Fantasy

[This is a review I wrote in 2009]

**Really good fantastical adventure for readers 8+. I'm a much older fan and I enjoyed it so much I've ordered the sequel**

The Scatterhorn Museum is a family legacy, founded in 1906 and handed down from the generation of the adventurous explorer Sir Henry Scatterhorn. It's a run-down, cold and draughty, dingy kind of a place, full of real stuffed animals. Sir Henry's best friend, August, was a first class taxidermist and the animals were all his creation. A few generations on though and the animals are quite tatty and worn - they haven't had much care over the years. Visitors to the musuem are few and far between; any that make it through the door are soon frightened out of the museum by the shabby, moth-eaten animals.

This is the place were young Tom ends up, staying with his eccentric uncle and aunt, while his mum chases off to Mongolia to find his dad who's gone missing on an assignment to find rare beetles. It doesn't take Tom long to find out that there's more to this run-down museum than if first seemed. Quite by accident he discovers some of the museum's old secrets and finds himself on adventures from Edwardian times to the present day, and from Catcher Hall just a short distance away, to jungles in India and more.

A brilliant rip-roaring adventure. I've recommended it for age 8+ readers but it's a bit dark in places so perhaps read it before you give it to a sensitive child. Can't wait to read Book 2, The Hidden World. ( )

Tom Scatterhorn is deposited with his relatives whilst his mother goes to look for his father who has gone missing whilst on an expedition. Uncle Jos and Aunt Melba are the owners and caretakers of a fantastic museum that is filled with all sorts of very realistic stuffed animals. But there is more to the museum than meets the eye and Tom finds himself travelling back through time to when the museum was first about to open.
Part fantasy, part mystery and all nail-biting adventure, this book would appeal to children aged 10 and up. ( )