Willodeen (Katherine Applegate)

Willodeen
Katherine Applegate
Feiwell and Friends
Fiction, MG Fantasy
****+ (Good/Great)

DESCRIPTION: Screechers are ugly. Screechers are loud. Worst of all, screechers are so stinky they'd make a skunk smell sweet as a rose. That's why the people of Perchance treat them like pests, even as they welcome other creatures like the beautiful little hummingbears, whose glowing bubble nests fill the blue willow trees by the river every autumn (and whose annual migration draws tourist money to boost the small town's economy). As the numbers of screechers dwindle, thanks to the town council putting a five-copper bounty on their hides, only one person seems to care: eleven-year-old Willodeen. Like screechers, she feels unwanted and misunderstood, especially since she lost her family in a wildfire many years ago. She rarely talks to anyone but the old women who took her in, spending her days roaming the woods and hills with her notebook instead of going to school. So she is the only one to notice that, as the screecher population drops, so do the number of returning hummingbears - threatening Perchance's lifeline. When the last old screecher in the woods is shot by hunters before her eyes, it may spell the end of the hummingbears and Perchance... unless one shy girl can find her voice in time.

REVIEW: Willodeen is clearly a message about threatened biodiversity and the need for everyone to pay attention to something other than their own self interest, as well as species that may not be deemed "cute" or profitable but which are essential threads in the life web, but it's more than that. It's also the story of a traumatized girl who finds her purpose and her place, and a town that learns to listen. Willodeen struggles with shyness, not neurotypical by implication if not explicit statement, and suffers both with post-traumatic stress and being mocked as the "screecher girl" by children and adults alike. It takes making a friend, and having something to say that needs to be heard, to coax her out of her shell and out of the woods where she prefers to spend her time. There aren't any real villains here, just people who aren't listening and don't see the bigger picture beyond their own concerns, nor are there easy answers; Willodeen's search for the connection between the screechers and the hummingbears is not straightforward, and even knowing something of what's gone wrong in the ecosystem only raises more questions. Applegate is not an author who offers clean and easy answers in her writing, and doesn't start here, but she does offer solid characters and a decent arc, tackling issues in a way that doesn't talk down to the reader. There's a bit of a worldbuilding disconnect, where this fantasy world (which has just a touch of magic in it, as well as impending industrialization with steam engine railways and gas lighting in the bigger cities) also has Shakespeare, but the target audience likely won't scrutinize that closely. The story as a whole is enjoyable, offering hope that is sadly lacking in our own world.

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