Summary

Chapters 1-13

A comic book illustration shows Mr. Tickham giving his wife a new, multi-terrain vacuum cleaner for her birthday. The vacuum is so powerful that Mrs. Tickham loses control of it and it drags her out into the backyard.

Chapter 1

Flora Belle Buckman is reading a comic, The Illuminated Adventures of the Amazing Incandesto!, when her mother calls up the stairs to remind her that she signed a contract promising to read true literature instead of comics. Flora ignores her. Flora is drawn to the window when she hears what sounds like a jet engine in the neighbor’s yard. Flora sees her neighbor, Mrs. Tickham, being dragged through the yard by a large vacuum cleaner. There is a squirrel in the path of the vacuum and Flora tries to call a warning, but cannot be heard over the noise of the...