Millroy the Magician
by Paul Theroux
Category: Fiction

"Brilliant...Wonderful...Millroy's magic pops out at the reader from the first page." --John Updike The New Yorker "PICARESQUE...ENCHANTING...Theroux is a gifted and versatile tale spinner." --Time Fourteen-year-old Jilly Farina was mesmerized by Millroy the Magician at the Barnstable County Fair. After all, he once turned a girl from the audience into a glass of milk and drank her. But when Jilly stepped into the wickerwork coffin during a performance, she had no idea he would transform her dreary life into something truly magical, and a touch bizarre. For Millroy was no ordinary magician. He could smell the future, and Jilly was going to be part of it. Yet not even Millroy could foresee how far determination and a dream could take him, as he and his new young assistant hit the road--and the airwaves--to save America's unhealthy appetite and floundering soul.... "MAGICAL...[A] funny, dark satire of America's obsessions." --The New York Times Book Review "AMAZING...[A] STARTLINGLY ORIGINAL TALE OF PURE MAGIC... that amuses, unnerves, and captivates the reader in a spell of bewilderment, danger and awe....The reader [will] be enthralled." --The Boston Sunday Herald