Book Review: Kiki's Delivery Service by Eiko Kadono

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A quick review for a quick read. I'm a bit of a fan of the animated films of Hayao Miyazaki and his famous Studio Ghibli. It was a bit over 20 years ago that I first saw "Kiki's Delivery Service". I loved it, like all of Miyazaki's output it's an excellent film. But I only learned very recently that the film is based on a children's book. That made me curious, so I ordered an English translation from Amazon. I wanted to see how much the film differed from the book. First published in 1985, this is apparently the first of a series of half a dozen books, but the others haven't been translated into English yet, so don't expect me to review those anytime soon! If you've seen the film, the early part of the book will be pretty familiar to you, but it does diverge after that. Kiki is a 12 year old witch. Her mother's a witch and she comes from a long line of witches. In the world of "Kiki's Delivery Service" witches are a separate line from humans, although they can and do interbreed. Kiki's mother is a witch and her father is a human. It's a tradition of he people that when a witch turns is 12, she must leave home on a night of a full moon and find a town to live where there aren't any other witches. Once settled, she must learn to fend for herself and isn't allowed to visit her parents for a year. It's a coming of age ritual. Kiki takes off on her broomstick accompanied only by her black cat Jiji (with whom she can talk) and finds a town on the coast called Koriko. It's a bigger town than the one Kiki grew up in, but she's excited to be in a new place that's by the sea (which she's never seen before). The locals aren't enthusiastic about Kiki's arrival though - they've never met a witch before and they've grown up with stories of witches causing trouble, putting curses on people etc. Kiki does make one friend though - Osono, the heavily pregnant proprietor of a local bakery. Osono invites Kiki to live in a vacant room in her bakery, and Kiki considers how she's going to make a living. The problem Kiki has is that she isn't a powerful witch - she can't cast spells or mix potions, all she can do is fly. So she has the idea of setting up as an airborne courier, delivering messages and small packages for people, and Osono allows her to use the bakery as her office. Kiki's Delivery Service gets off to a slow start, struggling to attract any customers at all due to the aformentioned prejudice against witches. But Kiki does start to get the odd customer here and there, and as word spreads that she provides an honest and reliable service, her business starts to become more steady, until after a year she has become a popular character in the town. Along the way she makes a couple of friends of her own age, and meets a variety of eccentric characters, for whom she performs some odd services, ranging from delivering a fountain pen to retreiving a band's instruments from a moving train. Unlike the movie, which has a more unified narrative, this book is more episodic, with each chapter being almost a self-contained story. One thing they didn't change for the film is Kiki's basic character being basically a normal teenage girl who happens to be able to fly and talk to her cat. She has a cheerful nature and a strong work ethic, uses her brains to solve problems, sometimes experiences moments of self-doubt, and struggle to learn to be self-sufficient. This is obviously a children's book, but I should think the average 12 or 13 year old would find Kiki very relatable. I'm a middle-aged geezer and found her likeable. On the whole, I enjoyed this book. The language and characterisation is simpler than I'm used to from the more adult books that I normally read, but I believe that the best children's books can also be enjoyed by adults. It's definitely one to read if you enjoy the movie and want to experience more of Kiki's adventures. 7/10