adventure

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Ember Shadows and the lost desert of time by Rebecca King and Raquel Ochoa

Most of us assume that we have a right to self-determination and the idea that we are restricted by a fate that is given to us at birth, is something that we might have real problems with.  This is the idea behind the adventures of the feisty Ember Shadows.  In the first book she is looking forward to receiving her fate card, which will decide if she can follow her dream of being an inventor; however, things do not happen as she hopes.  Firstly, there is no fate written on her card and then her younger sister receives her card, saying that she only has a short while to live.  This leads to a fantastic adventure as Ember tries to change the way that the fates work.

Thankfully the second book sees our heroine very much alive, as is her sister Juniper.  At the end of the first book Ember manages to solve the riddle of the fate cards and gives everyone back the freedom to choose; however, for many people, especially the adult this is proving to be a very difficult option.  There had been safety in the old system and they have problems coping with having choice. Someone is taking this fear to an extreme and they are gathering the strands of fate and cutting them, so that the owners are killed.  Ember and her brilliant sidekick Hans (yes, he is a hand from a clock, brought to life by magic) decide that they need to try and stop any further disasters taking place.  They meet a wide variety of characters on the way, from giant spiders to mon-keys (who manage the weather patterns), but there is always the lurking menace of the line cutter.  The author manages to throw a lot of red herrings in our path and especially in Ember’s way, so that she is often caught out in her thinking about the culprit.  The denouement sees an unexpected villain and an upsetting discovery about someone she had thought was a friend.

I absolutely love the main theme of this book , about letting people make their own decisions and allowing ourselves to make mistakes, learn from them and then try again.  These are very important life lessons and together with the thoughts around family (and what that really means) there is a lot to make us think and to act s a start from some very important discussions.  However, there is also a theme around Ember’s love of inventing and this is such an important message to be passing on to young girls especially today.  Science and Engineering are equally as important for girls and boys, yet we still have a conscious or unconscious bias against this choice.  This really is a superb series for the middle grade and I can’t wait for book three to appear next year.  A five star series.

About the author

Rebecca King was born in Wolverhampton and spent her childhood in a
village called Sound in Cheshire.
She studied Journalism at the University of Portsmouth and has worked
as a reporter and a primary school teacher, including three years
teaching in China. She was inspired to write Ember Shadows and the
Fates of Mount Never after visiting Mount Everest, in search of her
Tibetan heritage.
She now lives in Bratislava, Slovakia, with her partner and her Chinese
rescue dog, Mushu.

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The Sundae Delivery Service by Holly Rivers

I was asked to take part in this blog tour just before I went on holiday, so the story stayed at home waiting for my return.  Oh, how I wished that I had taken it with me (the explanation will follow shortly.)  I had the great pleasure of reviewing Holly’s previous book about “The Boy in the Post” and so it was delightful that I would be able to enjoy the new adventure featuring the three Shalloo siblings, Orinthia, Seafra and Taber.

In this book they are back in their village of Little Penhallow and are excited because an Ice Cream parlour, called the Two Scoops Creamery, is opening up and offering FREE cones to the first one hundred customers.  Well, I would have done exactly what the children did, although I don’t think I could run as fast as they can.  The problem is that everyone else wants the free treats; luckily the children meet up with Dotty, the daughter of the two owners and they manage to wangle their ices.  This is the start of a great friendship, especially between Dotty and Orinthia.  When  Pem and Pandora, Dotty’s mothers, announce that they are about to take part in an international Ice Cream competition called the “Golden Udder Award” and it is in Norway, things start to get exciting.  Together with Dotty and Orinthia (plus two cows called Fosse and Falaise)  the team head to Bergen on board their favourite ship the Mollusca, complete with their friend Mog.

This sounds like a really warm and cuddly story, but no, someone is out to destroy their chances of winning the competition and they find numerous problems are put in their way; culminating in the theft of the two cattle, without whom they would not have the right kind of milk for their Jam Roly-Poly Ice Cream.  Yet again Orinthia is called upon to use all her ingenuity to find out who is the enemy and then to make sure that the Two Scoops Creamery are able to take part in the competition.  Yet again we have a wonderful mix of adventure, intrigue and humour, with our heroes managing to lurch from one crisis to another, but always winning out in the end.  There are really strong theme around the concept of family and although our heroes have a very positive experience, we also get to see what happens when the wider family employs a moral blackmail in order to achieve their aims.

Image is from the official website, thank you to them for a superb photo.

