"Welcome to the Scatterhorn Museum! But don't get too excited - it's a cold and dingy place, crammed full of tatty stuffed animals and junk. Nobody much wants to visit any more, and its days are surely numbered.
But when Tom is sent to live there, he soon finds there is more to this museum than meets the eye. The animals may be shabby and moth-eaten - but they possess an incredible secret. And when Tom discovers he can go back to the time of their making, a hundred years earlier, he embarks on a journey full of unimaginable terrors...
Join Tom in his breathtaking adventure in and out of time, from an Edwardian ice fair to the wastes of Mongolia, the jungles of India and beyond..."
So reads the book's back cover; unfortunately the book group was not sure it quite lived up to the blurb!
The Museum's Secret is the first book of a trilogy and racks up a whopping 445 pages. The story starts with a rather gruesome prologue, but takes quite a while to really get going. Despite some good ideas and exciting action, the plot was over-complicated and hard to follow.
"It's a good story but it had confusing parts. I think Henry Chancellor got a bit carried away with his ideas. Parts could've been left out because it was really complicated." - Lilah
"Quite a lot of exciting things, but lots of bits you couldn't understand." - Tabitha
"It's a good story but a bit too complicated. The middle is the best bit!" - Ana
"It's complicated and jolts round to different places, but otherwise it was a really good book." - Sam
"The beetles really freaked me out!" - Beck
Sam and Lottie intend to read the next books in the trilogy, but everyone else decided they probably wouldn't bother.
Page Turners rating for The Museum's Secret: 3.5/5
