novel, creating silly names that are a joy to stumble across, like Shivtickle and Cobblemauler. These flights of verbal fancy hint at the deep strangeness ahead, which may remind readers of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, albeit with one foot more firmly in reality. At first, Reynard appears to be a sympathetic companion for Patience. That role soon falls upon Linus Pennywhack, Keyreeve’s nephew and a blossoming young scientist. Though the narrative isn’t overtly concerned with romance, when Linus shows Patience the stars through his telescope, the characters’ mutual enchantment is palpable. The collective comings and goings of magical creatures serve as a fantastical tide that regularly swells over Whosebourne, as in the scene in which Patience and Linus bounce across the rooftops with the gabledancers. Patience is a charming, determined hero, with an adorable catchphrase uttered in excitement (“Fox in a bonnet!”). Fabulous turns of phrase populate every chapter, like when we meet the unscrupulous Coinquaff, “who’d make a wolf walk the long way round to steer clear.” But Burnett also educates his younger audience by defining challenging terms well. “A hypothesis,” Linus explains, is “a guess about how things might be that you can test by investigating.” The story’s main theme of finding one’s “place in the world” is echoed in the goofy Chaos Court denizens’ names. The creatures have carved out unique niches, a feat to which Burnett’s readers should aspire. The finale offers a meta solution to the plot and creates the potential for further adventures.

Effervescent and captivating, this middle-grade tale boasts a big heart.