Half Magic (Paperback)

~ Edward Eager (Author), N. M. Bodecker (Illustrator) (Illustrator) "It began one day in summer about thirty years ago, and it happened to four children..." (more)
Key Phrases: small gentleman, iron dog, gray lady, Sir Launcelot, Miss Bick, Aunt Grace (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Edward Eager has been delighting young readers for more than 40 years with stories that mix magic and reality. Half Magic, the most popular of his tales about four children who encounter magical coins, time-travel herb gardens, and other unlikely devices, is a warm, funny, original adventure. The title refers to a coin that the children find. Through a comical series of coincidences, they discover that the coin is magic. Well, it's not totally magic--it's only (you guessed it) half magic. That means there's a certain logic to the wishes one must make to generate a desired outcome. Imagine the results emerging from inaccurate efforts: half invisible, half rescued, half everything! Half Magic is never too cute, and with just enough emotion to complement the magic, this classic is sure to hold a special place in any child's library. If you love Half Magic, its sequels--Knight's Castle, The Time Garden, and Magic by the Lake--have also been reissued in lovely hardcover editions, complete with N.M. Bodecker's original illustrations and covers by Quentin Blake. (Ages 8 to 12) --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

“Half Magic is a funny, charming, timeless book, as much a pleasure to read to a child now as it was forty years ago. Those who had it read to them then may even have an obligation to pass on the pleasure.”—The New York Times Book Review

Half Magic is a funny, charming, timeless book, as much a pleasure to read to a child now as it was forty years ago. Those who had it read to them then may even have an obligation to pass on the pleasure. (The New York Times Book Review )

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Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 9-12
  
• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Sandpiper; 1st Harcourt Brace Young Classics Ed edition (March 31, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0152020683
• ISBN-13: 978-0152020682
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.1 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (136 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #47,912 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

35 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Still magic after all these years, August 23, 2000

By	Ivy (Los Angeles, CA) - See all my reviews

I first read Half Magic when I was seven, courtesy of the El Segundo Public Library, and twenty years later, I still love it. My abiding love of children's literature probably began right here, in a book that has everything - plot, humor, intelligence, and fabulous characters.

Half Magic obeys the rules of great magic books that are carefully delineated by the main characters in the first chapter. (See what I mean about intelligence and wit?) The magic has its own rules, which they must discover. They thwart the magic. Then the magic thwarts them. If it's a formula, it's one Edward Eager developed, and it works - you don't want to stop reading, from King Arthur's court to a highly magical ending. (And I have no intention of telling you where that is.)

Even though the plot is exceptional, it's the characters that truly make the book. The four children are clearly *people* - it's easy to imagine meeting them on the street or in a park - and not merely characters on a page. And even though the book is set in the 1930s, and was written in the 1950s, the kids still resonate. We all know, or were, Martha - "Martha was the youngest, and very difficult." Likewise with Jane and Katherine. "Katherine *would* keep boasting about what a comfort she was, and how docile, until Jane declared she would utter a piercing shriek and fall over dead if she heard another word about it."

This first book in Eager's loosely-intertwined series is a masterpiece of children's literature. Children and adults alike will love Half Magic. Start here - and remember, to read one is to want them all.

(NB: the quotes used here came from my memory - I checked them before I submitted the review, of course - and normally my memory is not the best. That should tell you something about the strength of this book, or at least the impression it made on me.)

22 of 23 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A truly magic book, May 26, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Half Magic (Hardcover)

Like all the other reviewers, I too read this book when I was 9 or 10 and then worked my way through the other 6 titles. I loved them all so very much that I read them again and again. Before I had reached my teens, they were like old and very dear friends. However, here in the UK, they've been out of print for quite some time and it looked as if my hope of owning my own set was never to be. As a librarian, I've frequently come across very old and battered copies of Half Magic in several Children's Libraries but about 10 years ago, I had the best piece of luck. I was working in a (nameless) library in Central London and came across a complete set in a store room as part of an out-of-print collection. I avidly fell upon them all and renewed old aquaintances with the children I'd thought of as my friends. When that collection was broken up for sale/pulping, I was given the 7 Edward Eager books for my own. Since then, I've read them to my own children. They are more than stories, they are part of me. Edward Eager had a huge gift; in a few words, he could paint a detailed picture with warmth, humour and clarity. His children are real and believable. The situations are zany and so funny and the magic that underpins everything is the same magic that lives in the readers' hearts and minds for ever. What a nice man he must have been. I wish I'd known him.

11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Better By Half, October 18, 2002

By	Gord Wilson "alivingdog.com" (Bellingham, WA USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)

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So this is what Dr. Eager did in his spare time. If Half Magic is indicative of his bedside manner, he must have been a very good doctor indeed. For this is one of those sleepy time read-in-bed books like the Chronicles of Narnia, that gently draw you into their fantastic world at that drowsy time when good things seem so much more possible and you're about to drift off into the Land of Nod.

Half Magic is written in that wonderful, light, easy 'fifties style that gets so easily overlooked in favor of more extreme excitements. Later discovered, though, one simply wonders how writing could have ever been this good. A wonderfully understated example is shown in the genial attitude of the good samaritan stranger who helps out the young adventurers. He's first respectful of their mother,then falls more and more in love as the book goes on. This undercurrent is so subdued and tasteful that it's barely noticeable amid the magical misadventures until the conclusion of the book.

The Leave it to Beaver approach to problem solving is also delighfully refreshing--the spells only half work; unlike the obvious fantasy formulae in countless later books and movies, the magic leaves plenty of room for human ingenuity and skill,as well as the need to make decisions. Eager's other great fantasy, Knight's Castle, also continues in this vein, the hyjinks and hilarity deriving from,and always affirming,the human.