Half Magic

Rating:
Summary: Great Book!
Review: This is definitly one of the best books I've ever read. My mother reccomended it to me, and I was entranced by the first page. It's wonderful plot, characters, and old-fashioned Magick lend a hand in finishing it quickly and working on it's sequal.

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Summary: I love this book!
Review: An avid reader as a child, I read this story many times, and over 20 years later, can still remember with amusement and affection the cat that went half of 'Miaow'. It was funny, clever, appealed to a child's imagination and sense of magic, certainly didn't seem to talk down, the way other writers seemed to.
It's an absolute classic which is sadly not as well-known as it deserves to be, and I would recommend it wholeheartedly.

Rating:
Summary: Half Magic
Review: I recommend this book because it's about 4 children who end up with a coin. That does Have a wish unless you say twice as much. It is not funny or scary but it is exciting and adventures. Sorry but it is not non-fiction. Think before you mess with past. It also felt warmhearted because at the end the kids mother get's married....

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Summary: Totaly Cool
Review: Half Magic is a book for everyone who likes humor, action, and magic. It all starts on a hot, sunny day in the most boring summer the 4 siblings, Jane, Mark, Katherine, and Martha had ever had. When the oldest child of the family, Jane, finds a nickel on the ground. She soon finds out that it is a magic charm. She later finds out that its not complete magic, only Half Magic. So, if you wish twice the amount you get complete magic. One day the siblings wish themselves back in time in the days of king Arthur and help Sir Lancelot after being trapped by Morgan La Fay. Then they saw a tournament and then met the sorcerer, Merlin. Merlin tells the siblings that the charm has been worn out and does not have much magic left. They wish themselves back to the twentieth century and the next day, something happened. That day Jane got annoyed with Martha so she put her under her chair at the movies. Jane dropped her handbag with the charm inside and Martha got it. Martha wished to not be there so she was half there and she made a commotion. When the charm lost its power, the siblings put it on the sidewalk and someone picked it up. Who knows what will happen next. Half Magic is truly a great book for any person.

Rating:
Summary: Great for car trips
Review: I have loved this book since I read it many years ago. My son is only four, but I thought he might be interested. rather than replace our bedtime story with this new book I simply bought the audio book and put it on in the car. what is so wonderful about it is that the voices of the characters are done by different actors. My son loved it. If you have a small child who is not quite ready for the whole book, I really suggest buying the audio book, it is unabridged and delightful. I only wish that the other books in the series were produced in this format.

Rating:
Summary: When I Was Six
Review: When I was six years old (almost 50 years ago) and in the first grade, my teacher brought a selection of books into our classroom from the library. As first graders, we weren't allowed to go to the library, so this was a real treat. One of the books had a half black and half yellow cover with, if I remember correctly, mirror images of a coin, half on one side and half on the other. I eventually checked this book out and, in first grade, read it.
I was hooked on reading from then on. And I read Half Magic so many times I may have worn my school's copy out.
Until I began trying to find this book, with its black and yellow cover, for my grandchildren, I was unaware that the author had written other books. What a treat I must have missed.
Now if I could just find a copy of that black and yellow book that instilled in me the joy of reading ...

Rating:
Summary: A Winner across Generations by Twice
Review: One if not the most memorable books from my own childhood; I have recently received similarly rave reviews from an 11 year old boy with many Hobbits and Lords and Wrinkles under his reading belt. The humor, the fascination of the charm and the individual personalities of the 4 children remain compelling today- as I've been told. The story of the charm that grants by half everything that the holder requests, is exciting and suspenseful and perfectly absurd. There are the rather distant and "dense" adults whom the children defend, manipulate and cage and the childhood community that seems always to relate to children with odd rules, limits and absentee guardians.

The language and the illustrations are also in line with Eager's great imagination. I've decided to go for the entire set as my "child" reader is willing and so too am I.

Rating:
Summary: A delightful tale
Review: I just read this book and found it quite enjoyable. Written in the style of E. Nesbit, one of my favorite children's authors, it tells the tale of four children from Ohio finding a magic coin. Their attempts to use the magic lead to many amusing adventures before they find the true value of the coin.

Rating:
Summary: This is the greatest book I have read in my short years!
Review: Half Magic is a great book!I read it when I was in 5th grade, I am now in 7th grade.In 5th grade we had a 30 min. reading period at the end of the day.When I was reading Half Magic and the teachers told us to put our books up I didn't want to because I was so into the book. It was like a movie playing in my mind.With every page I was eager to read more.The book was interesting to me mostly because of the coin.In the beginning the kids were bored and they had found the coin.One of the kids said,"I wish there would be a fire!"Then a little girls playhuse caught on fire.So you have to wish really hard to get your whole wish. Because the coin is half magic. My favorite part of the book is when one of the kids wishes that a dog statue would come to life and the statue starts barking but does not move and that's when they figure out that the coin is half magic.This book is very interesting.If you are interested in magic and fiction books you should definateley read Half Magic.

Rating:
Summary: One of my favorite childhood books
Review: There are some memories from childhood that I can never quite place specifically. Things that linger in memory, but are so faint that they are like a sniff of fresh apple pie from down the street that you can't determine which house it is coming from. I recall reading some "magic" children books--at one time, I thought they were Andre Norton, who had several young adult novels with the word magic in the title, but I was never able to find the exact one. Until I ran across this book in the store, and realized a chapter into it that I was eating apple pie.

I love this book, but it may be because I remember it so fondly. I've been trying to catch up on children's fantasy the last couple of years--reading E. Nesbit, Norton Juster, P.L. Travers, E.L. Konigsburg--and, of them all, Eager is my favorite. In Half Magic, fantasy is rolled with some of the logic of science fiction, in that the wishes that the magic coin gives the children only occurs in halves, and they must figure out how to use it. As children, they are quite believable--maybe not as realistic as Nesbit, but not the Bobsey Twins either.

I should note that Eager was himself a fan of Nesbit's, and his stories do resemble her's in some ways. His affinity for her is clearly laid out here, where the children visit the library and one of their favorite books is The Enchanted Castle.