What is so great is that we get to learn about Bergen and in particular its famous Funicular called the Floibanen, although I am still not sure how the enemy was able to undertake one of their activities.  You will have to read the book in order to find out!

At the beginning of this article I said I wished that I had taken this on holiday with me, and that is because I have been on a cruise to Norway, starting at Bergen.  The story brought back so many lovely memories, especially of the Funicular and the amazing views that you get from the top, but it also reminded me of the arrival into Bergen and the astounding scenery surrounding it.  Thank you Holly for creating such a wonderful story and for giving us an insight into the beauty of another country.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Author: Holly Rivers

Holly grew up in a real-life children’s book, playing the part of Drusilla in ITV’s The Worst Witch alongside Felicity Jones. She spent her childhood in Wales, wishing that she was Pippi Longstocking, and after graduating spent time working as an actor, broadcaster and cheese-seller, until one day she had the idea to pen a story about a tenacious young inventor named Demelza. Holly’s days are now spent penning new stories as well as leading drama, craft and bushcraft classes for children. She lives in Brighton with her girlfriend and still wishes that she was Pippi Longstocking.

 

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Moonflight by Gill Lewis and Pippa Curnick

As a fan of books by Gill Lewis, I was delighted to be asked to take part in this blog tour.  The book itself is a fabulous tale of adventure and overcoming the limits that are placed on us (often by those who love us best).  Thank you so much to Gill for agreeing to answer these questions for me and many thanks to everyone at David Fickling books for publishing the book and asking me to be involved.

 

  • Moonflight is a very different story to those that we often associate with you. Have you always wanted to write this type of book and if so, have other authors been an influence on this?

My other stories are very grounded in the real world and are often about conservation with the human characters telling the story. I ventured into anthropomorphism with A Street Dog Named Pup, but Pup does live essentially as a dog in the modern human world. I suppose as a writer one can get pigeonholed into one genre, but I think most writers have a variety of stories they want to tell. I did enjoy being released from detailed factual research and building the world of the highly anthropomorphised Dockland Rats.

As a child, the stories I wrote were about small people or animals having adventures, and it has been wonderful to immerse myself in these worlds again. I have always enjoyed stories such as Despereaux by Kate Di Camillo and the world of the mice she created. As a child I loved Paul Gallico’s book Jennie, about a boy transformed into a cat after a car accident. I also love the Disney films of The Rescuers. I think children can relate to small creatures being the heroes of the story.

 

  • What gave you the idea for a hero who was so restricted in his lifestyle? Did lockdown have any impact on your thought process?

Lockdown had a huge impact. I was lucky that we had a big garden and access to local walks, but our lifestyles were so restricted in the first lockdowns. I remember feeling claustrophobic with a need to escape. And so, I escaped into Tilbury’s world, following him on his adventures, the twists and turns of the story happening organically as I wrote. I think I needed a change from my usual stories that are based in the real world, and to travel to new unexplored worlds. The infinite realms of the imagination were my portals out of reality. Lockdown also made me feel a little institutionalised, and anxious to venture out when Lockdown was lifted. A trip to London seemed a huge undertaking. I really felt I understood Tilbury’s paradoxical desires for adventure and yet to stay at home and never leave.

 

  • A main element of the story is about family and the importance of allowing the young to find their own way in life. Does modern life make us more wary of giving freedom to young people?

This is a hard one to answer – yes and no, I suppose. I think my early childhood had more freedoms than that of my own children’s – I lived in a suburban street and I played outside all the time, at friends’ houses, in local woodland even when we were really quite young. I didn’t have to say where I was going or what time I’d be back, I just had to turn up before dark or for tea. I think parents are more worried by stranger danger and dangerous traffic on roads these days. But also sadly, a problem of modern life, especially in urban areas is that are fewer places to play outside as many places may be developed for housing. My own children grew up in a rural area, but the small roads were so busy, and used as cut-throughs for local traffic, that cycling and walking were not very safe. Like all mothers, Tilbury’s Ma wants to protect her little son as much as she can, but of course, she cannot protect him forever. She must be brave and let him begin to find his way in the world, letting him test his own boundaries. Even Tilbury’s Pa must remind Ma that they were young rats once in search of adventure. But Ma will always there for Tilbury with a hot dinner and a warm bed if he should need it.

  • There are several very strong themes around greed, trust, cultural history and beliefs. Were they part of your original plans, or did they develop as the story grew?

