Taking A Fairy Adventure

With The Spiderwick Chronicles

(CBS)  The Spiderwick Chronicles is a series of books that tell the tale of three siblings and their adventures in the fantastical world of fairies.

Young readers met the books' heroes - Jared, Simon and Mallory Grace - last summer, when the first book in the series was published.

The book immediately became a New York Times bestseller, as did the second, third and fourth books in the series.

The Grace children's story concludes in the fifth book, "The Wrath of Mulgarath," which hits store shelves on Tuesday.

Co-creators Holly Black and Tony DiTerlizzi visit the "Early Readers Club" to offer a special preview to kids from New York's after-school program, Super Soccer Stars.

The Spiderwick Chronicles have been called "Harry Potter for the younger set." Only the author and illustrator claim that the stories are based on true accounts re-told to them by the three children.

“They claimed it was true,” DiTerlizzi says. “We thought it was such a cool story that we had to tell it. And so Holly changed their names, and we just kind of fudged it and squished it to fit in five little books.”

Each book begins with a letter to the reader, describing how Black and DiTerlizzi first met the three kids, and a reproduction of the letter the kids originally sent Black and DiTerlizzi, asking the adults to listen to their fairy adventures.

Both agreed that they had never seen any of the creatures they write about with their own eyes, but "who are we to say that fairies don't exist in kids' backyards?"

When asked if they believe in fairies, they said they were "on the fence." They have seen fairy "artifacts" - some of which they brought to The Early Show, but they have never had any run-ins with fairies themselves. Real or make-believe, they concluded, the fantasy world in which the Grace kids find themselves makes for a great story.