No one believes in magic, right? What is Ibby to think, then, when her cousin Francis shrinks to the size of a mouse and Cousin Alex levitates out the window and out of sight? There is more to solve than how to return Francis to normal size and get Alex safely home again, because with five more tricks in the beginner’s magic kit and her daring cousins determined to do them all, Ibby is going in all directions at once to help, until a bigger mystery arises. Where is her Uncle Godfrey, a professional magician who has been missing for years, a mystery that will require all their focus to solve? Readers will be carried away by the scrim of danger in Dyer’s fast-paced text and will relate to the likable characters who are as real as their own crazy acquaintances. The line drawings are perfectly pitched to characterization and events, capturing the characters mid-action and the absolute hilarity that is involved. Just right for a fun family read-aloud with fast adventure and a familiar familial world, this ebullient adventure will have readers laughing out loud while working out the mystery for themselves. (Fiction. 7-9)
