If you give a girl a wish, she has magic for a day. If you teach a girl to grant her own wishes... well, that never happens, does it?
Twelve-year-old Alexandra Gilliam is as good as her word. After all, breaking promises would set a bad example for her five younger brothers and sisters. By the time a magical key offers the children a wish apiece, they’ve read enough books to ask for things they actually want. From the high seas to the bright side of the moon, no place is beyond their reach, but Alexandra wants something even more ambitious: the power to do magic herself.
She strikes a bargain with the key: it will teach her everything it knows, and she will keep the lessons secret from everyone she loves. A tidy, straightforward plan—except magic takes a while to learn, and the key will only stick around as long as there are wishes to grant, and Alexandra’s family is beginning to wonder what she’s hiding from them.
For nine rollercoaster days, Alexandra will be stretched to her limits, reaching for the person she’s always wanted to be while doing her best to hold on to the person she’s always been. She’s never told a lie in her life, but if that’s the price of magic, she just might pay it—even if it costs her the trust of the people she cares about the most.
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“My name is Alee Gilliam, I’m thirteen, and I’m a mage. I’ve taught my four brothers and my sister to be mages, and I can teach you, too, if you want to learn.”
On Halloween, a mysterious gentleman will be testing claims of magic in a cavernous theater in Manhattan, offering a million-dollar prize to anyone who can prove they’re the real deal. It’s been more than a year since the events of Magic’s Key, and the six Gilliam kids are ready to share their secret with the world. The only thing they need to do to enter the contest is to post a video.
There’s just one problem… Well, no. That would be a lie. There are plenty of problems in the small upstate town the Gilliams call home. As the test date approaches and the view count on their magic video ticks up, the children’s burgeoning celebrity is making them more enemies than friends, even beginning to turn family members against each other. If they don’t want to look like frauds on the big day, they’ll have to start by looking after one another, one day at a time.
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A prequel story: “Christmas Magic”
It’s been under the credenza for so long that it can barely remember what the world outside looks like. Two years before the events of Magic’s Key, the eponymous key ventures into the wider world on a beautiful white Christmas.
You can read it online for free. Happy holidays!
Who’s the author?
E. D. Kastin was born during the last summer of the second millennium of the common era, a tiny human brand-new in the dark of morning and the bright of hospital bulbs. She spent the lion’s share of her formative years sitting upside-down reading every book she could find, tucked away in a series of apartments in the outer boroughs of New York City.
To follow her work (including the next installment of the story started in Magic's Key), sign up for her newsletter, where she writes twice a month about what she’s learned from loving stories and trying to tell them. To find out more about Kastin and her various endeavors, check out her website.