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When Ibby is sent to stay with her aunt, she discovers her two troublesome boy cousins, Francis and Alex, playing with an old box of magic tricks they found in the attic.

Ibby is sure that magic isn’t real – until she sees Francis sitting at the bottom of the biscuit tin, magically miniaturized by Alex. After that, nothing is what it seems.

A joyful, quirky tale about real magic – and the magic of family life and friendships.

Nominated for the Galaxy Best British Children's Book Award, 2008

Waterstones Book of the Month, June 2007

Reviews:

"Crisp language, fully formed characters, and a swifly moving plot make the book fly. The children's relationships with one another ring true, particularly between the brothers." BOOKLIST

Ibby went back upstairs. Francis’s bedroom door was firmly closed and there was a lot of banging and crashing coming from within. “Francis?” said Ibby. She knocked twice and went in.

'Shut the door!' barked Alex. 'Don’t let it get away!'

'Let what get away?' said Ibby, startled.

'I don’t know.' Alex was on his knees, peering under the bed. 'Some sort of mouse, I think. With stripes.'

'Stripes?'

Then out from under the bed darted a small figure – no larger than one of the people from Ibby’s dolls’ house. It ran across the carpet directly in front of Ibby’s feet, and disappeared under the armchair – but not before Ibby had recognized Francis’s scruffy brown head and stripy sweater. She stepped backwards with a cry of astonishment. Francis?

'Push!' yelled Alex, throwing his weight against the chair.

'Don’t!' shrieked Ibby. 'You’ll squash him!'

But to her relief, where the chair had stood there was only a dusty square of carpet on which lay a green plastic soldier and a broken pen.

'Where’d it go?' said Alex, looking round.

'There!' said Ibby, pointing – and before Francis could disappear under a landslide of board games and jigsaw boxes, she pounced. When she stood up she was trembling, with her hands cupped close to her chest.

'Let’s see!' said Alex.

Slowly, Ibby opened her hands – and there was Francis, curled up in a ball.

There was a shocked pause. Then Alex said, 'What is it?'

'It’s Francis,' said Ibby.

'Francis? What’s happened to him?'

'He’s shrunk.'

'I can see that. But how?'

At the sound of their voices, Francis uncurled and started trying to scramble out of Ibby’s hands. 'Pass the tin!' said Ibby. 'Quick!'

So Alex brought the biscuit tin and, carefully, Ibby released Francis into it. Immediately he went rushing round and round inside the tin, trying to scramble up the reflective silver walls in a hopeless sort of way.

'What’s he doing?' said Ibby anxiously. 'Why’s he running round and round like that?'

'Small animals do everything quickly,' said Alex. 'They’ve got a higher metabolic rate. That’s why they’re always hungry. If shrews don’t eat their own weight in worms every hour they can starve to death.'

'They starve to death in an hour?' said Ibby, shocked.

'Or quicker, even.'

'Let’s put the lid on. Perhaps he’ll go to sleep.'

'We can’t do that! He’ll suffocate!'

Alex ran downstairs and came back with a chocolate biscuit, a saucer of water, and a few lengths of toilet paper. He arranged everything in the tin, whereupon Francis promptly knocked over the water, ignored the biscuit, and began bundling up lengths of paper.

'He’s making a nest,' said Ibby. 'Look!'

But Alex was looking at something else.

His gaze had fallen on a long black box, lying on the floor. On the front of the box it said: Magic for Beginners, and there was a picture of a white rabbit jumping out of a black top hat. Beneath the picture it said:

Astonish your friends and charm your girlfriend with these incredible magic tricks! This beautifully presented set includes a top hat, cloak and all the props you need to perform your very own magic show.

'I knew it,' said Alex.

'Knew what?'

'He’s been doing magic!'

'Magic sets don’t do real magic,' objected Ibby. 'They’re all about sleight-of-hand and false bottoms, and things …' she trailed off, uncertainly. She had just remembered the black top hat rolling gently on Francis’s bedroom carpet.