The Sixty-eight Rooms

Almost everybody who has grown up in Chicago knows about the Thorne Rooms. Housed in the deep inside the Chicago Art Institute they are a collection of 68 exquisitely crafted miniature rooms. Each room is set in a different historic period, and every detail is perfect. Some might even say, the rooms are magic. Imagine-what if on a field trip, you discovered a key that allowed you to shrink so that you could sneak inside and explore the rooms' secrets? What if you discovered that others had done so before you? And that someone had left something important behind? Fans of Chasing Vermeer, The Doll People, and The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs Basil E. Frankweiler will be swept up in the magic of this classic feeling debut!

MARIANNE MALONE is the mother of three grown children, a former art teacher, and the cofounder of the Campus School Middle School for Girls in Urbana, Illinois. She and her husband divide their time between Urbana and Washington, DC. This is her first novel. You can visit her Web site at MarianneMalone.com.