The Field Guide. Spiderwick Chronicles 1

The original chapter books in the "Spikderwick Chronicles" are now available with art from the feature film adaptation from Paramount Pictures and Nickelodeon Movies, scheduled for theatrical release on February 15. Each edition features black-and-white illustrations and two full-color tips-ins. The Field Guide, the first book in the series, was published in May 2003. It opens in Maine, where nine-year-old identical twins Jared and Simon and their thirteen-year-old sister Mallory move into the decrepit Spiderwick Estate with their mother, Helen. On the first night, they discover a secret library on the second floor using a dumbwaiter. They later discover that the library connects to the rest of the house via a hidden door in a hall closet. A brownie named Thimbletack, who has lived in the house for years, becomes angry with the Grace children when they destroy his nest inside the walls, and Jared is blamed for the ensuing havoc wrought by the brownie in retaliation including assaults on Mallory, Simon, and the trashing of the kitchen. Following a clue in the form of a riddle-poem, Jared finds Arthur Spiderwick's Field Guide to the Fantastical World Around You in a secret compartment in a trunk in the attic. The Field Guide is an old hand-written and illustrated book with information on different types of faeries. The novel ends as the Grace children make amends with Thimbletack by building him a new home out of an old birdhouse. Thimbletack then warns them that the book which they found is dangerous and was not meant to be in the hands of mortals.