The Abracadabra Kid: A Writer's Life

Newbery-award winning author Sid Fleischman tells the story of his life, concentrating on his younger years when he started out as a professional magician and continuing on to his life during WWII in the Navy, his career as an adult novelist and screenwriter, and finally, his move into writing children's books. This is a highly entertaining autobiography that would be perfect for school use; it will appeal particularly to those students who are interested in writing and those who are interested in magic as well.

I picked up THE ABRACADABRA KID: A WRITER'S LIFE based on the reviews I read here. It was well-worth the few dollars I spent for the hardbound edition. The life of Sid Fleischman is told in an unpretentious and humorous style, I imagine just like his novels for kids, which, I have to shamefully admit, I've never read. He tells us about his growing up poor in Brooklyn and San Diego during the Great Depression, his love of magic, his service in the U. S. Navy during WWII, becoming a cub-journalist for a local newspaper after the war, writing screenplays, and trying to be an honest-to-goodness author of children's books. There are also many photos of his parents and two sisters, himself, his own family, as well as handbills he printed in High School Printing Shop class announcing the "See'n is Believ'n" magic shows he and a friend, Bud Ryan, performed for the public (in an effort to make some money during the lean years). They called themselves "The Ryan Brothers". Sid divides his book into 43 short chapters beginning each with a humorous excerpt from one of the many letters he has received from fans...all of them from kids. For example: "Please don't come back to my school. I hate to write letters." (p.45); "When did you start writing? When are you going to stop?" (p.98); "I'd like to be a writer, but my hand gets tired. Can you give me some advice?" (p.174). Fortunately, Sid does end his book with practical advice to anyone, child or adult, who wants to write. While the book is a stroll down memory lane, it is a trip only those who lived through the Depression and Second World War will remember taking. If you happen to be, like me, a "Baby Boomer" and nostalgic about growing up in the 50s and 60s, I recommend THE LIFE AND TIMES OF THE THUNDERBOLT KID by Bill Bryson and KNOTS IN MY YO-YO STRING by Jerry Spinelli. If you want to learn the craft of writing, read THE ABRACADABRA KID.

I was surprised to see that a reviewer called this a book that could teach kids how to write. Of course it can, but it can teach *anyone* of any age how to be a better writer. Sid Fleischman's sweet, gentle humor shines through on every page. His advice to aspiring magicians, authors, parents, human beings in general is so sound and so commonsensical that at first it seems simplistic. It isn't. Nothing he advises is obvious; it's just that he expresses it so well and it makes so much sense that his words slip into your work and make it, and you, better.

CHARMING, WITTY, and MAGICAL... THE ABRACADABRA KID, A WRITERS LIFE Newbery award winner, Sid Fleischman is surprised that he grew up to be a writer. " I had a childhood much like everyone else's," he writes. " What went wrong?" Sid Fleischman had a childhood that was not so typical after all. He grew up during the Great Depression with his best friend, named Buddy. Born to Russian immigrant parents, Sid enjoyed life with his three siblings. In fifth grade Sid decided to become a magician much to his fathers dislike. He taught himself magic tricks from library books and became known in his hometown of San Diego, as the Abracadabra Kid. Read and feel Sid's sadness as he tells you about the horrors of battle during World War II. Serving his country in the U.S. Navy, he finds good in everything. Sid loved to fish and spend time with his Spanish girlfriend any time he could, while off duty in the Navy. Sid Fleischman's writing career began after the war with an unsuccessful 250-page mystery. Working hard to correct and rewrite his mystery paid off with a winner. And thus began his writing career. Travel with Sid as he retells his charming life's story, in the Abracadabra Kid. Enjoy his wit and ups and downs of his successful life.

Sid Fleischman started out a child magician. His first book was a book of magic tricks, but since then he's written screen plays and several children's books, and even been the recipient of the prestigious Newbery Award for "The Whipping Boy," 1987. Sid's son Paul has also broken into the world of children's writing and written award winning books of his own, "Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices," 1989 among others. The "Abracadabra Kid" is an amusing autobiography written in a direct way, putting free speech on paper. Mostly it's a life story, but Fleischman does offer advice to aspiring authors. A lot of his growth as a writer has been in learning to develop plot. "Daily life doesn't often help. It rarely delivers us three acts ready to write. The author needs to rearrange the furniture, putting random story elements in some sort of dramatic alignment (p. 82)." That was chapter 19. By chapter 43, the final chapter, Fleischman writes, "Now I can sit at my desk without an idea in my head and, like a palming trick, produce a rough plot. I suppose that skill is one of the marks of a professional (p.194)." Sid Fleischman has learned a lot throughout his life as a magician, in the navy, as a newspaper reporter, and fiction writer. He shares his memories, encounters, photographs and writer's wisdom in this humorous autobiography. At least he didn't embrace the "wit Fred Allen who didn't know why anyone would spend a year or two writing a novel when you can easily buy one for a few dollars (p. 83)."