THE MAGICIAN

A young woman achieves her dream of becoming a magician with the help of her rabbit in this children’s book.

Holly Foster, a brown-skinned, freckled, curly-haired woman, loves performing magic with her white rabbit, Buddy. “I wish we could do this every day,” she tells her companion after a children’s show. In a flashback to Holly’s childhood, readers see that she has loved magic from a young age, admiring her Uncle Bob, a magician. When told girls “can only be a magician’s assistant” by a boy in her class, Holly ignores his comment, pulling a coin from behind his ear. Uncle Bob gives her Buddy and, when he retires after an “Indian Rope Trick” gone awry, leaves her his magician’s trunk. Buddy wants to help Holly become a full-time, professional magician. He reads Uncle Bob’s books and plans a way for her to perform an exceptional trick at the “Night of the New Magicians” event. Holly creates a perfect illusion, allowing her to realize her dream. While the story of a supportive anthropomorphic rabbit and a talented magician works well, Maret leaves readers with some key questions. There are no answers as to why Holly struggles to become a full-time magician and why there are so few female practitioners. And her day job, hinted at, is never described. At one point, Buddy leaves their apartment to enlist neighborhood animals for assistance, but the final trick he and Holly execute involves no extra creatures. When Holly performs her fancy illusion, Buddy initially waves the wand, making it seem as though she is functioning as the assistant, a role she rejected as a child. These quibbles aside, the author’s accessible text and calm, repeated refrain about Buddy’s “rabbity way” of helping will appeal to young would-be magicians. Behrend’s oil pastel illustrations, which feature a diverse array of magicians and audience members, match the book’s tone. They capture the whimsical, beautiful finale in a way that feels like magic. Behrend also sneaks in images of the covers of her title The Survivor Tree (2017) and Maret’s The Cloud Artist (2017) in a classroom where Holly performs a trick.

An engaging celebration of ambition and the imagination with magical illustrations.