The Wall and the Wing: 12/25/20

The Wall and the Wing by Laura Ruby is the first book in an alternate New York City duology. Every hundred years or so a Wall is born, a special child who can turn invisible. Something went wrong after the last Wall was born and now she's lost somewhere in the city, being searched for two two thugs.

Gurl and Bug are orphans at the Home for the Hopeless. Like the workers at Yubaba's bathhouse, the children there have their names and memories stolen. The mechanism though is very different and rather creepy, and similar to a magical machine in Malamander by Thomas Taylor (2019).

The New York that Gurl and Bug live in bears thematic similarities to Ruby's more recent York series (2018-2020). Both paint modern day versions of the city that have been taken into an alternate timeline by a big event in the last 150 to 200 years. The big event has fundamentally altered something about how the city or its people work. In this earlier version, most people have gained the power of flight.

I liked the dynamics of Gurl and Bug. They have a similar friendship / rivalry to the kids in City of Orphans by Avi (2000) or the more recent girls in Daring Darleen, Queen of the Screen by Anne Nesbet (2020).

The second book is The Chaos King (2007).

Four stars

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