ABBY CARNELIA’S ONE & ONLY MAGICAL POWER

Hard-boiled eggs that spin when 11-year-old Abby tugs on her “magical” earlobes? Such is her inexplicable and useless “power.” She jumps at the chance to enroll in a summer magic camp, hoping that someone will explain how she does it. There she meets other kids who possess strange, pointless talents. Eventually these abilities earn Abby and other “special” campers a place in a mysterious “super camp” that turns out to be a covert, tightly secured facility where kids are held against their will—and worse. All in all, the novel is breezy fun; the author keeps things moving at a sprightly pace, and Abby is bright and fully sympathetic. The secret of the “super camp” and the reason why the “special kids” are held captive, however, is, like Abby’s power, a little lame. Abby exploits her own and her fellow hostages’ unique skills to effect an artful escape, though, paving the way for a happy ending and implying Abby’s future success. Despite its flaws, this debut makes the nice point that all kids are special, magical power or no. (Magical adventure. 9-12)