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311R:Teenage Magic Device (Solved)

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Teenage girl accidentally turns herself invisible with a magic device.

Longer: This was a children’s/YA book I read in the early ’90s at the absolute latest. I’m pretty sure it was a hardcover, and the title was some common phrase like “Vanishing Act” which also referred to magic or invisibility, and the letters on the cover were gradually vanishing, from white into the black of the cover.

The main character was a girl, at least young teenage, who was a stage magician. She was described as having large, quick hands, which made it easier for her to do card tricks. She frequented a magic shop in her town and one day found a boxed magic trick which the owner didn’t want her to buy; she might have either stolen it or left the money and slipped out when the owner wasn’t looking.

The trick was a box with a row of buttons down the exact middle of it, six or seven in rainbow order, with the last one being either white or black. There was a sheet of directions and a piece of cloth included in the box, and when she put the cloth on something and pressed the buttons in the order specified in the directions, the something turned invisible (really, truly invisible; not a trick). She then followed the directions and made the thing visible again.

She used the box as her grand finale in a magic show she did, and the store owner was really angry at her, partly because it was cheating and partly because maybe there was something wrong with the magic box itself.

The accident happened when she tried it again, and it turned out her knee was touching the corner of the fabric, and the directions were folded up in her pocket and were also turned invisible, and so was the magic box itself.

She finally figured out/half remembered the right order to press the buttons in, and then it didn’t work, but she turned the box around (since it was perfectly symmetrical) and it worked.

There was a bit of scariness when the magic store owner (cranky old guy?) was trying to get the box away from her–maybe he fell in the water? Something about a warehouse? This bit is all very fuzzy.

311Q:Deployments And People Of Power

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In 1954 I read a book about POWER. The thrust of the book was observed methods or deployments people of power use. I.e., In a meeting the attendees will sit automatically by their importance to the chair. The most important will sit to the right of the chair while the least important will sit left of the chair. The author states, Power is so important in society it should be taught in schools.

311P:Going Fishing

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I’m looking for a book from my childhood (1940s) that had many little lessons of various kinds, for instance, one page was about “G,” who liked going fishing, swimming, etc., and felt left out when someone went “fishin’” or “swimmin.”

311O:A Boy With A Train Set

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I suppose I read book after about 1960 but don’t know if it was new then. It’s about a boy with a toy train set who dreams, in chapters, about being small enough to live in his toy train world and experience the perceptions attending the physics of being so small.

311M:Swashbuckling Pirate

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I was born in 1952 and the first book I remember had a swashbuckling pirate in a cave with treasure chests overflowing with colorful jewels and gold. The was a second character in the scene, but I can’t remember details.

311L: Lost Little Girl (Solved)

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My mother is looking for her favorite book from when she was in school. She remembers the cover art was a girl sitting on a wood fence. Her top is a white tank top and she has a long skirt and long brown hair. In the background there is a dirt road leading to a house. My mom says the title is something along the lines of ‘The Long Road Home’ or ‘A Long Way From Home’, and she says it might have been published in the 60’s or 70’s.

311K: Poems and Nursery Rhymes

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I had a wonderful children’s book (maybe from the 40’s??)
Hard cover, lighter green embossed cover. Larger dimensions than a regular book.
It was not very thick (maybe an inch or two??)
It was filled with fables, short stories, poems and nursery rhymes
I remember It included “Pandora’s box”, a poem about “who loved mother best” and “the land of counterpane” among many others
I lost it many years ago.
I would do love to know what it was called do I might try to find it again...

 

311J: Black Jack

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The story is about a really sweet girl who lives near a swamp. There is also a boy who likes the girl. There is a bad guy, I think his name was Black Jack or something like that, who wants to do something bad in or to the swamp. He ends up being killed by a rattlesnake and when they find him the snake is already eating one of his legs. I read this book the first time when I was in elementary school.