The Magician’s Boy wants to learn magic. But the Magician says the Boy must wait until the time is right. When the Magician’s Saint George puppet disappears at the start of a performance of Saint George and the Dragon during a party, he orders the boy into the Land of Story to retrieve it. Bewildered, the Boy finds himself at the party one moment and in a strange woods the next. He has a series of seemingly impossible encounters—first with a bossy signpost who becomes his constant, uninvited companion, and then with one fabled character after another: the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe and her brood, Peter Piper, Pinocchio, Jack and the Giant, and others. Their stories are all intertwined, and while each encounter demands courage or ingenuity from the Boy, none of them seem to be leading him any closer to Saint George—or are they? Susan Cooper’s short, breezy adventure story is about a boy who has a very surprising discovery in store. Serena Riglietti’s full-page, black-and-white illustrations are a whimsical addition to this fanciful story. (Ages 7–9; younger for reading aloud)

A Boy works for a Magician.
The Boy polishes the Magician's wands, and catches the rabbits that the Magician pulls out of hats. But the Boy's favorite job is operating the puppets for the Magician's famous puppet play, "Saint George and the Dragon" -- until one terrible day when, in the middle of a performance, the Boy can't find the Saint George puppet. The Magician is furious. He points a long magical finger at the Boy, and -- poof! -- the Boy is suddenly in the strange Land of Story, where he must find Saint George.
The Boy's hunt for Saint George is full of adventures with oddly familiar people. He saves the Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe from losing her children; he spoils the wolf's plan to eat Little Red Riding Hood; and he narrowly escapes being eaten by the Giant at the top of Jack's beanstalk. But the Boy's last adventure is the most amazing of all -- and changes his life forever. No child who reads this delightful tale by master storyteller Susan Cooper is likely to forget it.