Here’s Hank – Fake Snakes and Weird Wizards

Fake Snakes and Weird Wizards, by Henry Winkler and Lin Oliver, is a big-brother story for 6 year olds about a promise that arrives before the plan does.

What happens

Hank's little sister Emily loves reptiles. At a street fair she meets Ginger, a mud snake who goes to birthday parties, and decides her party needs her.

Then Dad looks at the prices and says no. Emily cries all the way home.

And Hank feels something surprising in the pit of his stomach. He wants to help her. (He's as baffled by this as you are.)

So he knocks on her bedroom door with a brilliant idea he hasn't actually had yet. What comes out of his mouth is the Westside Wizard, a man who pulls snakes out of thin air.

There is no Westside Wizard. Hank invented him on the spot.

By the time he stops talking, Emily is on the phone telling everyone she invited to expect real magic on Saturday.

What follows is Hank, his best friends Frankie and Ashley, one rubber snake from the ninety-nine-cent store, and a wizard costume held together with packing tape.

The heart of it is the trick itself. Frankie shows him fifty-five times and Hank still can't do it.

Hank tells you plainly that learning new things is hard for him. Really hard. He says it once, without any fuss, then goes back down to the clubhouse to try again.

That's what makes him such good company. He's very funny about everything except the one thing he can't do, and he keeps turning up to it anyway.

The rest is daft and fast and mostly at his own expense. A display of baby shoes comes down on his head. He tries to persuade his sister that an iguana would like some trainers.

His grandad Papa Pete is a joy too. He asks no awkward questions and simply turns up when he's needed.

It's an American story and it sounds like one, with Mom and Dad and second grade, though nothing here will slow a British reader down.

If your reader likes a hero whose plans are always a size bigger than his abilities, this is a very happy fit. It's one of the Here's Hank books, so there's plenty more of him.

What to read next

Cheerio, the sausage dog who wanders through this one, has a book of his own called A Short Tale About a Long Dog. That's the one where Hank talks his dad into a dog at last, and then has to prove he wasn't the one who let him off the lead.