Books like The rope trick by Lloyd Alexander

Taran, the assistant pig-keeper of the prophetic Hen Wen, leaves home in a perilous quest to save Prydain from the Horn King and Lord Arawn’s growing menace.

Jason teams up with his magic cat Gareth to hop across time, exploring historic countries from ancient civilizations to future worlds.

A dual‑tale graphic and text adventure following Billy Marvel, a shipwrecked boy who builds a renowned London acting dynasty, and Joseph Jervis, a runaway drawn into the family’s haunted house.

Twelve‑year‑old Isabel leaves London for her aunt’s Northamptonshire manor, where she embarks on an adventurous journey and learns the healing arts taught by her aunt.

After printing a showman's pamphlet, young Theo flees city life and joins Count Las Bombas, a con artist, and Mickle, a strong‑willed girl, on a quest to thwart Chief Minister Cabbarus’s plot to wrest the kingdom’s power.

When Christopher Rowe cracks the code behind an assassination plot, he and his friends are sent to Paris to investigate a centuries‑old curse on the French throne.

Luca and Isolde set out across medieval Christendom to confront ancient evil, but a sudden religious uprising and a violent storm test their resolve and threaten to ruin their quest.

After a mysterious accident leaves her drenched and disoriented, 12‑year‑old Triss discovers her memories have been erased and her sister has turned bitter. Haunted by odd visions, she uncovers her brother’s hidden survival and a supernatural secret that threatens their family.

During the Italian Renaissance, a seventeen‑year‑old apprentice named Luca Vero is tasked with uncovering the truth behind supernatural claims that threaten the Catholic Church, while a young abbess named Isolde faces accusations of witchcraft in a medieval nunnery.

A boy with lost memories races against a vengeful ghost to rescue missing children in a bleak Devonshire village.

In 1454 Venice, Luca and Isolde uncover a coin‑counterfeiting conspiracy while pursuing a mystical alchemist who seeks the Philosopher’s Stone, the mythical substance rumored to turn base metals into gold and grant the elixir of life.

Brandon wants excitement at any price. He persuades his weak-minded friend, Granillo, to assist him in the murder of a fellow undergraduate, Ronald Raglan. They place the body in a wooden chest and invite some acquaintances, including the dead man's father, to a party, the chest and its gruesome contents serving as a supper table. The horror and tension are worked up gradually and we see the reactions of the two murderers, closely watched by the suspecting Rupert Cadell, until finally they break.

A young king, driven by honor, embarks on a perilous journey filled with talking animals, formidable kings, demons, and the love of his life.

In a valley sheltered by an enchanted forest, young Tilja discovers she alone can protect her companions on a perilous mission to find a magician who might restore the forest's fading magic.

"A rope rises up into the air. A boy climbs up the rope and when the boy gets to the top he vanishes into thin air," explains Lamont, winner of the Jeremy Dalziel prize in British History, about a tall tale that found its way into legend. The rope trick is one of the most successful hoaxes of all time, created by an amateur magician and printed in the Chicago Tribune in 1890. Despite a later admission that the story was false, it continued to spread in newspapers and journals throughout the world. Some claimed to have seen the trick performed on trips to India. Others added their own spin to the tale. Using the original legend as a starting point, Lamont, who has performed as a magician and psychic, explores how easily people will believe stories that are fed to them as truth despite all logical senses and their outright impossibility.

Sebastian, once the fourth fiddler for a noble household, leaves home to pursue his destiny on the road. Along the way he encounters the challenges of adulthood and the music that fuels his journey.