Mr Majeika on the Internet

Humphrey Carpenter's Mr Majeika on the Internet is a magical school story for 6 year olds in which a wizard-turned-teacher gets his whole class stuck inside a computer.

What happens

Class Three at St Barty's has been given an old computer. Mr Majeika hasn't a clue how it works. He thinks a web site might be something to do with spiders, and that the net must be for fishing.

Then the old computer vanishes overnight. A giant new one appears in its place, and Hamish Bigmore, the naughtiest boy in the class, has a nasty grin on his face. The new computer is very rude. It tells the class a square has a million sides, and it won't switch off even when they pull out the plug.

So Mr Majeika tries a spell. Whoosh! Suddenly the whole class is inside the computer, looking out through the screen at Hamish, who's laughing his head off.

What follows is a wild ride from one strange web site to the next. They make friends with Gulliver, a computer mouse who has turned into a real mouse. They visit a land of tiny people, and a land of giants who are famous just for being famous. There's a flying island where everyone shops all night, and horses who have to sit exams every single day.

Jody is the one who knows her stuff. She keeps remembering bits of Gulliver's Travels, usually just a moment too late. Hamish is his usual rude self, even when he's in trouble too. Every place they land in is its own little adventure, so it's easy to read a bit at a time.

Grown-ups reading along will enjoy the jokes about celebrities and credit cards, and about people who've forgotten how to talk to each other without a phone. Children will just enjoy the idea of being zapped into a computer game and riding on the back of a frog-monster!

One page might need a quick word for a young reader. On the shopping island, people who've run out of credit are pushed off the edge, and Class Three get pushed off too. (They land safely in a haystack.)

What to read next

If they've never met him, the very first Mr Majeika book starts on a wet Monday morning, when the new teacher for Class Three flies in through the window on a magic carpet.