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A review by beccabeccalee
Horten's Miraculous Mechanisms: Magic, Mystery, a Very Strange Adventure by Lissa Evans
5.0
I picked up this book because I liked the cover (guilty as charged). It looked like a spooky read with an old-timey twist. While it wasn't scary, it was just the sort of thing to satisfy my odd-ball taste in reading: quirky long-lost relatives, a crumbling estate, birdwatchers, an old museum, and, of course, miraculous mechanisms. It was just my kind of book and I'm excited to watch the Horten saga unfold.
Horten's Miraculous Mechanisms follows Stuart Horten (or S. Horten, as embarrassing as that is) as he combs his new town for clues. Years ago, Stuart's magician uncle Teeny Tiny Tony Horten went missing, along with his secret workshop, rumored to be full of miraculous (and perhaps magic) mechanisms. Stuart, being the "right sort of boy," is eager to solve the mystery of his uncle's disappearance, though he's not the only one poking his nose into Tony Horten's affairs. There's also a bumbling would-be magician with a knack for attracting birds, a set of reporting triplets (some with glasses, some without), a blind woman and her dog, and a conniving assistant eager to get her hands on the secret Horten workshop. There are also Stuart's parents: a busy working mother and a crossword-writer father with an impressive (and sometimes bewildering) vocabulary.
This book had a delightful combination of quirky mystery and chuckle-worthy humor, with a bit of dark suspense to boot. I'm eager to see what happens to Stuart and his miraculous workshop. On to the next!
Horten's Miraculous Mechanisms follows Stuart Horten (or S. Horten, as embarrassing as that is) as he combs his new town for clues. Years ago, Stuart's magician uncle Teeny Tiny Tony Horten went missing, along with his secret workshop, rumored to be full of miraculous (and perhaps magic) mechanisms. Stuart, being the "right sort of boy," is eager to solve the mystery of his uncle's disappearance, though he's not the only one poking his nose into Tony Horten's affairs. There's also a bumbling would-be magician with a knack for attracting birds, a set of reporting triplets (some with glasses, some without), a blind woman and her dog, and a conniving assistant eager to get her hands on the secret Horten workshop. There are also Stuart's parents: a busy working mother and a crossword-writer father with an impressive (and sometimes bewildering) vocabulary.
This book had a delightful combination of quirky mystery and chuckle-worthy humor, with a bit of dark suspense to boot. I'm eager to see what happens to Stuart and his miraculous workshop. On to the next!