Irving the Magician

by Tohby Riddle

Genres: Picture Books, Childrens

32 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2005

About the author

Tohby Riddle is an Australian cartoonist and picture-book creator. In 2005 he became editor of The School Magazine, in which his illustrations, non-fiction pieces and poems appear regularly. In 2009 he won the Patricia Wrightson Prize in the New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards with Ursula Dubosarsky for their book The Word Spy.

Reviews

[Jack Kirby and the X-man · Rating 2 out of 5]

I suppose this is a heart-warming tale of a boy (Irving) who brings light and joy into an otherwise heartless inner-city neighbourhood through his magic shows.

I just don't feel that the lack of magic is a real problem in most people's lives - and the lack of a problem I could relate to really left me wanting more from this book. By the end of the book I was able to see the use of magic as simply a catalyst to fix a larger problem - the lack of a sense of community in cities, but by then the book had lost my interest.

I liked the illustrations... But I felt that as we gained that sense of community at Irving's magic show the illustrations could have better reflected the joy in that moment in contrast with the grungy, gritty illustrations earlier in the story.

So this wasn't a bad book by any measure, I just didn't get into it.

[Jenni · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a heart warming story of finding magic in everyday life.