Customer Reviews

I, Houdini

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is one of the most exciting books I have read this year.
Banks centers her story around the conflict between a hamster's desire for freedom and his master's desire to keep him in captivity.
Houdini is a self-educated hamster who loves to be free. But unfortunatly he is owned by a family of three boys, and their father and mother who wish to keep him in a cage. Houdini is constantly escaping,leading to his many adventures like getting trapped under the kitchen floor next to a hot water pipe, flooding the house, chewing everything in sight, and hiding from an angry father who wants to kill him.
Houdini yearns to be outside, but when he finally finds himself there he realizes how much more dangerous it is outside than inside. When he is caught in a fire,gets trapped under a trashcan lid,is used as a play toy for a cat,and sees a mouse devoured by an owl;Houdini decides to make a difficult decision: to live a long life in captivity or to be free and die at any minute.
I like this book because it is interesting to see things
from a hamster's point of view. I also like how Houdini is always having adventures. I really enjoyed the end;I never expected it to end the way it did.

I love this book. As the parent of a child who reads a 5th grade level but that same child is only in 2nd grade, it was perfect. The story had enough silliness in it for a second grader, but it also had some nice life lessons that in a few years if he reads it again, he will notice.

The hamster notes at the end that the best way for people and animals to live together is for both sides to give. He suggests its the best way for people who live together too.

As anyone who has owned a golden hamster will tell, the creatures are built for escape. Golden hamsters are also by nature solitary, so one ends up with a constantly escaping loner....
"I Houdini" makes it all seem like really good adventure, and is pretty sympathetic to the humans, as well. My 10-yr-old daughter (a very good reader) enjoyed it twice, and my 8 yr-old (not such a good reader) loves it enough for me to go on-line for another copy (the one we have is someone else's). The language is slightly Dickensian--great for the kids' improving diction-- and the action well-paced. One for the home library, for sure.

I enjoyed the story. My child enjoyed the story. Having had Golden Hamsters over the years, they are great little characters and the story was a great "point of view". One problem pretty well ruined this book for me, though and therefore I will not recommend it. The father at one point declares "Damn". This is NOT appropriate language for a childs book. Children may well hear this type of language all the time and maybe even in their own homes, but that doesn't mean it's alright. There is nothing I can do about language out in public, but I don't need it in a story meant for children.