This is a magical fairy tale…

Coakley, Lena

Wicked Nix

Illustrated by Jaime Zollars. 2018. 176pp. $16.99 hc. Amulet Books (Abrams). 9781419728693. Grades 3-5

Wicked Nix is a fairy who has been left behind by the fairy queen to keep the “peoples” out of the forest. When a man moves into a cottage in the forest, Nix begins to threaten him with fairy pranks unless he agrees to leave. The man is as determined to stay as Nix is for him to vacate the forest, and Nix fears the wrath of the queen if he does not rid the forest of the man by midsummer night’s eve when the queen returns. When Nix’s “wicked” antics do not deter the man, he discovers that Nix is really his “older” brother who was stolen away by fairies when he was a young child. Reunited, they go to the fairy meadow to hear the truth from the fairy queen herself, only to have to make a bargain to rescue Nix’s friend from the same fate. In the end, Nix comes to accept the fact that he is a boy, not a fairy, and agrees to live with his “younger” brother in the cottage in the forest. This is a magical fairy tale that leaves the reader’s heart aching for an abandoned, homeless child in the forest, and culminates with a touching ending where the two brothers reunite at long last. This story would be a great way to teach students about an unreliable narrator.

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