The Girl Who Drank the Moon Literary Elements

High Fantasy, coming of age

Unknown year in the magical world of the Protectorate/City of Sorrows and surrounding landscape

An anonymous third-person narrator is omniscient and provides access to the characters’ inner thoughts, usually following Luna, Xan, Antain, and Adara closest.

Whimsical, optimistic, sentimental, reverent

Luna is the main protagonist who tries to understand the truth about magic and heal those who need it; Ignatia is the Sorrow Eater who uses lies to steal and benefit from others' misfortune.

Everyone who lives in the Protectorate is full of Sorrow, and no one fully understands why they follow the rules that cause them so much pain.

Luna, Adara, and Xan work together to magically protect all of the people, the Bog, and everything good in the world from the erupting volcano in the woods.

Head Sister Ignatia's horrible need to consume the Sorrow of those around her is foreshadowed throughout the novel by her odd habit of licking her lips.

When Grand Elder Eherland separates Adara and Luna in the first chapter, he sees the matching crescent moon birthmarks on their forehead and notes that in common lore such people are regarded as special. This foreshadows their importance in the story and their communities but also understates the power that they have.

The Bog is an allusion to the myth of creation. All of the people in the Protectorate believe that everything in universe comes from the Bog, which alludes to their understanding of the connections between the Bog as a natural resource and the spiritual importance of that. However, Glerk's connection to the Bog alludes that Glerk himself is in some way a physical manifestation of creation itself. Not a Christian god with dominion over creation, but something else.

The Tower where the Sisters of the Star live provides an allusion for the modern-day "ivory tower" where knowledge is restricted so that only a few out of the many can learn from it.

As Luna's magic leaks out of her, both at the age of five and again as she approaches thirteen, she transforms the world around her without being aware of it. The images of flowers growing in the steps she leaves behind serves to indicate how unwitting but also positive her spirit is as it unleashes magic on her surroundings. That the flowers turn their heads to look in her direction as she walks away, shows how much she is beloved by all.

The people of the Protectorate believe that the Witch is out in the woods and sacrifice their children to her by the direction of Ignatia and the Council. Xan is a witch who picks the children up every year and blesses them with starlight and brings them to good families in the Free Cities, assuming they were mistakenly abandoned in the woods. However, the real Witch is Ignatia who feeds off of the Sorrow of the citizens of the Protectorate. So they think they are sacrificing the babies to the Witch, but really they're sacrificing their own pain to the Witch when they give up their babies.

By beginning the novel with Ethyne's mother telling her a bedtime story about the evil Witch in the woods and ending the novel with Ethyne telling her son, Luken, a story about the Witch of the Bog who protects them all, the author draws a direct parallel between the conflicting world-views of the novel. This helps to provide a sense of resolution.

Within the Protectorate, the image of Tower serves as metonymy for the controlling forces of the community. Its domineering shadow is only one of the many shadows cast over the town, and its thick wooden doors that seal in the screams of Adara and the knowledge of the library serve to reinforce the reader's understanding about the restrictions in this society.

Similarly, the bog itself provides basic resources for the people and stands in for the concept of the Bog, which is connected to the general sense of creation.

In the second chapter, the volcano "grumbled as it slept."