These themes developed as the story grew. Part of the story was inspired by the myths behind the Koh-i-Noor diamond, a priceless diamond in the Crown Jewels. Queen Victoria gained this diamond by deception from the then 11-year-old Sikh Maharaja, Duleep Singh. This diamond has many stories woven around it, and different claims to its ownership. Queen Victoria would never have wanted to admit to the deception and may indeed have convinced herself she lawfully gained it. But this diamond also holds a curse such that no royal male ever dares wear it. Maybe the curse itself is a story, a hidden narrative of guilt, lies and bloodshed that cannot be ignored.

In Moonflight, I wanted to explore the stories we tell ourselves, those narratives we weave around our own lives to protect us and validate who we are. Sometimes it can be difficult to challenge those stories. I wanted to put Tilbury, a timid little rat, into a tale where he has to search for the truth, and in doing so, gain a greater understanding of himself too.

 

  • Finally, are we likely to see more stories set in this magical world?

At the moment I don’t have any plans, although if there were to be a spin-off I think it would follow Nimble-Quick on her travels. The first draft of Moonflight had other rat groups that ended up being cut from the story. I’d particularly like to revisit the City Rats, large domestic fancy rats that live in the top of the Shard and collect shiny watches and other bling. I’d also like to delve into the Elders’ possessions in the Tower of London, acquired and stolen over the centuries. An earlier draft of Moonflight included a rather mature piece of cheese from the original piece that Samuel Pepys buried to protect in during the Fire of London. So will there be more stories? Not right now, but maybe watch this space!

This really is a highly recommended story and gets  five stars from me.  I do so hope that we will have more stories from this magical world.

 

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The Uprising: the Mapmakers of Cruxcia by Eirlys Hunter

The first thing to say about this book is that it is the sequel to “The Mapmakers’ Race”, which makes this a very exciting prospect indeed.  For those who have not read the first book, it follows the adventures of the four Santander children as they go in search of their explorer father, who has disappeared on his latest expedition.  They undertake a gruelling challenge called the “Mapmakers’ Race”, hoping to win enough money to continue their search.  Despite dastardly competitors (not quite Whacky Races) they actually win and thanks to some teasing information they start out on a new adventure.

Gecko Press, 9781776574049

In “The Uprising”, the quartet of Sal, Joe, Francis and Humphrey are joined by their mother, as they follow their information to the small community of Cruxcia.  They find that the area is under threat from a gigantic corporation called the Grania Trading Corporation, who have already appointed the local governor and want to take over the whole of the valley around the local mountain.  The family find themselves in danger from the agents of the corporation, as well as from very unscrupulous map makers, who we met in the first book.  As they begin to uncover the machinations of the giant corporation, the Santanders find themselves helping the local people who are trying to save their homes and land from the outsiders.  Their adventures take us on a helter skelter ride as they face dangers that are both natural and also man-made, so hang on to your hats as we follow these intrepid mapmakers.

I am delighted to say that Eirlys Hunter has written this fascinating insight into her longing for adventure and how it was often thwarted by the adults in her life, when she was a child.  This is probably why her heroes are able to go off and have adventures, sharing them with others of a similar age.  This is yet another fantastically exciting  story as the children continue their quest and find themselves getting closer to finding their father.

Searching for adventure

When I was young, I liked reading about families, and I liked reading about children who were competent. Who knew about motorbikes, or how to care for horses, who sailed boats, put on plays, or acted in films. Most of all, the children in my favourite books managed to have adventures, adventures that rarely involved adults, and never involved parents. 

My sister and I wanted to have adventures more than anything. We lived in London, it should have been possible, but we just didn’t know how to go about it. Once, we persuaded our mother to drive us a long way from home and leave us to get back on our own with just our pocket money. It was exciting to be in an unknown street, miles from anywhere familiar, but then we turned round the first corner and there was the tube station by our mother’s work. We were home in less than an hour. Why did we go on the tube instead of, say, seeing where the first bus that came along would take us? Tragic.

We got our father to drop us at the head of the loch one holiday, with our expedition’s provisions. It was a four-mile walk along a straight road beside the loch to get back to Granny’s house, but long before we got there, the old Ford Consul pulled up and our father insisted we hop in.

We had our last stab at adventure the summer holiday I was thirteen. My sister and I left the campsite in the Italian Alps where we were staying with our parents. We said we were going for a walk, but we didn’t mention that we were going to try to touch the snow that we could see high above the valley. We climbed for hours, desperate for adventure. Then we touched the dirty old snow, and walked all the way back down the endless zigzag path to the tent. Our mother was beside herself – certain that something terrible must have happened. It was all so disappointing. It would have been so much more exciting if we’d been in a book.

