Blizzard of the Blue Moon is the thirty-sixth installment to the Magic Tree House series and the eighth of the Merlin Missions.
Synopsis[]
The magic tree house carries Jack and Annie to New York City in 1938 on a mission to rescue the last unicorn.
Chapters[]
- The Last Unicorn
- Who Are They?
- Lost in Central Park
- Hard Times
- The Cloisters
- The Hunt of the Unicorn
- Dianthus
- Back to Life
- It's Them!
- The Wand of Dianthus
Plot[]
It was November, the sky was cloudy and gray. As Jack was about to have some hot chocolate, Annie told him that she saw the magic tree house again. It was cold out, so they put on some winter clothes. In a letter, Merlin told them that this was their last mission to see if the kids could use magic wisely. He said that the last unicorn had been imprisoned under a spell. It will run out in late November before a blue moon. In order for him to wake, someone calls his name, which is Divine Flower of Rome. Then a young girl (like Annie) must love him and show him the way home. Morgan sent them a guide book about New York City in 1938, they went there once with their Aunt Mallory. They were ready with their three remaining lines!
The tree house landed in a snow-covered Central Park. A blue moon is when two full moons appear in the same month. Annie suggested asking the New Yorkers if they’d seen anything unicorn-esque, but they all left, and it was really snowy. They came across merry-go-round; no one was there either. Jack saw two teenagers in the distance, a girl wearing a cape and a boy with a raincoat. Annie suggested they might be Teddy and Kathleen as they helped them in disguises on their last three missions. The kids came across a statue of Balto, there was also a nearby that took them to a fountain with an angel. Going left, they arrived at a frozen lake and arched bridge. Jack realized that they needed to get off the path, but he couldn’t find Annie in the blizzard! Worried, he used the “Find a Treasure You Must Never Lose” rhyme and Annie appeared, claiming he was the one who got lost. The two found a castle and saw the two teens again, but they ran into a man named Bill Perkins, who introduced them to Belvedere Castle. He comes from the U.S. Weather Bureau, he had discovered that after this storm from the Midwest, another blizzard will unfortunately be coming from the South. This would result in the worst blizzard since 1888. He said the Bronx Zoo was closed due to the storm, but one could get there by taking the West Side IRT subway.
Perkin gave them directions out of the park, on their way to the Subway they noticed many poor and desperate people, like many closed stores and cheap items. Jack learned that was because this was the time of the Great Depression, where many people were without homes or money due to a lack of jobs. Jack gave one nickel to a beggar and another for the subway. They saw the teens again and a woman told them the zoo was off Tremont Avenue; a girl with a shawl on her head also told them when to get off. However, they weren’t at the zoo and the man at the station booth said the tracks there were buried in snow anyway. Suddenly, a taxi driver with a big furry cap and scarf offered them a ride, but the taxi got stuck on the way to the zoo.
Jack and Annie decided to rest in a nearby building and think about what to do. They were at the Cloisters, part of the Metropolitan Museum. The museum lady suggested that they instead stay there, it has many medieval exhibits like tapestries, but Jack tried to make up an excuse to leave. He decided to take Annie to the tapestry room, but to their surprise, one had a unicorn on it! It was “The Hunt of the Unicorn”, woven in the Netherlands at the end of the 1400s. The kids realized that this was the unicorn they were supposed to free, the math meant that the spell would run out that night, but he wasn’t coming out of the painting no matter how hard they tried. Just then, the teens showed up, Jack and Annie decided to hide and surprise the two. However, they weren’t Teddy and Kathleen, they were named Balor and Grinda. They are actually mean, and when they called out the unicorn, Dianthus, they prepared a black rope intending to take him back to their master! Outraged, Jack and Annie jumped out and then Dianthus also came out without changing the tapestry. Balor and Grinda introduce themselves as evil magicians from the world of magic intending to take Dianthus to the Castle of the Dark Wizard. As the four fight over the unicorn, Jack used the “Call a Cloud from the Sky” rhyme to create a fog they could escape.
Balor and Grinda gave chase as Jack and Annie rode on Dianthus’ back. The unicorn calmed the blizzard for them, making it rather pretty. He also made cars work and houses regain electricity. Once they arrived at Central Park, the sun came out, so the storm Perkins predicted wasn’t coming after all. Despite all the happiness Dianthus brought, Balor and Grinda arrived by the magic tree house, the A train was surprisingly faster than the unicorn. Just as Balor was able to get the rope around him, Annie shouted the “Turn into Ducks” rhyme transforming them into mallard ducks. She explained she memorized it ever since she first read, she really wanted to use it eventually. She and Jack told them to fly south with the other ducks for the winter, so they did.
Suddenly, the taxi driver and the girl on the train appeared, they were Teddy and Kathleen. They confessed that they did that to get them to the Cloisters and not the zoo. However, neither they nor even Merlin knew about the apprentices of the Dark Wizard, but they did inadvertently help. Teddy had actually told Merlin the clue about Dianthus’ name was a little hard, it’s Latin for Divine Flower, those two just knew it because the unicorn is famous throughout the Otherworld. They explained that the dark wizard had wanted Dianthus to prevent his goodness from being spread. Also in the cab was Merlin and Morgan, they agree that Teddy is quite the driver. Merlin explained that long ago, Dianthus was stolen from Camelot by evildoers. He was rescued by magic weavers in the Netherlands who hid him in their tapestries. Teddy and Kathleen revealed that the duck spell will wear off and few days and Balor and Grinda will be punished by the Dark Wizard for their failure. Merlin has Teddy take the black rope to Camelot to have it destroyed. For succeeding in their four missions, Merlin presented Jack and Annie with the Wand of Dianthus, which they can use to make their own magic. However, Morgan said it would only work if they tried their hardest and only for the good of others. While Teddy and Kathleen would leave for Camelot on Dianthus, Merlin and Morgan return to the taxi to explore New York some more. Before they themselves left, however, Teddy and Kathleen revealed that was indeed them that helped Jack and Annie in Venice, Baghdad and Paris.
Once Jack and Annie returned to Frog Creek, they decided to keep the books of rhymes as a souvenir. They took the wand with them, too. Jack confessed that he used the “Find a Treasure You Must Never Lose” rhyme to find Annie. However, Annie insisted that Jack was the one who got lost. They returned home to have some hot chocolate.
Notes on time and place setting[]
- Due to the mentions of summer and November, this book would take place about 3-5 months after Night of the New Magicians.
Publication Note[]
This book was originally published as book #36 of the Magic Tree House Series. In 2017 the books where Merlin sets the mission were separated from the main series and given their own numbering system.
Trivia[]
- At the beginning of the book, a line from Anne Morrow Lindbergh's poem, The Unicorn in Captivity, is shown. He stays, the Unicorn, In captivity.... Yet look again— His horn is free, Rising above Chain, fence, and tree. Just like this book, the poem was also inspired by the tapestry in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.