Eric Elfman

After a house fire in Tampa destroys their home and kills their mother, Nick, his brother Danny, and his father former Tampa Bay Ray's pitcher "Whiffing Wayne" Slate, start over in Colorado Springs in the former home of Nick's great aunt. The attic is chock full of gadgets, and Nick decides to have a yard sale to get rid of it all; he does better than he ever expected, and disappoints a strange man in a vanilla suit who leaves his business card. When the appliances and such - a box camera, a show more recorder, a toaster that keeps hitting Nick's head, and more - turn out to be more than meets the eye, Nick and his new-found friends Camille and Mitch have to figure out what's going on before the strange men in pastel suits catch up to them.

I heard Neal Shusterman speak at our local middle school after only having read the first two books in the Unwind series, and promptly put this - and almost every other book he wrote - on my TBR list. Though the characters are in eighth grade, I could see this appealing to kids in middle grades much more than the older middle school crowd (the cover is young, too). It's light on science and high on silliness, sort of reminding me of Danny Dunn, except that these aren't Nick's inventions and he has to work out what they do. There are lots of punny moments and a few nods to parental readers as well, who would get some of the jokes that would go over most younger readers' heads. An entertaining read I could recommend to a variety of readers. show less

TESLA'S ATTIC is a smart, entertaining read from Neal Shusterman, Eric Elfman, and Disney-Hyperion. (Thank you to Disney-Hyperion for providing me with an advanced copy)

It's a book that could have been written by Dan Brown, if he had Douglas Adam's brilliant sense of humor and ability to create engaging characters who have a wickedly sharp understanding of how the middle-school world churns.

Back Story
As he looked around at this boneyard
of uselessness, Nick Slate had a simple idea.
An idea show more that would not only change the direction
of his life, but the very course of human existence.

He would hold a garage sale.

After loosing his mother in a horrible house fire, Nick and his brother and father move from Florida to Colorado Springs where they take up residence in a weird old house. In the attic there are a bunch of devices which they believe are junk. Shortly after they sell them at a garage sale, it becomes apparent that they are anything but junk. They are, in fact, brilliant devices created by none other than Nikola Tesla, the famous physicist/inventor.

In some ways this story is familiar. It's like other middle-grade books were there is a group of young teens that find themselves facing off against an ancient organization of bad guys.

But there's also a significant difference. And that is that Shusterman and Elfman do it right. TESLA'S ATTIC is intelligent and carefully plotted. They create imperfect characters and give them time to explain and express themselves.

The authors also just have fun with the whole concept, so that I think I laughed more at the jokes in this book than any other book I've read this year. The Douglas-esque quips about science, history and the human condition were really appealing.

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Nick took a deep breath, his resolve setting in. "We have to destroy it," he said. "We have to destroy them all."

The scorched-earth policy is a time-honored tradition of war. Villagers about to be overrun by the enemy would burn their own homes and crops to deny the enemy shelter and food. Armies would destroy their own munitions to prevent their attackers from using their own weapons against them.

The Russians used this strategy very successfully against a very irritated Napoleon, burning everything they had and retreating into Russia. And since there was no end of Russia to retreat into, Napoleon was pretty much screwed.
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TESLA'S ATTIC isn't perfect. But I found it a lot more entertaining than 93% of the other Middle-grade fiction that I've read.

Recommend this book for those that like quirky characters and weirdness. The humor is geeky and pedantic. show less

This was one of the first novels marketed as MG I have read in a while, and it was really good! As an adult I appreciated the tongue in cheek humor and descriptions that a person can read on both literal and referential levels. The Tesla inventions that build the story (the shut up and listen that offers advice, the tape recorder that records what one thinks versus what they say, and the wet cell battery that revives the dead) were so well integrated into a brilliant, fun premise of finding show more about the unknown in the world and within the self. The novel works on many levels and was set up really nicely for the next in its series. The only thing that I wish were handled a little differently was the backstory of a recently deceased mom (who the protagonist blames himself for killing) and a couple of other deaths that felt a bit too lighthearted in treatment. I think the suspense would have been greater in the novel had the threat of real death been taken a little more seriously, but it is probably not this novel‰ÃƒÂ›Ã‚ªs intention to be as suspenseful as it is playful and entertaining. For these last two qualities it is excellent!

Also, kudos for remembering a genius, on whose shoulders one could say Thomas Edison stands. show less

I really enjoyed Shusternan's Unwind dystology, and looked forward to starting a new series. The pacing was good, I liked the teenage humor, and the voices felt authentic for teenagers; however, I did not connect with the protagonist, Nick. A classic new kid story moving into a new school, following a tragic fire in which his mother dies, he meets a cast of characters, who seemed better developed or at least more consistent. He moves into the attic of his new house, where he finds a bunch of show more junk, that he sells at a garage sale, and he cannot believe people are buying the goods ... at least until he finds out that the junk has hidden secrets. Then, he tries to get them back and the craziness begins as a secret society (the Accelerati) wants them too. I found this good enough to want to read the next installment. show less