Set “during a time of war” when “terrible things happen everywhere,” Newbery Medalist DiCamillo’s engrossing medieval fable verges on darkness while examining what changes a world. A book with an angelic soul: large, sharp, and uncompromising.

Blackall’s luminous black-and-white illustrations and medieval-style spot art add to this feeling and are wonderful at conveying emotion through posture, pose, and delicate linework. The fairy-tale conventions give it a sense of timelessness and omnipresence. The story is told in language as clear and beautiful as an illuminated manuscript, with characters who spring instantly to life. a gently feminist tale where stories carry the same power as magic and are, perhaps, one and the same.

DiCamillo fills her narrative with humor and love. Somehow, DiCamillo manages to fit a medieval epic into just over 250 pages-and that includes many glorious black-and-white illustrations by Blackall that one can easily envision stitched upon a tapestry. Beatryce, both the character and the book, are easy to love. The story, as well as Sophie Blackall’s lustrous pencil illustrations, lingers in the bright places of work and discovery, illumination and beauty. With its timeless themes, unforgettable cast, and magical medieval setting, Kate DiCamillo’s lyrical tale, paired with resonant black-and-white illustrations by Caldecott Medalist Sophie Blackall, is a true collaboration between masters. But Beatryce knows that, should she lose her way, those who love her-a wild-eyed monk, a man who had once been king, a boy with a terrible sword, and a goat with a head as hard as stone-will never give up searching for her, and to know this is to know everything.

As the monk nurses Beatryce to health, he uncovers her dangerous secret, one that imperils them all-for the king of the land seeks just such a girl, and Brother Edik, who penned the prophecy himself, knows why.Īnd so it is that a girl with a head full of stories-powerful tales-within-the-tale of queens and kings, mermaids and wolves-ventures into a dark wood in search of the castle of one who wishes her dead. Gentle Brother Edik finds the girl, Beatryce, curled in a stall, wracked with fever, coated in dirt and blood, and holding fast to the ear of Answelica the goat. In a time of war, a mysterious child appears at the monastery of the Order of the Chronicles of Sorrowing. We shall all, in the end, find our way home. We shall all, in the end, be led to where we belong. From two-time Newbery Medalist Kate DiCamillo and two-time Caldecott Medalist Sophie Blackall comes a fantastical meditation on fate, love, and the power of words to spell the world.

The beatryce prophecy book review