Everyone thought Ned was the wrong boy. Everyone thought Ned should’ve died, not his brother Tam. Everyone thought that Ned’s father should’ve saved Tam, the superior of the two twin brothers. That’s what Ned grew up thinking. In The Witch’s Boy by Kelly Barnhill, the people around our protagonist Ned run away from their problems without a second thought about the consequences.

     After becoming sick or hurt after using her magic, Ned’s mother, Sister Witch, leaves the magic she is meant to protect behind when the queen requests her help. When the Bandit King breaks into Ned’s house, Ned is forced to bring the magic to him. But when the pot breaks, the magic consumes him, giving the bandits no choice but to kidnap him and hold him prisoner. If Sister Witch had taken the magic with her, Ned never would have been kidnapped and put in danger several times.

     Overwhelmed with the grief of losing his son without being able to say his goodbyes, Ned’s father retreated to a state of decline and didn’t acknowledge Ned unless it was absolutely necessary, leaving Ned without a loving father. Without a father figure to reassure him, Ned was even more vulnerable to the villagers calling him the ‘wrong boy.’ Since we know that Ned did eventually find his voice, maybe if he had a father to reassure him, he would’ve found it sooner.

     Everyone in Ned’s village called Ned the “Wrong Boy,” because he allegedly wasn’t as smart as his brother, something that could easily be solved if the town decided to help him get a proper education. We also know that Ned wasn’t actually dumb, he was just unable to talk because of his brother’s soul. For example, in one of the passages towards the lead of the book, a shop owner was saying that Ned was illiterate, because Ned wasn’t responding to him asking what the sign in front of his shop read, but we know that the only reason he didn’t respond is because of Tam’s soul preventing him from responding. The only reason they didn’t give him a chance was because they didn’t want to have to admit they were wrong for tormenting him, so rather than face that problem they just continued to torment our poor protagonist Ned.

     I believe that there are no characters in The Witch’s Boy that are without flaws. Everyone around Ned, even his own parents, have hurt Ned in one way or another, even if they didn’t mean to. To conclude this essay, I would like to say that I think many characters in this book have characteristics of antagonists, even the most minor characters.