Harry Houdini for Kids: His Life and Adventures with 21 Magic Tricks and Illusions (For Kids series)
Reluctant readers (as well as budding troublemakers) will flock to this biography/handbook hybrid about one of the most famous magicians who ever lived. Even for those familiar with Houdini’s fascinating story, Carlson’s snappy writing gives it new life. Raised in poverty, the immigrant born Ehrich Weisz began as an $18-a-week circus act but in 20 years would pull in $1,800 a week as the world’s premiere death-defying escape artist. According to Carlson, Houdini—aka Cardo the King of Cards or the King of Handcuffs—took advantage of the public’s distrust of authority figures by mastering everything from straitjackets to underwater manacles, along the way acting as a movie-stunt pioneer, ghost buster, and U.S. spy. Nearly every page is enlivenedwith period photographs, boxed sections containing biographies and definitions, and, most important, 21 magic tricks that will have readers breaking out their deck of cards and practicing their sleight of hand. The text is light on criticism, but most readers won’t care—this is one book that will magically vanish from shelves. Grades 4-8. --Daniel Kraus