Magic Shop

"To quicken the egg, take it outside at midnight on the night of the next full moon. Lift it to the moonlight and wisper: Full moon's light to wake the egg Full moon's light to hatch it; Midsummer Night will crack the world, But St. John's day will patch it." When Jeremy Thatcher follows the...

As if she didn't have trouble enough after her classmates discovered she had worn her brother's underwear to school (oh, the teasing, the humiliation!), Jennifer Murdley has just stumbled into Mr. Elives' Magic Shop, where she buys a toad named Bufo. Of course the odds of buying a normal toad in that shop are zero, as Jennifer finds out when Bufo starts to talk to her. As it turns out, talking is the least of the toad's strange talents.

When timid Russell Crannaker stumbles into Mr. Elives' strange store, he buys a mysterious ring that lets him turn himself into a monster. But Russell soon learns that when you mess around with magic you must always follow the directions! This is the frightfully funny, deliciously scary story that launched the wildly popular Magic Shop series.

When Charlie Eggleston stumbles out of Mr. Elives' Magic Shop clutching the skull of truth, he has no idea the grisly object will force him to tell the truth and nothing but the truth. That would be trouble enough for a kid who has been a chronic liar since second grade. Stir in a pair of talking rats, the fact that the skull itself is a real chatterbox, and the appalling discovery that the truth curse is infecting his entire family, and you can see why Charlie's life is getting more complicated by the minute.

It's not easy being shy, especially when you suddenly find yourself at the center of a widening circle of lovesick boys. But this is exactly the predicament Juliet Dove ends up in after she receives a strange amulet in Mr. Elive's magic shop.