Synopsis: Ottoline Brown is no ordinary girl. Her parents travel the world while she is looked after by a small, hirsute Norwegian bog man named Mr Munroe and a parade of domestic helpers. She likes mysteries and puzzles and clever plans. She wears odd shoes. She has a bear living in her laundry room. She has a diploma in disguise from the Academy of Subterfuge. And she is more than a m ...

Synopsis: When a monster is born there are two possibilities – either it’s a Faraway–in-the-forests monster or it’s an under-your –bed monster. If it’s a Far-away-in-the-forests-monster, that’s that. But if it’s an Under-your-bed-monster, there are two possibilities-…And so the story goes on with a constant refrain which eggs the re ...

Synopsis:When Tamar's grandfather, an intensely private man, falls from a balcony to his death, he leaves behind a box with Tamar's name on it. For a long time Tamar refuses even to think about it...until one hot June day she opens it to reveal a series of clues and hidden messages from her grandfather. She and her cousin Johannes follow the clues and discover that her name also ...

Synopsis:Robert is a boy who can do anything - or so old Edith Sorrel at the nursing home tells him. Robert doesn't think so, knowing as he does that he is the school geek. Niker, the bully, challenges Robert to spend the night at old Chance House with him - but who will prove to really be the strongest?

Review: As part of the "Elders' Project", twelve ye ...

'Synopsis: I Had a Fucking Talking Fucking Brain Tumour'. As if school bullies and his mum's tofu sandwiches weren't enough for Hector Brunty, he now has another problem: a talking brain tumour...

Review: At first Henry is the perfect alter-ego, but soon he is trying to make life and death decisions Hector finds less attractive. Winner of the 2006 Bo ...

Synopsis: This beautiful picture book is the story of a boy who discovers a penguin on his doorstep one morning and, assuming the penguin is lost, embarks on a quest to return him to his home. A long journey to the South Pole and a sad parting makes him realise the truth, that the penguin is not lost but lonely. This wonderful story about loneliness and friendship has won both the Nestle ...

Review: This beautifully translated book first appeared in French more than twenty years ago, and the fact that it has at last become available in an English translation hopefully says something about the increased interest taken today, by both publishers and readers, in books written in other languages. If this kind of quality is generally replicated in translated books, it is to be ho ...

Synopsis: Daisy is sent from New York to England to spend a summer with cousins she has never met. They are Isaac, Edmond, Osbert and Piper. And two dogs and a goat. She's never met anyone quite like them before - and, as a dreamy English summer progresses, Daisy finds herself caught in a timeless bubble. It seems like the perfect summer. But their lives are about to explode. Fallin ...

Synopsis: In a fractured realm, struggling to maintain an uneasy peace after years of civil war and religious tyranny, a twelve-year-old orphan and her loyal companion, a large and homicidal goose, are about to become the unlikely heroes of a revolution. Mosca Mye has spent her life in a miserable hamlet, where her father was banished for writing inflammatory books about tolerance and f ...

Synopsis: When Samuel Godwin, a young and naive art tutor, accepts a job with the Farrow family at their majestic home, little does he expect to come across such a web of secrets and lies. His two tutees are as different as chalk and cheese - the beautiful younger sister Marianne, full of flightiness and nervous imagination, and Juliana, oddly sensible and controlled. Assiste ...