Series Review: The Magic Treehouse

[image error]My son has been reading The Magic Treehouse series by Mary Pope Osborne for some months, now. He is what is termed a reluctant reader, so we take his reading interest where we can find it, even with comic books or the Jack Stalwart series (see previous review). I’m not super fond of the Magic Treehouse, but my son is determined to read his way through the entire 57 (and counting)-book series, and it has been a favorite with elementary-age kids and new readers for years.

My main issues with the series are the stripped-down nature of the writing and the complete lack of plot. Maybe I should say complete lack of plot sophistication. Even for a new reader, I think that a story with some twists and turns is needed. Even fairy tales involve some complexity. These stories? Let’s just say that Osborne reuses whole phrases and paragraphs at the beginning and end of each and every book because, yes, they all start and end exactly the same. That wouldn’t be so horrible, but the middle part is also shamelessly predictable. Jack and Annie go in the treehouse and through a book to a new place and time (from the dinosaur age to the Revolutionary War). They have to retrieve something determined by the magical Morgan le Fey, and they encounter one or two simply-cast obstacles on the way back to the treehouse. As far as I could pay attention (I often slide out of consciousness), this is all there is to every book. We are on number eleven.

Oh, and I almost forgot to mention: if you think that these books will help your children with grammar, you are sorely mistaken. Osborne is very fond of writing in sentence fragments and of too-short paragraphs, which drives a homeschool mother crazy. I spend half the day reminding my son to capitalize, punctuate, and complete his thoughts, and then hand him a grammatically farcical book before bed? Oi.

And the illustrations. Not a fan. Simply okay, but not great and definitely nothing special. (See what I did with the sentence fragments there?)

[image error]I suppose that one of the up-sides to this series are the information books that you can get to supplement the fiction books. Although not tremendously deep with knowledge, these books seem to be easy to access and interesting for children and would be a great resource for a project or paper. However, my son—and I am sure plenty of other kids—refuses to read the Fact Tracker series in lieu of reading yet another Magic Treehouse adventure. I think he does glean some history and maybe even science from the books, but I’m not sure it’s completely worth it.

At any rate, I’m not going to stop my son, or other children, from devouring these books like I did The Babysitters’ Club. Many children love them, and they have only increased literacy, even for “reluctant readers” (which does make me reluctant to be harsh in my review). But although extremely popular, they are not literary classics, and I would recommend trying Beverly Cleary or E.B. White first to see what happens.

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My son has read out to me the first twelve, around-75-page books from Random House. The series is listed here. (Note: The official Magic Treehouse website’s list of books was down, so I looked to fan lists.):

Dinosaurs Before Dark
The Knight at Dawn
Mummies in the Morning
Pirates Past Noon
Night of the Ninjas
Afternoon on the Amazon
Sunset of the Sabertooth
Midnight on the Moon
Dolphins at Daybreak
Ghost Town at Sundown
Lions at Lunchtime
Polar Bears Past Bedtime
Vacation Under the Volcano
Day of the Dragon King
Viking Ships at Sunrise
Hour of the Olympics
Tonight on the Titanic
Buffalo Before Breakfast
Tigers at Twilight
Dingoes at Dinnertime
Civil War on Sunday
Revolutionary War on Wednesday
Twister on Tuesday
Earthquake in the Early Morning
Stage Fright on a Summer Night
Good Morning, Gorillas
Thanksgiving on Thursday
High Tide in Hawaii

Merlin Mission Books (Advanced series)

Christmas in Camelot
Haunted Castle on Hallow’s Eve
Summer of the Sea Serpent
Winter of the Ice Wizard
Carnival at Candlelight
Season of the Sandstorms
Night of the New Magicians
Blizzard of the Blue Moon
Dragon of the Red Dawn
Monday with a Mad Genius
Dark Day in the Deep Sea
Eve of the Emperor Penguin
Moonlight on the Magic Flute
A Good Night for Ghosts
Leprechaun in Late Winter
A Ghost Tale for Christmas Time
A Crazy Day with Cobras
Dogs in the Dead of Night
Abe Lincoln At Last
A Perfect Time for Pandas
Stallion at Starlight
Hurry Up Houdini!
High Time for Heroes
Soccer on Sunday
Shadow of the Shark
Balto of the Blue Dawn
Danger in the Darkest Hour
Night of the Ninth Dragon
A Big Day for Baseball

Fact Trackers (formally called Research Guides)

Dinosaurs
Knights and Castles
Mummies and Pyramids
Pirates
Rain Forests
Space
Titanic
Twisters and Other Terrible Storms
Dolphins and Sharks
Ancient Greece and the Olympics
American Revolution
Sabertooths and the Ice Age
Pilgrims
Ancient Rome and Pompeii
Tsunamis and Other Natural Disasters
Polar Bears and the Arctic
Sea Monsters
Penguins and Antarctica
Leonardo da Vinci
Ghosts
Leprechauns and Folklore (or Auguste Bartholdi, unsure)
Rags and Riches: Kids in the Time of Charles Dickens
Snakes and Other Reptiles
Dog Heroes
Abraham Lincoln
Pandas and Other Endangered Species
Horse Heroes
Heroes for All Times
Soccer
Ninjas and Samurai
China: Land of the Emperor’s Great Wall
Sharks and Other Predators
Vikings
Dogsledding and Extreme Sports
Dragons and Mythical Creatures