IgniteLit

Title: Escape!: The Story of the Great Houdini
Author: Sid Fleischman
Major Themes: Biographies, Magicians
Synopsis: Although born as a poor, working-class immigrant’s child, Houdini eventually became one of the best-known magicians in recent world history.

What child the world over doesn’t dream at some point of becoming adept at magic tricks, or at least being able to understand how they are done? I know that’s an area that has always fascinated me, and along with that fascination, of course, are the stories of the greats in the magic world—Houdini among them. Sid Fleischman has long been one of my favorite children’s authors. His humor, well-drawn characters, and intriguing settings have always been a great joy to me, but until I picked up Escape!: The Story of the Great Houdini, I don’t think I’d ever read a nonfiction work from his pen. I’m so glad I took the time for this book. Even though it is biographical, it reads almost like a novel, and in my opinion, that’s the best nonfiction out there. I enjoyed this story!

Publisher’s description:

My thoughts:

I admit; I didn’t know much about Houdini before reading this book. We’ve had another biography about the man on our shelf for years, and though I always intended to read it, for one reason or another that never happened. Still, as soon as I started this story, I was swept up and away—back to a time vastly different and yet not so very different from our own; the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Not only is this a portrait of the man who became the world-famous Houdini; but this is also a picture of what the world of magic looked like back in Houdini’s day—as well as a bit of what it looks like today. One thing I was surprised (and secretly thrilled) by was that Fleischman dabbled in magic tricks when he was younger, so that added an additional layer of both information and intrigue into this story—as one magician speaking of another. Although Houdini’s tricks are touched on frequently throughout the story (as you would expect), I actually found the lesser-known parts of his life more fascinating. Things like how and where he grew up (something he elaborated on and changed in his later life), what got him into the magician’s trade, the years of struggle and failure he faced before becoming famous, the way he treated other magicians—even his concerted effort to expose people who claimed they could bring back and speak with the dead.

Escape! is much more than just an overview of Houdini’s life. It’s also a portrait of this entire subset of the art world at his time, and how the socio-political climate (and World War I and everything associated with that) pushed people toward wanting Houdini’s brand of magic. While Sid Fleischman says in his introduction that he believes he’s a better fiction than nonfiction writer, I disagree. I found this biography to be a fascinating read, and wouldn’t mind having it on the shelf one day. It’s a gem!