Horten's Incredible Illusions

xxpish - Stuart Horten has just moved to the town of Beeton. Beeton is the town where his great-uncle, “Teeny-Tiny” Tony Horten lived and had his workshop for Horten’s Miraculous Mechanisms. Adjusting to life, Stuart stumbles across a trail of clues left by his great-uncle that leads him to his workshop. In a mysterious tale of Stuart’s adventures searching for clues, Lissa Evans cooks up a promising debut. My thoughts: Horten’s Miraculous Mechanisms was a very wonderful book. I love mysteries, and books that have characters following clues to find something they desire. Stuart is a really small ten year old who is trying to find something that is related to his family. He is very ambitious looking for the workshop; there are adults who are spying on him, he is getting into trouble but he still does his best to follow through. The dad is a crack-up with his stupendous use of really long and confusing words, as are the next-door twins, April, May and June, with their newspaper. I can not wait to read the sequel (which is waiting on the hold shelf for me to pick up at my local library!!!! and I think that Lissa Evans did a great job with her debut.

March 5, 2012
Evans borrows several classic tropes and themes—magic, riddles, a quest, and even a night at a museum—for the entertaining story of 10-year-old Stuart Horten (often nicknamed “Shorten” for his small stature) who stumbles into a family mystery when he and his parents move to the small British town of Beeton. There, ­Stuart discovers that his Great-Uncle Tony Horten, who disappeared years ago without a trace, was both an inventor of mechanical devices and a magician. A chance phone call in a broken phone booth is the first step in a journey that leads Stuart around town, as he unearths his great-uncle’s legacy and secrets. Stuart also draws the attention of April, May, and June (the journalistically inclined triplets next door), as well as Beeton residents with more sinister intentions. Evans has crafted an old-fashioned mystery of the kids-besting-clueless-adults variety. Stuart’s dweeby parents are particularly hapless (his father, a crossword puzzle creator, regularly drops lines like “Behold, I bring hydration for your powwow”). First published in the U.K., Evans’s story leaves the door open for the sequel due in September. Ages 8–12.

Starred review from March 15, 2012
Wacky, funny and ever so mysterious, this clever tale hits the ground running and never lets up. Very short 10-year-old Stuart Horten--S. Horten, get it?--thinks he's facing a long, boring summer when his parents pack the three of them up and move to his father's hometown as school lets out. His parents are a pleasantly oblivious pair: His mom is an unimaginative doctor, and his father designs crosswords for a living. (He joyfully tosses around hundred-dollar words like "prestidigitator" and "perambulation.") Stuart quickly discovers the long-abandoned home of his great uncle Teeny-Tiny Tony Horton, a famous magician who disappeared 50 years before, and the puzzle box left to his incurious father. Resourceful Stuart wants to learn more, but he's plagued by the girl next door, who's intently following him everywhere. Just as a fabulous clue appears in a vandalized phone booth, the prying girl, April, shows up, and it turns out she's identical twins--oh, no! triplets--April, May and June. And they're shortly followed by the villainous, entrepreneurial Jeannie, hot on Stuart's heels. The pace is rapid, the clues to Tony's disappearance are intriguing and the characters are vividly--often hilariously--drawn. Irony runs hand in hand with just enough believable danger to create palpable tension. A vastly engaging, must-read mystery infused with the perfect touch of captivating conjuration--er, magic. (Mystery. 9-14)

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May 1, 2012

Gr 4-6-Ten-year-old Stuart is unhappy about moving to a new town with his academic parents, especially the small British town of Beeton where his father grew up. But when he discovers a challenge in a note from the legendary Tony Horten, his magician great-uncle who disappeared years earlier, to find his hidden workshop of "miraculous mechanisms," the summer becomes an adventure. By finding Tony's hidden clues and following them on a sort of scavenger hunt to the past, Stuart dodges the nosy triplets next door, makes a friend, helps two sisters reunite, outwits a greedy villain, gets out of some dangerous scrapes, and inherits a magical legacy. Fans of mysteries, puzzles, and Trenton Lee Stewart's The Mysterious Benedict Society (Little, Brown, 2007) will be happy to make Stuart's acquaintance, and they will look forward to the promised sequel.-Laurie Slagenwhite Walters, Peachtree Montessori International, Ann Arbor, MI

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