A delightful story that is both refreshing, funny and exciting. When two boys get up to some mischief with some magic, one of them is magically miniaturised and ends up, yes, in a biscuit tin!!! Coupled with some quite zany and witty illustrations no reader can fail to be hooked.
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.
I first began writing when I was seven. Then, I was trying to copy Enid Blyton. I loved the feeling of being in another world when I was reading her books, and when I’d read them all I started to write my own story in the same world, so that I could carry on being there. I copied her style, as well. I think I still write to try and make a world that other people can get inside.
How would you describe your books?
So far, my books have all started out with an ordinary person who soon meets someone quite peculiar. That person might be someone like Eliza Flot, who looks like a girl from the waist up, but has a tail like a fish (The Fish in Room 11). Or Hilary in The Girl with the Broken Wing, who can fly. Or Ernest – an old man who finds something rather extraordinary hiding in a cake. I hope that when people read my books they feel like they’re in another world, quite like this one but just a little bit magical. I hope that they can see everything like a movie in their head. Some bits might make them laugh, as well.
