Castle in the Air

Castle in the Air (1990) is a children’s fantasy novel by Diana Wynne Jones. It is the second in the Howl’s Moving Castle trilogy and is followed by House of Many Ways. All three have standalone plots concentrating on different protagonists. Castle in the Air follows Abdullah, a carpet salesman who daydreams of adventures and marrying a princess. When he buys a magic carpet, his dreams start to come true, and he meets the beautiful princess Flower-in-the-Night. She is kidnapped by a powerful djinn, launching Abdullah on an adventure to rescue her. He is accompanied by strange companions: the carpet, a genie, two cats, and a dishonest soldier. The book explores fate, free will, and personal growth, engaging with the tropes and structures of a traditional fairytale. Diana Wynne Jones (1934-2011) was a prolific, award-winning writer, particularly known for her children’s and young adult fantasy and speculative fiction.

This guide uses the 2000 Collins paperback edition.

Plot Summary

Abdullah runs a small carpet stall in Zanzib. He and his neighbor Jamal, who has a smelly dog, help each other out. He daydreams that he is secretly a prince betrothed to a beautiful princess who has a wonderful garden but that he was kidnapped as a child by bandits and then ran away. 

One day, a merchant sells him a flying carpet. Despite a convincing demonstration earlier, Abdullah can’t get the carpet to fly on command. Nevertheless, every night it responds to his dreams, taking him to a garden resembling the one in his daydreams. There he meets a beautiful princess called Flower-in-the-Night. She warms to Abdullah and decides she would rather marry him than her father’s choice. He sells up his stock, ready to elope, and visits his overbearing relatives to finally learn the prophecy made for him at birth. The prophecy promises he will be raised above everyone else in the land. The relatives try to push him into marrying two sisters from their family so they can benefit too.

Abdullah visits Flower-in-the-Night to elope, but she is suddenly kidnapped by a powerful djinn. Her father, the Sultan, believes Abdullah took her. He threatens to impale him on a pole, which Abdullah realizes would fulfill the prophecy. However, the Sultan also reveals that Flower-in-the-Night was prophesized to marry the first man she saw other than the Sultan, which turns out to be Abdullah.

Abdullah manages to escape into the desert on the carpet: He learns that it obeys when he speaks politely. However, it deposits him among the bandits from Abdullah’s daydreams, led by Kabul Aqba. They have just found a genie in a bottle. Although the genie is angry at being trapped, he is obliged to grant a wish a day to his owner. Kabul Aqba falls asleep on the carpet, which takes him away as he dreams, leaving the genie with Abdullah. The genie can’t take Abdullah to Flower-in-the-Night because the djinn is too powerful. Instead, he takes him to someone whom he divines can help find her, though it’s unclear how: He is an ordinary soldier in a far-off land. The soldier’s country, Strangia, was defeated by Ingary, who got their wizards to help. Ingary wanted their prince Justin to marry the Strangian princess, Beatrice, but she ran away before they found her.

The soldier travels through Ingary pretending to be rich, and robbing those who try to rob him. Abdullah is implicated in this when he tries to help, and they both end up on the run from the constables. They keep seeing a castle in the clouds. Abdullah asks for the soldier’s help and pretends that it was prophesied that the soldier would get to marry a princess as a reward. They head toward Ingary’s capital city to ask the wizards for help, pursued by constables. They meet a cat and her kitten, whom the soldier names Midnight and Whippersnapper. Midnight turns into a huge panther when threatened.

Along the way, the genie tries to cause as much trouble as possible with his wishes. Abdullah gives up for a while, instead making selfless wishes such as wishing Jamal and his dog could be transported away from the Sultan to the nearest safe castle to work in the kitchen. Eventually, the soldier persuades him to wish for the carpet back so they can get to Kingsbury. It arrives carrying Kabul Aqba, who turns out to be the djinn. 

The djinn explains that he is a Good Djinn named Hasruel. However, his evil brother Dalzel has stolen his “life,” where his mortality is kept. Dalzel is making him steal all the princesses in the world for him to marry. Hasruel is deliberately leaving a trail of dejected lovers in the hopes that one of them will restore his “life” to him while trying to rescue their princess. He inflicts appropriate misadventures on these lovers—he has been making Abdullah’s daydreams come true. He plans to go to Kingsbury next to steal the princess of Ingary, four-year-old Valeria.

Abdullah and the soldier use the carpet to get to Kingsbury. Abdullah visits one of the Royal Wizards to ask for help and warn him about Valeria. Midnight follows him. The Royal Wizard’s sister, Lettie, immediately recognizes that Midnight is her sister Sophie, turned into a cat. They manage to turn her back. Sophie is a witch, and also the wife of the other Royal Wizard, Howl. She explains that the djinn stole their magical moving castle. Howl turned her into a cat to keep her safe, and she gave birth in cat form later. However, Howl and his fire demon, Calcifer, have not been seen since.

Hasruel successfully kidnaps Valeria. The soldier absconds with both the genie and Whippersnapper, now a human baby. Abdullah and Sophie instruct the carpet to follow. It takes them up to the castle in the clouds, which Sophie identifies as Howl’s castle, magically enlarged. There they find all the kidnapped princesses and also the soldier, the genie, Sophie’s baby, and Jamal and his dog, sent by Abdullah’s earlier wish. 

Led by Flower-in-the-Night, and with the help of Sophie’s magic, everyone hatches a plan. The soldier agrees to help on the condition that he marry a princess. He picks Beatrice, who prefers this to the idea of marrying Justin, whom she has never met. They discover that Hasruel’s life is hidden in his own nose ring, and they stage a kerfuffle as they try to get hold of it. Jamal’s dog ends up eating it accidentally.

Hasruel must now obey them instead of Dalzel, who is weak on his own. He agrees to banish Dalzel to a luxurious island. They also send the two brides Abdullah’s family lined up for him, rescuing them from the Sultan’s dungeon: Dalzel and the sisters both just want to be married, so everyone is happy.

The genie and the carpet are transformed back into Howl and Calcifer respectively. Hasruel says he aimed to teach them a lesson for using magic unfairly in the war. Hasruel then reveals that he enjoyed being evil too much: He won’t be allowed to return to the ranks of the Good Djinn, so he leaves to travel to other worlds. The soldier turns into Prince Justin. He remembers that Hasruel turned him into a defeated soldier to teach him a lesson, and resolves to help the defeated people. He and Beatrice decide they do actually like each other. They have a double-wedding with Flower-in-the-Night and Abdullah.

The king of Ingary gives them important roles. Abdullah creates the beautiful garden he dreamed of for Flower-in-the-Night, and they live happily ever after.