90 MAGIC WORDS "[T]he world looked amazingly brilliant, every line and shape per fectly defined. 'Shazam,' Bobby said, and laughed shakily. 'What just hap pened?'" -- Stephen King, Hearts in Atlantis (1999) "Wow! Shazam and alakazam!" -- L.D. Brodsky, Yellow Bricks (1999) • Bejesus "He looks berserk. He's scaring the shazzam out of me." -- Terry Sunbord, Nebula Express (2004) • Change, transform "[G]ive Uncle Sam time to slip off and shazam himself into the President." -- Robert Coover, The Public Burning (1977) "Shazam! With a wave of her bone she could turn herself into any thing she wanted." -- Shelly Jackson, "Bone," Juncture (200 ) • Charm, luck "[T]he team waited for him to rekindle that spark that'd lit the way all season. . . . Again and again Starks would carefully place his toes on the three-point line, as he always does, and let the ball fly, looking for that magic shazam." -- Ethan Hawke, Ash Wednesday (2002) • Confusion "Clearing their ear, rubbing their eyes, and scratching their heads with confusion, the boys said . . . 'Shazam!'" -- Doug Fields, Spontaneous Melodramas 2 (2001) • Conjuring "Yefim directs a shazam-like wave of his hands in her direction. She says the pain is gone." -- Dan Zevin, The Day I Turned Uncool (2002) "Shazam! Conjuring more storage space . . ." -- Lori Baird, Cut the Clutter and Stow the Stuff (2002) • Curse word (euphemism) "[T]he only way to stem the blurt of bad words is to sterilize your own speech. Before it's too late, get back in touch with 'Drat!' 'Shucks!' 'Shazam!' 'Golly!' 'Fiddlesticks!' and 'Gee-Willikers!'" -- Walter Roark, Keeping the Baby Alive Till Your Wife Gets Home (2001) "I was immediately distracted by my audience scan because, holy shazam, was that Liam standing at the escalator on the second level of the mall in front of The Limited?" -- Rachel Cohn, Pop Princess (2004) "What a shi -- shazam of a day." -- Carole Nelson Douglas, Catnap (1992) • Disappear, vanish "Nobody said, 'Get out of here,' it was just shazam and they were gone." -- Patty Duke, Call Me Anna (1988) "So, with a sick brother, a pigtailed beloved who would have liked to shazam me from the earth's face, a mother distracted by bills and lack of love for her husband, I spent much time alone." -- Geoffrey Wolff, Duke of Deception (1979) "It was like a magician saying 'shazam,' suddenly you disappeared." -- William Coughlin, Death Penalty (1992) "Shazzam! It disappears right before your eyes!" -- Tamson Weston, Hey, Pancakes! (200 )