The Wishing Game
A children's book author invites four fans to his island home for a contest, where the winner receives his final unpublished manuscript.
Themes & atmosphere
Books in conversation with The Wishing Game
A few of the closest reads from our full list.
Where The Wishing Game keeps showing up
One of our editors' lists features this novel.
What you might want to know about The Wishing Game
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
Lucy Hart is a twenty-six-year-old teaching assistant in Connecticut who grew up on the Clock Island books and dreams of adopting a former student named Christopher.
The Wishing Game was written by Meg Shaffer and published in 2023. Shaffer is the pen name of Meg Whittaker; she has written several other novels under different names.
Loosely. The Wishing Game has been compared to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for its premise of a reclusive children's-book author inviting four contestants to compete to win his estate. The tone is more bittersweet adult literary fiction than children's fantasy.
The Wishing Game is 304 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, The Wishing Game takes most readers 5 to 7 hours to finish.
The Wishing Game is a standalone novel by Meg Shaffer, not part of a series.
The Wishing Game is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.