The Changeling: A Novel

Content Warning: The source material for this study guide includes depictions of domestic violence, child abuse, and the death of a child. It also describes instances of parents attempting to kill their children and references death by suicide and racist attitudes.

Apollo Kagwa is the protagonist of The Changeling. Born to Brian West and Lillian Kagwa, he is raised by his mother after his father attempts to take his life when he is a young child. Lillian saves Apollo, and though the novel doesn’t explicitly state this, it implies that she kills her husband. She later suppresses the details of the incident, hoping that Apollo will forget it. However, Apollo’s memories of this event take the form of a recurring nightmare in which his father returns to him as a faceless man who promises to take Apollo away with him.

As a boy, Apollo remembers his father fondly even though he feels hurt that his father abandoned him. Apollo sees reading as a remnant of the bond between them since he, like his father, likes to read. Apollo holds on to the book Outside Over There by Maurice Sendak as a reminder of his father, understanding that Brian West would read it to him every night. This attachment to literature becomes the bedrock for Apollo’s love of books. After reading a memoir about book collecting and literary archaeology, he is inspired to become a used book dealer, going straight into his career after high school. Though his love for books connects him to his father, it also inspires him to find others who share that love. This leads him to fall in love with Emma Valentine, who is a librarian.

Apollo is a persistent romantic; he patiently waits for Emma to accept his invitation to go out on a date and then waits for her to return from Brazil. When Emma tells him that she met a witch during her travels and made three wishes, Apollo makes a daring promise to fulfill all those wishes without even knowing what they are. When they decide to start a family, Apollo commits himself to Emma’s desire to give birth at home, assisted by her sister Kim as a midwife. Apollo is forced, however, to use his knowledge of home birth classes to assist Emma when she ends up giving birth on a stalled subway train. He names the child Brian after his father, which signals his intent to correct his relationship, replacing his father’s abandonment with his love for his son.

Apollo is so determined to be a better father than his own that it turns him into a “New Dad,” which refers to a trend of attentive fathers who take on a more proactive role in their children’s lives. He regularly posts photos of his son on social media so Emma can see baby Brian when she is at work, but the photos also garner attention from the other people in his life. His desire to be a good father ends up causing him to become distant from Emma—he shuns her when she starts to describe the strange things happening to her and Brian, blaming the problems on her distance and lack of attentiveness. Apollo feels shocked and betrayed by her when she appears to have killed Brian, and he solely blames her for the events that led up to Brian’s death.

Apollo initially seeks revenge against Emma, and he even wants to kill her. Since she is absconding after the incident in which she seems to have murdered Brian, Apollo teams up with William Wheeler to find her on North Brother Island. However, Apollo’s encounter with Cal and the Wise Ones helps him to realize that Emma is not at fault and that he may have been deceived into thinking that his son is dead. He goes on to learn that Brian was replaced at some point by a changeling, echoing the plot of Outside Over There. He also learns that William Wheeler, who calls himself Kinder Garten, was responsible for antagonizing Emma in the first place, validating her claims of the strange things that had happened to her. Apollo then seeks Emma out in Forest Hills to reconcile with her. Together, they overcome Kinder Garten, his father Jorgen Knudsen, and the troll that Jorgen’s ancestor had brought to the US. When Apollo defeats the troll, he is also symbolically freed from his trauma following his father’s abandonment. This allows Apollo to save his son and restore his family.