A Book That Makes Me Happy // 30-Day Book Challenge - Day 5

Today is the fifth day of the 30-day book challenge, in which I will be writing about a different book or book series every day for 30 days, with each book chosen according to the daily prompt. Today's prompt is: "a book that makes you happy".

Here's a little story about me. When I was a teenager, I recommended a book called A Tale for the Time Being to my best friend. Although she liked the book, she was concerned about some of the apparently depressing subject matter in it (bullying, suicide, kamikaze pilots, all sorts of things). She must have mentioned this to her mother, because the next thing I knew, her mum was staging a minor intervention with the sole purpose of telling me that I needed to start reading happier books.

Clearly, I don't have a reputation for reading terribly cheerful works of literature. I often struggle to recommend books to my mum, who prefers to avoid books with very heavy subjects or dark themes, because her rather simple request basically rules out all of the books I've ever read or owned. In my defence, I feel that we all look for different things in the media we consume. I wouldn't say that I specifically seek out books that are particularly grim, but I do like media that tackles difficult subjects and makes me think about things differently.

That is, I enjoy those books most of the time. We all have periods when we're not necessarily in the mood to read a 1000-page novel that examines the heart of human existential dread. Sometimes, we just want to read something happy or fun - which, by the way, is no less respectable than reading the so-called "heavy" stuff.

In that sort of situation, I have a few "comfort books" I like to return to. One of them is I Capture the Castle, which I mentioned in a previous post. But the book that stands out to me most as a book that makes me happy, as per the prompt of this post, is Diana Wynne Jones' Howl's Moving Castle.

No doubt some of you reading this are chiefly familiar with Howl's Moving Castle through the Studio Ghibli adaptation of it. If that is the case, I have three things to say: I haven't seen the film, I'm sure it's very good, and I have no wish to discuss it further. Now let's move on.

I've been doing this challenge for a few days now, and I'm starting to realise that maybe I don't have the time to write a summary for every single book I mention in addition to my thoughts on said book. So, here's a plot overview of Howl's Moving Castle, courtesy of Goodreads:

In the land of Ingary, where seven-league boots and cloaks of invisibility really exist, Sophie Hatter attracts the unwelcome attention of the Witch of the Waste, who puts a curse on her. Determined to make the best of things, Sophie travels to the one place where she might get help - the moving castle which hovers on the nearby hills.

But the castle belongs to the dreaded Wizard Howl whose appetite, they say, is satisfied only by the hearts of young girls..

I appreciate how un-spoilery this summary is, so I'm not going to ruin it by giving any more plot details. Instead, what I will do is run through the many reasons why I love this book and particularly why it makes me so purely happy. How do I love Howl's Moving Castle? Let me count the ways...

First of all, it's a fantasy book. I don't often read fantasy novels, but when I do I always end up enjoying the escapism they provide. Howl's Moving Castle is especially enjoyable to me because it explicitly recognises and plays with fairy tale tropes. For example, the trope that the eldest child of three will never be successful. The protagonist, Sophie Hatter, is just one such eldest child. Being aware of the assumed fate of people of her birth order, she has more or less resigned herself to not amounting to anything much in life, besides running her family's hat shop. Little does she know, her life might not turn out quite the way she expects. This brings me to another thing I love about this book... Sophie herself.

Sophie is one of my favourite book protagonists ever. Although I think the book is actually aimed at children younger than her, I read the book when I was around the same age as Sophie: about 18 years old. As I mentioned in my post about Gathering Blue, I have a soft spot for kind, quietly strong heros. Sophie definitely fits this description, even though she starts the book rather reserved and lacking in self-esteem. What's more, one of the things I love most about the book is watching as Sophie becomes increasingly confident, caring less and less what people think of her and truly coming into herself as she does so. 

The rest of the characters are another part of the book which brings me great joy. We have Howl, the charming but rather dramatic wizard; Calcifer, the snarky fireplace demon; Michael, the endearingly helpless servant boy... it's hard not to love them all (and there's no reason why you shouldn't). 

I haven't covered everything I love about the book here, as that would take me much longer than one post. What it is about Howl's Moving Castle that makes me happy is more than just a list of qualities, anyway. It's the overall magic of the book, the joy and comfort it brings me when I return to it no matter how long it's been since my last re-read. Howl's Moving Castle charms me, excites me, and makes me feel hopeful. Put simply, it makes me happy.