Inkheart

I love these books!  Cornelia Funke brings the Inkworld to life in the fabulous Inkheart Trilogy.  In the first book, Inkheart, Meggie Folchart and her father Mortimer - known as Mo, or to some as Silvertongue, are visited by a mysterious figure, who somehow knows Mo.  But Meggie has never seen the strange man before.  Who is he?  And how does he know her father.  Eavesdropping in on their conversation, Meggie discovers that the stranger's name is Dustfinger, and he has come to warn her father about a man named Capricorn.  Mo packs up and, along with Meggie and Dustfinger, leaves their little house to, as he says, visit Meggie's aunt.  Meggie refuses to go until she knows why.  And that's when she learns about the Inkworld.  Since her father won't tell her, she learns from Dustfinger how Mo read Dustfinger, Capricorn, and one of Capricorn's henchmen named Basta, out of a book called Inkheart.  Mo has the power to read people and objects out of books.  And now Capricorn wants Meggie's father to read treasure out of books for him.  Unknown to Meggie, Dustfinger wants Mo to read for him to, but Dustfinger just wants to go home, back to the world inside the book.  When they reach Meggie's aunt Eleanor's monstrous house,  they are frostily greeted and led inside.  Eleanor is a book-collector and spends all her money on finding and buying rare and valuable books.  She doesn't trust children near her books, therefore she doesn't trust Meggie, although she loosens up a little because Meggie is a book-binder's daughter.  Mo is there to repair Eleanor's books, but Meggie knows he has another reason too, and she thinks it has something to do with the little green book she saw Mo holding before Dustfinger came.  But Mo and Eleanor won't let Meggie see or touch the book, and they hid it from her too!!  Then, when Dustfinger offers to put on a show for Meggie (Dustfinger can control fire) in Eleanor's backyard, the curious girl agrees.  Soon, weird sounds are coming from the house and Meggie wants to see what they are, but Dustfinger holds her back and she watches as Mo disappears with some strange people.  As she runs inside to her aunt, Meggie realizes that Dustfinger is gone to.  Hopeful, Meggie thinks that Dustfinger was following them to get Mo back.  Unfortunately, that's not what he had in mind.  He brings Meggie to Capricorn, who told Dustfinger that one of his men could read him back to the world inside the book.  Disappointed in the results of his lies and treachery, Dustfinger tries to help Meggie and her father escape from Capricorn.  Meggie is trapped in a cell with Fenoglio, the author of the book Inkheart.  Together, they try to come up with a plan to rid this world and the other of Capricorn once and for all.  Fenoglio tries to write a different ending to the story, but it's taking a while.  Does Mo have that much time to rescue his daughter?
(The other two books are called Inkspell and Inkdeath)