Milo is a boy who doesn’t know what to do with himself. He plods through his days, going through the motions of
getting, up, having breakfast, going to school and coming home again. Nothing interests him. He doesn’t see the point in knowing lots of stuff they are teaching at school. Milo feels, flat, bored, uninterested and believes most things are a waste of time.
One day after school while he lies dejectedly in his bedroom, he spies a package. It wasn’t there before. What could it be? He unpacks and assembles (following the precise instructions supplied) a small tollbooth, equipped with one coin. Climbing into his small electric car (he figures there’s nothing else to do), he drives up to the small tollbooth and deposits the coin in a custom made slot.
In less than a wink, he is travelling along an unknown road, in an unknown land, heading for an adventure he never could’ve dreamed of – if he could be bothered to in the first place.
He meets strange creatures, contrary people, lovers of letters and words, and the opposite in collectors of numbers and equations. There is no Rhyme or Reason in this land of Wisdom, split by warring brothers living in Dictionopolis and Digitopolis. Milo is suddenly charged with the very confusing task of restoring order. He has to really think to understand the plethora of conundrums dropped in his lap, and the journey shapes him into a different Milo indeed.
This Classic has been reviewed over 11,000 times on Goodreads, and probably a zillion times everywhere in between. First published in 1961 by an architect who was supposed to be writing something else, The Phantom Tollbooth is well loved worldwide.
The play on words, the funny sayings we use and take for granted in everyday life, not to mention the English language and all its confusing quirks, is pushed to the max and revealed to Milo (the main character), in an imaginative myriad of ways.
The Phantom Tollbooth reminded me of The Magic Faraway Tree, Alice in Wonderland and Wizard of Oz all mixed up together on purpose. It’s completely bonkers, incredibly clever and just shows how the English language is a complicated beast, not to mention the Maths, the island of Conclusions and the conducting of Sound.
Find it. Read it. Laugh and Love it.
Author – Norton Juster
Age – 8+
(1961, Harper Collins, Adventure, Magic, Fantasy, Action, Animals, Humour, Music, Funny, Monsters, Princes, Brothers, Sibling Rivalry, Princess, Dungeon, Castles, Wisdom, Quest, Words, Numbers, English, Maths, Sound)