You Wish (Benjamin Bartholomew Piff Series #1) Book

On his eleventh birthday, sad, orphaned Benjamin Bartholomew Piff accidentally adheres to all of the wishing rules—and, in wishing for the mother lode of limitless wishes, he unknowingly sets into a motion a chain of events that threatens to disrupt the balance between the magical realm of wishes and curses. Before long, Benjamin has been recruited by the Wishworks Factory director himself to fight the evil henchmen of the Curseworks Factory. In the process, Benjamin will reclaim his original wish—giving new credence to the old adage: “Be careful what you wish for . . . ”

Children's Literature

Ben Piff has been having a bad day. His parents perished in an airplane crash a year earlier, leaving Ben at the mercy of the badly behaved adults who run Pinch's Home for Wayward Boys. He has spent the evening scraping out incredibly disgusting stew pots with an old toothbrush. A single bright spot appears when a social worker shows up with a cake for Ben's eleventh birthday. Benjamin Bartholomew Piff makes a wish when he has that birthday cake and everything changes. Ben is unaware that he managed to exactly follow all the rules for birthday wishing, and his clever wish for unlimited wishes comes true. This unfortunately has a devastating impact on the Wishworks and its president, Thomas Candlewick. The Wishworks is responsible for granting (or not granting, as the case may be) human wishes. Ben's unlimited wishes are negating other people's wishes and could cause the collapse of the entire wish industry. Just as Candlewick is sure his day cannot get any worse, the very powerful wish globe containing Ben's wish is stolen. Candlewick and Ben must team up with other wish-giving fairy folk and rescue the globe before all wishes are converted into powerful curses. This is a delightful read, with a fast paced plot, horrible bad guys, interesting good guys, espionage, robots, and even an epic battle scene. The vocabulary runs a little on the high side so it is probably not a good choice for reluctant readers, but your fantasy readers will love it.