(3) 4-6 Illustrated by Kristina Kister. Mandala artwork by Ben Guterson. With his parents away on a research trip, Zander Olinga is spending five weeks with his grandmother at the Number Nine Plaza, the wondrous department store she owns in the Eastern European-esque city of Novatrosk. The building possesses wish-fulfillment departments to tempt any young shopper—nineteen floors of pet stores, magic shops, bakeries, reading rooms, art museums, and ice cream parlors, with a giant Ferris wheel on the roof. Zander would enjoy it all immensely but for the looming threat of Darkbloom, an evil spirit who invades the minds of the weak, once conjured by his great-great-great uncle Vladimir. A magical plate bearing a sandstone mandala that gave the Nine its exceptional ability to enchant has been missing for ninety-nine years, and Zander hopes to recover it before Darkbloom’s minions can use it to destroy the Nine. If the plot is a little MacGuffinish, the setting and mystery are constructed with great skill, with Zander and his friend Natasha dodging acts of sabotage that have plagued the department store and seeking out a series of nonsensical inscriptions that Uncle Vladimir left behind. Readers will enjoy trying to puzzle out the cypher coded in the inscriptions and will cheer Zander’s attempts to conquer his acrophobia, a bit of personal development that comes into play at the climax. Despite the ongoing threats and danger, the story has built-in guardrails that keep the action from getting too intense, giving younger readers the security to wallow in the sparkling fantasy Guterson invents, of a store more magical than Santa’s workshop, without fear. Final interior art not seen.

Reviewer: Anita L. Burkam