The Coral Island are, in his own words, "adventure stories for young folks", and "The Coral Island" is no exception. It is a Robinsonade, a genre of fiction inspired by Daniel Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe" (1719), one of the most popular of its type, and one of the first works of juvenile fiction to feature exclusively juvenile heroes. Susan Maher, professor of English, notes that in comparison to "Robinson Crusoe" such books generally replaced some of the original's romance with a "pedestrian realism", exemplified by works such as "The Coral Island" and Frederick Marryat's 1841 novel "Masterman Ready, or the Wreck of the Pacific".
The Seance (Lawrence novel) Houdini comes to town. The Seance (Lawrence novel) The Seance is a mystery novel by Iain Lawrence, first published in 2008. It is set in America in the 1920s. The main character is thirteen-year-old illusionist Scooter King, who lives with his mother the medium, helping her to host seances and make a small living. Scooter admires Harry Houdini, a famous magician and escape artist. He can't wait to see him escape from his deadly Torture Tank. One night, Scooter stumbles on a dead man in the Torture Tank. Little does he know that the dead man is Herman Day. A