The Candy Shop War

The Candy Shop War

Author	Brandon Mull
Illustrator	Brandon Dorman
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre	Fantasy novel
Publisher	Shadow Mountain Publishing
Publication date	September 11, 2007
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages	404 pp (first edition, hardback)
ISBN	978-1-59038-783-2 (first edition, hardback)
OCLC	137244606
LC Class	PZ7.M9112 Can 2007
Followed by	The Arcade Catastrophe

The Candy Shop War (2007) is a children's fantasy novel by Brandon Mull about Nate, and his friends, tomboyish Summer, cool Trevor, and smart Paul (who everyone calls Pigeon, due to an incident in third grade), are given magic candy by Belinda White, the owner of a new candy and ice cream shop, but the fun turns sour when she uses their trust to do terrible things, and they have to go to John Dart, an agent that works against bad magicians, and Sebastian, another candy shop owner, but a good magician, unlike Mrs. White.

Plot summary

Eleven-year old^[1] Nate Sutter and his family move to town. Nate's mother tells Nate to talk to the kids riding in their bikes, and he reluctantly goes out and talks to the kids. The brown-haired girl is named Summer and is funny, like Nate. The chubby boy with a buzz cut is Pigeon, while the olive skin, black-haired boy is Trevor. Pigeon brings up their club, earning a glare from Summer. Nate asks to join, and Summer says that they will discuss about it, and he should come back in fifteen minutes.

When Nate comes back, Summer tells him to jump off a ramp. Nate accepts the challenge, but then a group of bullies attacks them by throwing dirt as projectiles. Nate chases after them, but they throw some more and escape. For Nate's courage, Summer lets him join for free and he doesn't need to jump off the ramp anymore.

Later, Nate is disappointed because he is put in a class with only Summer and Pigeon, not with Trevor; to his chagrin, he also gets a really strict teacher, who did not think it was amusing when Nate said his mother calls him "Honeylips." She intends to give out homework on the first day is willing to not give homework to whom could answer some questions correctly. Pigeon gets them right, though instead of no homework, he asks to be called Pigeon, which she refuses since his mom didn't call him Pigeon.

After school, the friends meet Belinda White, an old woman who owned a candy shop. She acts warm towards them and gives them penny candy, which is different each day. They help her clean the shop and other deeds and Ms. White awards them with normal, delicious candy.

Things start to get strange when she accidentally mentions "magic candy." They are eager to find out what they were and Ms. White gives them an assignment. She tells them to attract beetles and provides them strange instructions, which she says would work. It does, and they bring it back. Ms. White rewards them with what she calls Moon Rocks, claiming them to be magical. Nate and his friends doubt it, but still try it out. The claim proves to be true as the Moon Rocks make them jump high into the air and land as light as feather.

From there, they grow attached to Ms. White, doing her bidding and getting rewarded with candy, but Ms. White's tasks start to become strange. On one of the frieds' visit to her, a strange old hobo stops them, saying that Ms. White is evil. They don't believe him and proceed.

Ms. White also requests them to give all their relatives white fudge, an addicting fudge that causes the consumer to be unaware of anything and be highly addicted, so that they can do anything without rousing suspicion.

Ms. White requests them to steal a book and a wristwatch, saying that she was only "borrowing" it and that it was "rightfully hers". The friends receive Melting Pot Mixers to change their looks and their fingerprints randomly so that no one could detect their identity. Nate also receives Pixie Dust, linked to a Pixie Doll, so that the user of the candy would be unconscious as a human, but gains control of the doll, and the control of the doll stops when the user is woken up. They steal the wristwatch, but accidentally crack it, due to a mysterious man chasing after them. They barely make it with their lives.

The next task Ms. White wants them to do is to dig a grave, scaring the friends a little because the hobo mentioned "Digging graves". Nevertheless, they do it with a new candy, Sweet Tooth, which gives the user the ability to sweet-talk and convince people.

The task that shocks them is when Ms. White tells them to give a Clean Slate to Mr. Stott, saying it would erase his memories because he was "evil". Summer and Pigeon back out, but Nate and Trevor stay. A new candy, Mirror Mints, can allow the user to travel into the mirror world, but requires another mint to exit. Instead of sneaking the candy into a drink, they warn Mr. Stott and pocket the candy for something else.

There, the man John Dart tells them that Ms. White was after The Fountain of Youth, because as a young magician, her power would be bigger than as an old magician. They realize that Mr. Stott and Ms. White are both ancient magicians who were racing to the fountain, and if they both stepped outside unprotected, they would die instantly.

Summer and Pigeon return and help, and Nate and Trevor sneak into Ms. White's shop, only for Trevor to get trapped in the mirror world.

Mr. Stott sends them to find a ship with his own candy, Peak Performance gum that helps them have high agility, speed, and anything, Iron Hide, and a candy for animals only that grants them the gift of speech for 20 minutes. The bullies and Ms. White's new henchmen, Denny, Kyle, and Eric, race them.

Pigeon feeds a horse candy and the horse sends them to Mr. Stott's house, only to find Ms. White's henchmen waiting there; Nate decides to take it to his house. Ms. White's wood Indian steals the ship and Nate fails to stop him, getting grounded by his dad by having no friends over on weeknights; under the white fudge, he thinks Nate invited his friend over.

The next thing is that the Fountain's location and key are only known by a relative of it. Pigeon thinks the custodian, Gary, is one of the relatives and asks him. Gary then says his family vowed to kill anyone who asks, but because he was too kind to kill, ties Pigeon to a chair and escapes. Pigeon realizes that Kyle was listening the whole time as a Pixie Doll and cannot stop him.

Summer gets held captive, and Nate and Mr. Stott are stranded in Mr. Stott's ice cream truck. Mr. Stott tells Nate to eat the three Time Grains, the first of the past, the second of the future, and the third of the present, warning him that he cannot change the past.

Nate goes to the past as the hobo he and his friends met earlier, and failing to warn them, says what the hobo had said. The future, Nate realizes, is horrible and he comes across an elderly Pigeon who says that he was forced to get the cup, and no matter how much he tried to spill, it regenerated. Whoever turned the key turned into an old man (Kyle), whoever stepped in aged drastically (Eric, who could not walk), so they sent Pigeon. After he did, his dog followed him and was killed, while Ms. White drank the water, became a 10-year-old, and dominated the world under white fudge, making everyone her slave, and she forced Summer and Denny to eat the fudge.

As the present, Nate splits into three; one goes to rescue Trevor with his Mint, one goes to talk to the current Summer and Jonas, and the third goes to stop Ms. White.

Nate puts the Clean Slate he received earlier into the cup of water. He was unable to stop Ms. White from drinking it, but he was able to erase her memories. It ends with Nate eating a fortune cookie and turning back into a boy,(only about 7 hours older than he was before) while the clueless Ms. White stars as a protagonist in the second book as "Lindy".

Sequel

In 2012 Brandon Mull wrote a sequel to The Candy Shop War, titled The Arcade Catastrophe.^[2]

References