From School Library Journal
Grade 4–6—While preparing a salad one afternoon, sixth-grader Abby Carnelia makes the astonishing discovery that when she tugs on her earlobes, she can make a hardboiled egg spin. The library and Internet research give her no insight into this seemingly useless power. Then her dad suggests that she attend a summer magic camp. Abby hopes that it might help her find out why she is able to cause this strange phenomenon. Pogue's first novel for children has an original enough concept to keep readers entertained. Short chapters and plenty of dialogue move the story along, and Abby is a protagonist many readers can relate to as she tries to discover if there is something more sinister going on at Camp Cadabra. Marred only by a slightly schmaltzy ending, this book will please fans of Bruce Coville's "Magic Shop" series (Harcourt) or other readers looking for a little magic.—
Amanda Raklovits, Champaign Public Library, IL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
New York Times columnist Pogue's debut novel is a youth fantasy about magic and, eventually, a shifty pharmaceutical company. Abby Carnelia discovers that she is endowed with magic when she makes a hard-boiled egg spin after tugging on her ears. Her power is specific, inexplicable, and thoroughly useless, and her attempt to find an explanation leads her to Camp Cadabra, where she meets other children just like her. The story progresses at a leisurely pace, kept buoyant by the snappy dialogue between kids, until the last third of the book, when Camp Cadabra's hidden agenda is revealed. Abby's emergence as a leader among her peers is not entirely convincing, and the intrusive narrator, who we later discover is Pogue himself, is at times jolting. Still, the premise that every child is magical is clearly expressed without ever being heavy-handed. Abby's triumphant finale will have young readers contemplating how they, too, are special. Grades 3-6. --Kara Dean
