Title: Stranger Things Have Happened
Author: Jeff Strand
Pub Date: April 4, 2017
You can’t always believe what you see in this hilarious coming of
age novel from the author of The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever and I Have a Bad
Feeling about This
Harry Houdini. Penn and Teller. David Copperfield. Marcus Millian
the Third.
Okay, so Marcus isn’t a famous magician. He may not even be a great
magician. But his great-grandfather, the once-legendary and long-retired
Zachary the Stupendous, insists Marcus has true talent. And when Grandpa
Zachary boasts that he and Marcus are working on an illusion that will shock,
stun, and astonish, Marcus wishes he could make himself disappear.
The problem? Marcus also has stage fright—in spades. It’s one
thing to perform elaborate card tricks in front of his best friend, Kimberly,
but it’s an entirely different feat to perform in front of an audience.
Then Grandpa Zachary dies in his sleep.
To uphold his great-grandfather’s honor, the show must go on. It
would take a true sorcerer to pull off the trick Marcus has planned. But maybe
he’s the next best thing…
JEFF STRAND lives in Tampa, Florida.
He is the author of A Bad Day for Voodoo, I Have a Bad Feeling About
This, and The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever. Explore his website at jeffstrand.com.
GIVEAWAY
Hello. I'm author Jeff Strand. If you
tolerated A Bad Day For Voodoo, were
ambivalent toward I Have a Bad Feeling
About This, and had little or no opinion regarding The Greatest Zombie Movie Ever, I'm pleased to announced that
you'll be equally unenthused about my latest YA novel, Stranger Things Have Happened.
It's an extremely silly comedy about
15-year-old Marcus Millian III, who aspires to be a legendary magician like his
great-grandfather, Zachary the Stupendous. The problem (well, the first problem
of many) is that he suffers from paralyzing stage fright. That's a bit of an
issue when you want to be a stage magician.
Some stuff happens, and Marcus finds himself
part of a bet between Grandpa Zachary and his arch-nemesis Bernard. Marcus has
to invent and perform a ridiculously amazing illusion that will astound the
audience at Bernard's theater. Yeah, this is going to be a challenge, but at
least he's got Grandpa Zachary to help him. Until Grandpa Zachary dies in his
sleep.
So now Marcus is on his own. Well, not
entirely. He's got his neighbor (and secret crush) Kimberly to help out, along
with the very socially awkward and heavily bullied new kid, Peter, who
has...secrets. Together they will work to create the ultimate illusion, one
that may or may not involve making a shark disappear from a tank in front of a
live audience.
Also, there's a really evil guy named Sinister
Seamus. Watch out for him.
Readers who are into magic (of the Penn &
Teller variety, not Harry Potter) should enjoy this book because that's kind of
what the whole thing is about. Readers who are into books that are filled with
silly (some might even say stupid) jokes should also enjoy it. It's also about
overcoming obstacles and following your dreams, if that's the angle you want to
play.
Excerpt
Marcus stared at
Grandpa Zachary in horror. He wouldn’t really call him up to the stage to
perform a magic trick in front of fifty strangers, would he?
He shook his head
a bit, hoping to telepathically convey his message of NO NO NO NO NO NO NO!
Grandpa Zachary
smiled in a way that implied he had not received the message. “As most of you
know, I used to be Zachary the Stupendous. How many of you like magic?”
Since Grandpa
Zachary had not specified the method by which the audience was supposed to
answer, people in the crowd raised their hands, applauded, cheered, and/or
said, “Me!” A woman standing next to Marcus folded her arms in front of her
chest and scowled.
“You there,” said
Grandpa Zachary, pointing to the woman. “Surely you enjoy magic!”
The woman shook
her head.
“Why not?”
“I guess I’m just
no fan of the devil.”
“This isn’t that
kind of magic. I assure you no goats will be sacrificed here, especially since
we’re raising money for an animal shelter. The magic of which I speak is the
art of illusion.”
“Oh, that’s okay
then,” said the woman.
“Ladies and
gentlemen, everyone has to start somewhere. Before the great William
Shakespeare wrote some of the most enduring works in the English language, he
almost certainly wrote about a dolphin on the moon and spelled most of the
words wrong. Before Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, he probably
invented a prototype that burned your ear like a hot iron.”
