The story carefully balances realism with fantasy, and although there is some kind of magic at play (in what is otherwise a normal world), each story beat follows the previous with logic, making it relatively easy to follow the action.

As children, Diana and her two sisters were deprived of a good, steady supply of books by a father, 'who could beat Scrooge in a meanness contest'. Crossley finds a note claiming that ``someone in this class is a witch,'' only the beginning of events that have 6B and the rest of the school in turmoil. Archer’s Goon is a six-episode television adaptation of the novel of the same name by Diana Wynne Jones. Tomato in the Mirror: When Howard finally tracks down Venturus' lair and learns where he's been hiding all this time.

Diana Wynne Jones's signature delightfully spewing plot structure and irrepressible characters kept me racing to the end.

He also tells Howard that Catriona and Quentin found him (Howard) as an infant and adopted him, which proves only to add more to the boy's troubles. They do nothing, Venturus set them up to mislead the others and to give his adoptive father tax-free income. Erskine has the three locked up as a way of exerting even more pressure on Quentin, but they manage to escape with the help of the aforementioned Ginger Hind, who insists that he needs Howard's help to be free from Shine. When some things are revealed, I would have liked the book to end, but it kept going and I didn't particularly care for the ending. But what I'm truly impressed with here is the way the plot unfolds, starting with the Goon in Howard's kitchen and proceeding through the introductions of the seven siblings.Diana Wynne Jones skillfully guides the reader through a riveting, twisty plot, with satisfying surprises at every amazing turn.