Rating: 
Summary: Good fun
Review: Lewis Barnavelt (introduced in THE HOUSE WITH A CLOCK IN ITS WALLS) is having problems. He's picked on by bullies and he's afraid his best friend, Rose Rita, doesn't respect him because he's not rough-and-tough. When he finds his great-grandfather's lucky coin, he starts wearing it, hoping it will bring him luck...only to discover that it's actually a powerful talisman and a sinister hooded figure is watching over him.This isn't quite up to the level that HOUSE was, but it's still a grand entertainment. We feel Lewis' pain and rage at being a target and at his inability to intervene when Rose Rita is attacked by bullies. Lewis' love/hate relationship with the talisman can also been seen as a symbol of drug addiction. It all ends well, with a good message about loyalty and a caution against using outside props (talismans or drugs). Next in the series: THE LETTER, THE WITCH AND THE RING.
Rating:
Summary: I Love this Book, period.
Review: Mr. Bellairs' realistic characters and vivid descriptions make this book a masterpiece...in fact i thought I was seeing it on the Movies untill the teacher came over and told me to get to work on my Mathwork.
Rating:
Summary: A very compelling book, my absolute all-time favorite!
Review: This book is what nightmares are made of. Take the main character, Lewis, plagued by his bully and stalked by an evil spirit. you read the rest.
Rating:
Summary: A GREAT BOOK
Review: This is a very good book and I reccomend it highly. I am now looking to read another of John Bellairs books, I hope they are all this great...
Rating: 
Summary: Thriller
Review: This is definitely a gripping thriller for kids, and Mayer's illustrations add to the general creepiness. The mixture of an ordinary life of friends, bullies, and school and the menacing world of dark magic is expertly handled. Who is sending Lewis strange postcards in the middle of the night? Who is the tall figure he sees under a street lamp? The story carries itself forward with excellent pacing, moral dilemmas, and mystery. I think the magical objects used at the climax ought to have been introduced beforehand; here they seem to function more like a god from the machine, as the saying goes. Still, few young readers will mind, they will just want to know how it all comes out.
Rating:
Summary: Thriller
Review: This is definitely a gripping thriller for kids, and Mayer's illustrations add to the general creepiness. The mixture of an ordinary life of friends, bullies, and school and the menacing world of dark magic is expertly handled. Who is sending Lewis strange postcards in the middle of the night? Who is the tall figure he sees under a street lamp? The story carries itself forward with excellent pacing, moral dilemmas, and mystery. I think the magical objects used at the climax ought to have been introduced beforehand; here they seem to function more like a god from the machine, as the saying goes. Still, few young readers will mind, they will just want to know how it all comes out.
Rating:
Summary: spooky fun!
Review: This is one of those books that stays with you for the rest of your life. It is sheer spooky fun. What sets it apart from the rest are the vivid images painted by Bellairs's words, from characters' appearences to atmospheric settings. I still study cloud formations!
Rating:
Summary: Wow!
Review: This was a great book! It was a spine chiling tale that I read in one day. It was almost as good as The House with a Clock in its walls. The Figure in the Shadows is a story of a boy who finds a magical amulet and says a spell that raises the powerful spells on the coin. It allows him to have good luck, but that all changes when he starts getting followed by a shadowy creature. I reccommend this book to other kids. And I will be willing to give more than 5 stars.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful horror-mystery story
Review: This was the first John Bellairs book that I read, so it's the one that got me hooked. I identified with the characters, and all his characters are wonderfully illustrated. He has that right mixture of horror, mystery and gothic overtones
Rating:
Summary: Great book full of magic and mysteries.
Review: When first I started reading this book I thought it was kind of sad how everybody made fun of Lewis. I thought how could somebody be so rude. It got interesting however how Lewis was so sensitive yet he could stand so strong. I thought when I read that the person who was writing "Veno" was the man who once owned the amulet. Later I realized that it was not him because he would have gone after the amulet rather than write "Vino" . Over all I thought that this was a great book that would pull you into the text and make you feel like you were part of the story. A clever mix of horror, humor, magic, and mystery by John Bellairs. I would recommend this story to all kids.
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