La spalla fece muovere il gomito e il gomito trasmise altri movimenti in una reazione a catena, fino al polso e infine alla mano. Hugo e Isabelle ammirarono, con gli occhi spalancati per la meraviglia, la testa in miniatura dell’uomo meccanico che iniziava a muoversi con cautela… (251)

Ora pero’ inizia un’altra storia, perche’ le storie portano sempre ad altre storie, e questa ci portera’ dritti fino alla luna. (265)

Il cineasta Georges Melies inizio’ la propria carriera come illusionista e proprietario di un teatro parigino specializzato in spettacoli magici. La familiarita’ con l’illusionismo lo aiuto’ a capire subito la possibilita’ del nuovo mezzo di comunicazione. (364)
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The illustrations alone make this book an absolutely gorgeous read. ( )

An incredibly imaginative story with evocative images. WOW. ( )

A lovely tribute to Georges Milies, but more so a wonderful, subtle, and magical adventure story with themes fleshed out by Selznick's sketches that made me feel all warm and cozy and happy especially because of the appreciation for these early films.

The movie based on the book is also an almost perfect translation, with certain characters more realized than in the book for the sake of filling out the movie.

Also, for a 533-page book, it will take you about 2 hours to read, which is totally satisfying. ( )

Ahhh this book was SO GOOD. I liked it so much it's a new favorite. It includes a lot of my favorite things to read about: secretly sneaking around inside of city walls and buildings, mysteries that might change people's destinies, people who are geniuses at something awesome (in this case, putting together mechanical things), lock-picking (I really want to learn how to do that), dreams, gorgeous black and white illustrations, etc. Hugo is a mechanically talented boy with many secrets. What happens when he runs into an old man with similar mechanical talent and just as many secrets? Literary dynamite, that's what. Also, the man's goddaughter Louise is awesome and has just as many skills (the lock-picking with a bobby pin among them) and she's a bookworm so I love her. The story is told with tons of gorgeous black and white pencil drawings as well as photographs from old movies. TIOHC won the Caldecott Award that year, which caused an uproar since that award is for picture books and this book is a novel. However, the pictures are just as important to the story as the words are, so I'd say it counts. This book was fantastic and everyone should read it immediately, especially old movie buffs. 5/5 stars

"I like to imagine that the world is one big machine. You know, machines never have any extra parts. They have the exact number and type of parts they need. So I figure if the entire world is a big machine, I have to be here for some reason. And that means you have to be here for some reason, too." ( )