A Tale of Highly Unusual Magic Hardcover - 2015

From the rear cover

Greetings salutations and welcome to The Exquisite Corpse!

All it takes is one person bold enough to set the story in motion--let the magic begin!

Kai is in Texas, visiting her truck-driving, hip-hop loving, Sherman tank of a great-aunt. Leila has finally escaped the suburbs and is ready for a glamorous summer of international adventure and royal treatment with her father's family in Pakistan. They have no idea that their utterly different worlds are about to collide.

Each of them finds a copy of a mysterious old book, and when Kai writes three words on the blank pages, they magically appear in Leila's copy on the other side of the globe. Kai's words are soon followed by line after line of the long-ago, romantic tale of Ralph T. Flabbergast and his forever-love, Edwina Pickle. When Leila adds a sentence, more story appears. Every sentence they write--whether it's inspired by a Chihuahua attack (Kai) or a misunderstanding with a goatherd (Leila)--inspires a reaction from the book. And so it goes until the fable is unspooling madly, connecting both girls to each other and to Ralph and Edwina in ways they never could have imagined.

This hilarious, inventive, and deeply touching story about destiny--how we shape it, and how it in turn shapes us--carries readers along as Kai, Leila, Ralph, and Edwina begin the search for their true selves, and discover the invisible threads that link us all, ultimately, to one another.

Media reviews

Citations

• Booklist, 09/01/2015, Page 118
• Bulletin of Ctr for Child Bks, 11/01/2015, Page 0
• Kirkus Reviews, 08/01/2015, Page 0
• School Library Journal, 09/01/2015, Page 143