The Marvellers (2022) is the first middle grade fantasy novel by author Dhonielle Clayton, who also wrote the New York Times bestselling series The Belles and cowrote the novel Tiny Pretty Things, which was made into a Netflix series. Prior to becoming an author, Clayton worked as a teacher and school librarian. She is currently the COO of We Need Diverse Books, a nonprofit organization committed to advocating for greater diversity and representation of marginalized characters and communities, and wider opportunity and access to authors of color in the American publishing landscape.

When The Marvellers debuted, it quickly became a New York Times bestseller and made several “best books of the year” lists, including Kirkus, School Library Journal, and Amazon. The novel was quickly followed by a sequel in The Conjureverse Series entitled The Memory Thieves (2023). Intended for readers aged nine and above, The Marvellers centers The Challenges of Integration, The Inherent Injustice of Segregation, and the characters’ experiences Navigating Questions of Identity.

This study guide and all its page citations refer to the Henry Holt and Company 2022 Kindle edition of the novel.

Plot Summary

The Marvellers is set in a contemporary setting between the months of September and May, corresponding to a full school term for students at the Arcanum Training Institute. Clayton’s novel includes scenes set in New Orleans, Mississippi, and Paris, but the bulk of the action takes place in the sky, where both the Arcanum and the orbiting city of Betelmore are situated. The story is told by an omniscient narrator who switches between the perspectives of 11-year-old Ella Durand, Clayton’s protagonist, and her antagonist—the infamous rebel, Gia Trivelino. Clayton supports her narrative by including news articles and email messages between the characters, in addition to traditional prose. The story follows Ella’s experiences as she adjusts to the Arcanum as the first Conjuror student ever admitted.

The novel opens with 11-year-old Ella packing for her first year at the Arcanum Training Institute for Marvelous and Uncanny Endeavors. She will be the first student from a Conjuror family to attend the elite Marveller school. Unlike Marvellers, who live in sky cities and consider their brand of magic superior,  Conjurors live on the earth and practice a more naturalistic magical craft. Ella’s parents are part of the magical community in New Orleans, and they worry about the kind of treatment their daughter will receive at the sky academy. Once Ella arrives at school, she discovers that her classmates don’t want her there at all. They are fearful and suspicious of Conjurors, having already made up their minds that Ella doesn’t belong in their midst.

The administrators who run the institute are sympathetic and supportive of their new student. Ella’s roommate, Brigit, grew up in New York among non-magical folk known as Fewels, not realizing she possessed any magical abilities. Brigit’s sullen and abrasive attitude toward Ella reflects the resentment she feels at being made to attend the school at all. Ella is paired with a first-year student named Jason, who has a large group of older siblings to indoctrinate him into all the rules at the Arcanum—information he shares with Brigit and Ella. The three soon become inseparable, forming a bond with one of their teachers, Masterji Thakur, who becomes Ella’s mentor and goes out of his way to help her adjust. On two separate occasions, Masterji tries to give Ella some confidential information about previous Conjurers at the academy, but a spell chokes off his voice before he can speak.

Over the course of the school year, Ella grows obsessed with discovering what magical gifts (known as the five Paragons of Marvelling) she possesses: touch (signifying bravery), vision (signifying wisdom), spirit (signifying intuition), sound (signifying patience), or taste (signifying honesty). Each Paragon has a subsidiary ability associated with it, which is called a marvel. Jason and Brigit figure out what their Paragons and marvels are, but Ella is left searching. She feels that she must find her Paragon to prove that she belongs at the Arcanum.

The hostility toward Ella remains constant, and Masterji explains that the students are wary because of an earlier group of rebel classmates known as the Aces, who found a way to swap marvels—a practice considered unnatural. The leader of the Aces, a circus illusionist named Gia Trivelino who called herself the Ace of Anarchy, was sent to prison after accidentally killing a man during a circus performance. Gia escapes shortly after Ella’s arrival, and all the Conjurors are blamed because it was their magic that held Gia imprisoned in the Underworld. Now that Gia is on the loose, she plans to extract marvels from all the Marvellers and become unstoppable. To do so, she abducts Masterji to help her mix the necessary potions.

Ella, Jason, and Brigit solve the mystery of their missing professor and manage to foil Gia’s evil plot just in time. They return to school as heroes, but Ella faces one final hurdle after being accused of beating another student. The trio ultimately discovers that one of their teachers, who opposes integrating Conjurors into the student body, fabricated an illusion to frame Ella. By the end of the school year, Ella proves herself to be an asset to the Arcanum, and her classmates finally accept her. Her confidence rises to such a degree that even when she discovers her Paragon, she finds she no longer needs it to feel worthy. She knows she belongs at the Arcanum.