Full Text Review(s)
"Set in 1927 rural New England, McKenzie’s atmospheric debut contains all the trappings of a good dark-and-stormy-night ghost story. Elijah, nearly 12, never suspects his plain, kindly farm mother is a witch, until two dotty aunts arrive at Dredmoore Hollow out of the blue and spirit him away to their creepy overgrown home at Moaning Marsh. These strangely glamorous ladies are up to something in their Magic Snippers beauty salon, where customers enter at their own risk, while the lugubrious hired hand Mr. Grobbs skulks about with his ever-present hunchback wolf, Jack. The evil aunts, who have been feuding with Elijah’s mother for 15 years, are inordinately interested in Elijah’s chin— namely his first whisker, which they will add to their cauldron potion and thereby rehabilitate the Dredmoore "curse." Written in the personal, gutsy voice of plainspoken Elijah, McKenzie’s work betrays some influence of the Potter books, as well as a bit of Poe and Irving, but delivers a fresh, spooky shiver."

"Eleven-year-old Elijah Twisp would prefer to be safely lost in a good Tom Swift adventure rather than having a real and scary one of his own, but he can’t stop peril from catching up to him on his New England family farm in 1927. Aunts Serena and Agnes, from the long estranged Dredmoore side of the family, arrive on the same day that Mama and Poppers disappear mysteriously to take care of Grandma Ester, who apparently made off in her hot-air balloon. Elijah is whisked off to live with his aunts in Moaning Marsh, where, after surviving a suffocating attack by Lullabeetle Silk and witnessing a delivery of Croneswort, Mimicker’s Quills, and Midnight Moon Blood, he begins to sense that his aunts are doing more at the Magic Snippers Beauty Salon than cutting hair. The audience will figure out much earlier than clueless Elijah that his family secret is of the witchy variety; they’ll also have plenty of time to piece together the connection between his chin, the family curse, and his role in the mending that needs to be done. All the best witching efforts are made here, including turning people into animals and chanting around frothing cauldrons, yet Elijah’s narration carries an earnest homey flavor that marries well with his clumsy efforts to escape his dark deed-doing aunts and reunite with his parents. McKenzie captures the rural setting in a romping boyish tone similar to Peck’s A Long Way to Chicago (BCCB 10/98) but with an added dose of the creepy and unnatural, and readers should appreciate the exploration of a family with more than a few black sheep."

"This magical tall tale, set in 1927, follows 11-year-old Elijah through action-packed adventures with crazed teenage witches, vindictive plants, and mean aunties. After Elijah's aunts Serena and Agnes arrive uninvited at the family home in Dredmoore Hollow, his parents suddenly disappear. A letter from his mother informs Elijah that he is to follow his aunts to their home in Moaning Marsh, where they run a very suspect beauty salon called the Magic Snippers. After narrowly escaping a treatment to cure the "marsh rash" the aunts insist he has contracted, Elijah realizes that his aunts are witches who will stop at nothing to reverse a curse. Luckily, a plucky young lady emerges to help Elijah escape from his predicament. Although a little slow to start, this humorous tale builds to a wonderfully creepy finale. Lemony Snicket and younger Harry Potter fans will enjoy the twists, turns, and tone of this debut novel."

"It comes as a shock to 11-year-old Elijah to find his Aunt Serena and Aunt Agnes descend upon his family since his mother had never told her husband or son that she had siblings. Fifteen years earlier, the women had quarreled, were under a curse, and had broken a magic cauldron. And now the aunts have come because they needed their nephew to reverse the spell. These truly evil women "remove" his parents, kidnap him, and take him to their fiendish, squalid house to do their dastardly deeds. Unable to escape, he is put under spells, but discovers that he, too, has magical powers. It’s a good thing because time after time Elijah and his new friend, Dez, are in deep trouble and need magic to escape. Set in 1927, the book has continuous action and piles of demonic atmosphere. While it lacks the sardonic wit found in Roald Dahl’s gleeful tales about witches, it does have lots of suspense. And, at the end, timid, resourceful Elijah turns into a hero."

"For most of his twelve years, Eli has known about the cryptic quote on his grandfather Phineas Dredmoore’s gravestone: "Some Things You Choose. Some Things Choose You." But timid Eli never thought he would be chosen for anything, much less to fulfill a mystical legacy. Unbeknownst to Eli, his mama, a closet witch, shut down the family business by destroying the Dredmoore caldron that empowers his relatives. Only Eli possesses the main ingredient, the first whisker from a Dredmoore male descendant, necessary to make a potion that will reassemble the caldron; his two aunts plot to hold him captive until that initial hair appears. A host of special effects (plants that grow out of control, a creature that turns mortals into stone, and witching sticks galore) creates a frenzied atmosphere, and an odd assortment of characters (including a trio of apprentice witches awkwardly doing the bidding of Eli’s aunts and a spunky girl determined to get to the bottom of all these strange happenings) keep the action plugging right along. Here’s a reluctant hero who, by the hair of his chinny chin chin, finds within himself the power to right dynastic wrongs."