"Though these exhibits made my skin prickle with fear, I felt at home among such things," says Coralie Sardie of the human anomalies and sideshow items of her father's Museum of Extraordinary Things in Alice Hoffman's magical novel. In fact, at the age of 10, Coralie became an exhibit herself: the Human Mermaid. Her hands are webbed and she can swim with speed and ease; her father, "the Professor," trained her to use a special breathing device so she could spend an hour or more underwater.
The Museum of Extraordinary Things, primarily set over a few months in 1911, weaves real-life moments together with fiction in a fantastical story. One night, as Coralie rests along the northern shore of the Hudson during her evening swim, she spies a young man taking photographs in the dark: "Coralie felt something pierce through her, as if she were a fish on a hook, unable to break free."
The man is Eddie Cohen, an ambitious young immigrant Jew who escaped Ukrainian pogroms with his father. While taking pictures of the horrific Triangle Shirtwaist fire, he becomes involved in a woman's disappearance. Meanwhile, Maureen, the Professor's Irish housekeeper--loyal to her employer and totally dedicated to Coralie--will come to play a key role.
Populated with historical figures like Clement Moore and Alfred Stieglitz, The Museum of Extraordinary Things is a carefully rendered portrait of a city and people living in extraordinary times, with a strange and moving love story at its heart. --Tom Lavoie, former publisher