I never managed to have an adventure when I was a child, but I nowadays I can invent children, write about them, and give them adventures. And the first thing I always do, is get rid of the parents. And if you read The Mapmakers books you’ll find out how I turned that disappointing hike to touch snow into a proper adventure.   

The Uprising: The Mapmakers in Cruxcia is out now in paperback (£7.99, Gecko Press)

 

 

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Antigua de Fortune of the High Seas by Anna Rainbow and Oli Hyatt

This is the second book about Pirates that I have had the pleasure of reading in the last few months.  this one is aimed at a slightly older audience, age 8 years and above and definitely makes it onto the reading list for “Talk like a Pirate” day.

Tiggy (short for Antigua) wants to lead a life of adventure and perhaps even be a pirate.  She wants to spend time down by the harbour with her friends Marina and Felipe, but unfortunately, she is a young lady and has to wear long dresses and even attend her first dance at the Governor’s Ball.

During the celebrations to commemorate the freeing of the town’s boys, based around  a legend about the ‘Pirate King’ who had taken all the boys and turned them into Sea Golems in the distant past, history seems to repeat itself.   A band of sinister pirates and a giant squid, attack the island and make off with all of the young boys, including Tiggy’s younger brother; she and her friends decide to try and free the captives.  Mysterious mental messages from a mermaid and the fact that Tiggy’s friend Marina is the daughter of a Selkie helps them in their quest.    Importantly,  how can this threat be defeated?

Although there is no real location for the island on which they live, the authors have very strongly given the setting a feel of the Caribbean, but with strong links to Spain, with the use of Madre and Padre  as well as some of the characters’ names.  They have created a world that we can associate with, but which has magical elements that weave a wonderful  and complex place.  You can absolutely feel the heat and hear the sounds of the busy Caribbean Port, together with the rich diversity of characters that are found there.

This is a roller coaster of a story in which the Swash has never before been so Buckled!  It is a fantastic story for the KS2 reader and gives the opportunity to explore themes such as identity, belonging, family, as well as folk tales and legends.  There are wonderfully strong characters, so that this book will appeal to both girls and boys.  It is also a great starting point for some very creative art and writing.  I definitely hope that we will see some more adventures for Antigua and her friends.  Thank you to Anna for this short post that she has given, sharing the background to the Selkie theme that is so important in the book.

 

An introduction to Selkies

By Anna Rainbow

One of the oceanic myths of particular interest to Oli and me was that of the selkie. Unlike the better known mermaid, who is permanently a human with a fish tail, the selkie is a shapeshifter, most commonly a woman who can exist as a seal in water, and then upon shedding her seal skin, change into a human form on land.

A main theme of our book was trying to reconnect landlubbers with the ocean, and promoting the synergy between land and sea, so the selkie seemed to encapsulate this theme perfectly — a person (or a seal) who could live in and enjoy both environments. Someone who values both habitats equally is far less likely to dump plastics in the waves and destroy marine life with pollution.

But it wasn’t just this that fascinated us, it was the dark feminist twist on the tale, something we weren’t aware of before we started our research. A common tale about Selkies is that should a man steal her selkie skin, he can make her his bride. Perhaps symbolic of the power, the identity and freedom, taken from women when they become a wife, especially in the olden days. Or perhaps even deeper, the power taken from women they are born into a patriarchal society.

It was therefore important to us that the Selkies in our story were strong women who kept hold of their seal skins. It is no coincidence that Gabriella, a well known Selkie and Mother to Antigua’s best friend, Marina, is a single Mother who has kept her powers. On the flip side, woman generally don’t give their power away, it is stolen by men, so it was equally important that the men in our book did not steal our Selkie’s skin.

That is not to say that all men steal women’s power, of course not, but Antigua de Fortune of the High Seas is a feminist book, with a strong female lead who rescues all the boys of her island, and we wanted this reflected in our mythology too. It was important to us that we invented a world where Selkies keep hold of their own skin, and men don’t attempt to steal it.

