THE TRIUMPHANT TALE OF PIPPA NORTH

It would be possible to enjoy this fantasy novel for the names alone.

The people in this fantasy novel have unlikely names: not just Pippa North, but Council member Gulliver Slickabee and a witch called Helga Hookeye. And the story centers on an unusual subject: hats. Magicians in the kingdom of Wanderly can’t perform spells until they’ve received their hats. Oliver Dash is 11, and his hat has yet to arrive, so he comes up with a far-fetched scheme to get one, in which he convinces Pippa he’s her fairy godmother. (The characters’ race is almost never described, but Pippa and Oliver appear white in the cover art.) This all makes sense in context, although it requires many improbable plot twists in rapid succession. That sometimes leads to haphazard pacing, but the characters and events are consistently engaging. The problem is: Sometimes they’re not outlandish enough. The enchanted letters that children receive, on gusts of wind, feel a little too much like J.K. Rowling’s Howlers. But even when elements seem too familiar, the jokes are funnier than in Beltz's first tale set in Wanderly, The Tragical Tale of Birdie Bloom (2019). It’s hilarious that a peacock is named Bob, for reasons too ridiculous to explain here but that are conveyed in one of the many footnotes that festoon the book’s pages.

The plot, however messy, is so delightfully off-kilter that the names may be the least outlandish part of the story.