Marcus narrowed
his eyes. He understood the point that his great-grandfather was trying to
make, but he was making it very poorly.
Grandpa Zachary
harrumphed. “I can see by the expression on a certain young man’s face that my
analogy is insulting instead of inspiring. So I present to you the first-ever
public performance by the amazing, the astounding, the gobsmacking…Marcus
Millian the third!”
“No, thank you,”
said Marcus.
“Don’t be
hesitant,” said Grandpa Zachary. “Do you know what happens when you throw a
non-swimmer into the ocean?”
“They drown?”
asked Marcus.
“Nope.”
“They get eaten
by sharks?” someone else volunteered.
“Sometimes, but
that’s not where I’m going with this.” Grandpa Zachary looked out into the
audience. “Does anybody else have an answer?”
“The kid was
right. They usually drown,” said a man standing in the back. “It’s a horrible
way to go. Way worse than falling onto a pit of spikes. If you ever have the
choice of how to die, go for the spikes. Trust me.”
“Could we hear
from somebody less ghoulish?” asked Grandpa Zachary.
A woman with an
overflowing plate of peanut butter crackers raised her hand. “They learn to
swim.”
“Exactly!”
“Until they’re
pulled beneath the dark surface of the water by the jaws of a shark,” the man
interjected. “Sure, it’s nice that they learned to swim so quickly, but that
doesn’t do you any good without arms or legs.”
“Did you have a
bad childhood?” Grandpa Zachary asked.
The man shrugged.
“There were some rough patches.”
Grandpa Zachary
stared at him for a moment and then returned his attention to the rest of the
audience. “My point was that in order to achieve greatness, sometimes we must
face our fears before we think we’re ready. And so, I present to you a
beguiling illusion by the awe-inspiring, gasp-inducing prodigy…Marcus Millian
the third!”
The audience
applauded politely. Marcus stood there, motionless, as if his entire body had
been covered with shellac.
“I didn’t bring
my cards,” he said.
“Nonsense,” said
Grandpa Zachary. “You always carry a deck of cards. I can see card-shaped
bulges in your pockets right now.”
Marcus knew that
he had two options. One, he could drop to the floor, curl into the fetal
position, close his eyes, cover his ears, and let out a high-pitched shriek
until everybody became so uncomfortable that they vacated the premises. Or two,
he could go on stage and do a trick.
Option one
sounded very appealing.
Nah, he’d just do
a trick.
The audience
applauded again as Marcus walked to his doom. “You’ll do great, I promise,”
said Grandpa Zachary, handing him the microphone with a wink.
“Hello,” said
Marcus. “For my first trick, I will make my great-grandfather disappear.”
Marcus waved him
away, and Grandpa Zachary walked back into the audience as everybody laughed.
Maybe performing for an audience wouldn’t be so bad. It might even be fun. It
was what he’d always wanted, right? He could do this. Move over, David Blaine.
Marcus Millian III would amaze them all!
“I’m going to
need a volunteer,” he said.
“Me! Me!” said a
little boy, waving his hand so frantically that Marcus worried that it might
fly off and hit somebody. “Me! Me! Me! Me! Mememe! Me!”
Marcus didn’t
really want to do this trick with such a young volunteer, but the crowd
immediately went, “Awwwww,” so Marcus didn’t really have a choice
without disappointing the crowd.
“Come on up
here,” said Marcus, wondering how much sweat weight he’d lost in the past
ninety seconds.
The little boy
ran over to him.
“What’s your
name?” asked Marcus. He held the microphone to the little boy’s mouth.
“Donnie. I’m
five.”
“Nice to meet
you, Donnie.”
“I’m five.”
Donnie pretended to take a bite out of the microphone.
“What do you do
for a living, Donnie?” Marcus asked. The audience chuckled.
Donnie turned
toward the audience, his face red with fury. “Don’t laugh at me!”
Marcus placed a
comforting hand on the boy’s shoulder. “It’s okay, Donnie. They were just
laughing at my joke.”
“I’m five.”
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