ANTIGUA DE FORTUNE OF THE HIGH SEAS by Anna Rainbow and Oli Hyatt is out now in paperback (£6.99, Chicken House)

 

About Oli Hyatt & Anna Rainbow
ANNA RAINBOW grew up and still lives in North East England and works as a Clinical Psychologist with people with disabilities. Anna loves music and has always been in various choirs, singing quartets, bands, and orchestras. In 2015 she was shortlisted for the Times/Chicken House Children’s Fiction Competition which led to Chicken House publishing The Fandom, her series for young adults (as Anna Day) – it sold in 24 territories and was optioned for TV development by Fox. This is her debut middle-grade novel.  Find out more at annadaybooks.com and follow her on twitter @annadayauthor

OLI HYATT is based in Kings Sutton and is the co-founder of BAFTA award-winning animation studio Blue Zoo. He is also the Director of Alphablocks Limited, the company behind the popular CBeebies phonics shows, Alphablocks and Numberblocks. He is also the chair of Animation UK and was awarded an MBE for his services to the animation industry. This is Oli’s debut novel. Follow Oli on twitter @HyattOli

Antigua de Fortune of the High Seas is Oli and Anna’s first co-authored book together.

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The Eye of Mogdrod by Derek Keilty and Mark Elvins

There is something quite fascinating about pirates and even ex-pirates; the stories have been sparking  the imagination of readers both young and old for many years.  As a child my first encounter with the idea was watching episodes of ‘Captain Pugwash’ on the television and then later on discovering the wonders of ‘Treasure Island’.  If I thought really hard about it, I am sure that there were other pirates in books, but I definitely remember those to be found in the swashbuckling adventures of actors such as Errol Flynn and Burt Lancaster; Sunday afternoon was full of old films that kept us happy on a cold winter’s day.  Today we have the whole range of films such as ‘Pirates of the Caribbean’ and ‘The Goonies’, as well as a host of books for all ages.  As a librarian for a School Library Service I was constantly being asked for collections of titles about pirates and whilst there are lot of amazing titles about real-life buccaneers, it is also fantastic to be able to create imaginary worlds with a wide range of characters.  This would definitely have been part of my collection at work..

Flyntlock Bones is the unlikely hero of this series for all serious wannabee pirates.  He is the cabin boy aboard the vessel “The Black Hound” , but the crew are not what you might expect.  They are all ex-pirates and have become ‘Pirate Investigators’ who help retrieve stolen treasure.  This second adventure sees them asked to retrieve a precious gold goblet that has been stolen from Fergus McSwaggers, the chief of one of the clans in the Boglands; the only problem is that he is the brother of the cook on board the ‘Black Hound’ and they have not spoken for quite a while.  The plot deepens as they try and discover who has stolen the goblet.  The consensus is that it was probably a giant cat-like creature called the Mogdrod, that is feared but rarely seen and is said to love shiny things.  When Flyntlock, his friend Red and the rest of the crew are captured by Gretel the Sea Witch, they discover that Mogdrod is her ‘Kitty’ and that she had taken the goblet.  To further complicate the story, the treasure is then taken by the Ice Pirates and it is up to the crew to rescue it again.

This is a fantastic and very funny story for the young reader, who is just growing in confidence.  The author has this real ability to make even the most fantastic of stories seem real.  His previous series about an elfling sky cowboy called Will Gallows has been a favourite of mine for a few years now.  As you can see from the images, Mark Elvin has produced the most amazing illustrations that bring the story to life and which are so intricate that the reader can spend quite a bit of time working their way through all of the detail.

I was delighted to be asked to join in the celebrations for the launch of this brilliant book and I look forward to reading further adventures in the future.

If you love this story as much as I did, why not read some more pirate adventures and take part on “Talk Like a Pirate day” on Sunday 19th September this year.

 

Derek Keilty

Meet the author

Derek KeiltyDerek Keilty lives in Belfast and is the author of over ten books for children. His work has been translated into many different languages, selected for the Richard and Judy Club and shortlisted for the Children’s Books Ireland Book of the Year.

 

Mark Elvins Personal website

Derek KeiltyMark Elvins lives in Yorkshire. When he’s not drawing pirates he’s a print-maker and recently won an English Heritage competition to illustrate the displays at Whitby Abbey.

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what’s on the top of the book pile?

With half term fast approaching, I am starting to look at sorting my reading pile for the break.  At the moment there is “Dodger” by Terry Pratchett, “Oblivion” by Anthony Horowitz, “Four children and It” by Jacqueline Wilson and those are just the big names.  So look out for what I think about them after the break.  I will also be looking at the shortlisted titles for the Centurion book award, which means I will have to spend some time sitting in a comfy chair – it’s hard, but someone has to do it!