House of Secrets

 

Authors: Chris Columbus & Ned Vizzini

Year Published: 2013

Pages: 490

Genre: Action, Adventure, Fantasy

Chris Columbus delivers in this non-stop action thrilling adventure! It's no surprise that the author directed the Harry Potter movies and produced Night at the Museum. 

Set in modern day San Francisco, Chris Columbus' first book in the House of Secrets trilogy opens with the purchase of a house by the Walker children's parents. Money is tight for the family since their father lost his job as a medical doctor due to a very strange incident that occurred in the operating room. The children later learn that there is an eerie connection 

The three children, Cordelia, Brendan and Eleanor, soon discover that what they first thought was a run down old house, holds secrets beyond their wildest imaginations. Their first family movie night in the house is rudely interrupted by a very creepy lady who introduces herself as the next door neighbor. She tells the family that she grew up in the house. The book nerd 😊 of the family, Cordelia,  quickly puts two and two together, and realizes that the old lady is the daughter of Denver Kristoff - the man who wrote the books that inhabit the shelves of the library inside the house. But how could the next door neighbor lady possibly be his daughter? She would have to be well over one hundred years old - like Guinness Book of World Records over one hundred. 

Almost as soon as Cordelia solves the WHO, the WHAT happens. The creepy old lady shows up with a bang and identifies herself as the Wind Witch. The parents are injured and disappear, and the children are left trying to figure out where they are and how to find their parents. 

Trapped inside a mash of Denver Kristoff's stories, the children meet the characters from the books, some nice, some trying to kill them. Every page is filled with Jumanji-ish, Night at the Museum-ish adventure - from giants to giant dragonflies to pirates to sword wielding skeletons. The children have to find a way to get back to reality and stop the Wind Witch while resisting the overpowering urge to open the Book of Doom and Desire. The Book uses the selfish desires of each character in order to overcome them and enable the Wind Witch to become all powerful.

Do the children love each other and their parents more than they love themselves? Will they find their way back home to reality? Did their parents survive? Which one of them will give in and open the Book? Just once? Just a peek? 

                                Get it here: House of Secrets (House of Secrets series Book 1)