Costa Book Awards-Children's Award

A young Gypsy girl is shunned by the children in her village because she lives in a covered wagon. And when her guardian great-grandmother dies, she must adjust to a new life and learn to accept life's inequities.

2009 digitally remastered edition of this lost '70s concept album including bonus material. This beautiful recording was first released with the original publication of the best selling book, The Butterfly Ball and the Grasshopper's Feast and is not to be confused with the Roger Glover album of the same title. The appeal of the well known book is expanded further by this interpretation, which places the entire text in a musical setting by composers Rod Edwards and Roger Hand previously of legendary UK psychedelic pop bands The Picadilly Line and Edwards Hand. Rod Edwards was also one third of the UK 70s folk Rock band Jade. Some of the poems are sung, with haunting melodies and fascinating sounds; while the others are effortlessly and incomparably narrated by Judi Dench and the late Michael Hordern, within a sympathetic, descriptive, orchestral tapestry. Wizzard.

Tom is so good at fooling around that he does little else. His Aunt Fidget Wonkham-Strong, who thinks this is too much like having fun, calls upon the fearsome Captain Najork and his hired sportsmen to teach him a lesson. So the Captain challenges Tom to three rounds of womble, muck, and sneedball, certain that he will win. However, when it comes to fooling around, Tom doesn't fool around, and his skills prove so polished that the results of the contest are completely unexpected. . .

Essential Modern Classics are relaunched in gorgeous new covers bringing these timeless story to a new generation. Maria likes to be alone with her thoughts. She talks to animals and objects, and generally prefers them to people. But whilst on holiday she begins to hear things that aren't there - a swing creaking, a dog barking - and when she sees a Victorian embroidered picture, Maria feels a strange connection with the ten-year-old, Harriet, who stitched it. But what happened to her? As Maria becomes more lost in Harriet's world, she grows convinced that something tragic occurred...Perfect for fans of ghostly mysteries like 'Tom's Midnight Garden'.

This beautifully poised novel chronicles the extraordinary upbringing and early adulthood of Marjory Bell in the 1920s and '30s, in a rambling South London house teeming with eccentric uncles and aunts and their hangers-on. By turns harsh, kind, immoral, hypocritical, hilarious and spiteful, they are all dominated by the baleful presence of Marjory's unrepentantly Victorian grandmother. Marjory is motherless, her father a remote, weekend visitor to 'Gran's house', where Marjory belongs, but is isolated. Gran would crush her individuality, or crush her entirely: and Marjory has to bring all her intelligence, tenacity and humour into play to survive. As she remarks at one point, 'Some of the animals in our family are nicer than some of the people.' But she does survive. Glimpses of her adult life tell us the price she pays - but how she also never loses her wit, integrity and spark for life. No End to Yesterday won the Whitbread Prize in 1977 as a children's book, but it's an adult story. Whitbread judge Lynne Reid Banks said: 'The writing showed signs of a literary gift far beyond what one normally expects in children's books or finds in adult novels. The whole environment and the period are imparted. The imagination is pricked awake by the author's skill... and finds itself capable of evoking settings, smells, textures and even the strongly "other" emotions of that earlier time.'

Official Ball of U.S. Bubble Soccer Association. Jump inside a big inflatable bubble and have at it! Leave it to those crazy Europeans to invent a sport that is spreading from Europe -- a mashup between soccer, human bowling and dodgeball. Get into a friendly game and see what everyone is talking about. Each ball is made from high-quality, durable 0.8mm PVC plastic. Battle Balls is the ONLY seller of the Battle Ball Bubble Soccer brand on Amazon. Other sellers have attempted to list under Battle Ball's name, however the products are NOT the same product, nor do they carry the same quality guarantee of the Battle Ball brand.

A thirteen-year-old boy escapes from slaughter by the Boxers in China and joins forces with an English botanist and her escort, traveling with them to Tibet where the power of Buddhist monks transforms the lives of all of them.

Set in the Cumbrian fells - the "hollow land" - this collection of stories tells of two families: one local and one from London. Read about the exploits of friends Barry and Harry, the sweep Kendal, the Egg witch, Granny Crack, the Household Word, and many other characters.

Recounts the many harrowing adventures of a group of mice and their leader Pentecost who set out to help Snake regain his inheritance and find a new home for themselves in the Lickey Hills.

This is not a fairy tale. This is about real witches.

Grandmamma loves to tell about witches. Real witches are the most dangerous of all living creatures on earth. There's nothing they hate so much as children, and they work all kinds of terrifying spells to get rid of them. Her grandson listens closely to Grandmamma's stories—but nothing can prepare him for the day he comes face-to-face with The Grand High Witch herself!

SUMMARY: Moll Swayne is a magical creature to her children, the Queen of the Pharisees, who danced in the fairy ring. The family lead a gypsy like existence in the forest until Sim is accussed of vagrancy. It is young Will who feels the force of the change that befalls the Queen of the Pharisees' children.

This is a powerful novel about a community devastated by unemployment and shaken by the fear of a terrifying beast roaming the moors - which young Bill Coward is determined to track down at any cost. It started out as a game. A game that Billy and his friend Mick play to take their minds off the fact that the mill might be closing and everyone could lose their jobs. They'll hunt down the Haverston Beast, that's killing sheep and hens and maybe even men, and kill it. So what if the farmers say it's just a dog - they know that it's real and they're out to prove it. But then Billy's dad finds out that the mill might close for ever, and suddenly the game doesn't seem so much fun any more - and the terrifying Beast might be closer to home than Billy imagined...An astonishing novel about the monster that is unemployment, and its devastating effects on a local community, "The Nature of the Beast" is as painfully truthful and relevant today as it was when it was first published, to critical acclaim, in 1985.

Gabriel has no idea what the future will hold when he runs away from his apprenticeship with the bad-tempered stonemason. But God Himself, in the shape of playmaster Garvey, has plans for him. He wants Gabriel for his angel...But will Gabriel's new life with the travelling players be any more secure? In a world of illusion, people are not always what they seem. Least of all Gabriel. Geraldine McCaughrean is considered an exceptional writer of our time. She has won the Carnegie Medal, the Guardian Children's Fiction Award, the Whitbread Award (twice) and the Blue Peter Book of the Year Award.

First published by Macrae in 1988, it was winner of the Whitbread Award, and the Friends of the Earthworm Award. A conservation issue, this is the story of Jo's fight to save a beautiful garden from being used for development. A shy girl, she has to dig deep to find the courage to achieve her quest.

Winner of the 1989 Whitbread Children's Novel Award. Part of the 1995 Scottish Book Fortnight promotion.

Paul Kagomi's most precious possession is his AK - his gun. He is a warrior, a boy soldier, trained for a terrible war in the African bush. He doesn't remember his real parents. For him his father is Michael, who leads the guerrilla group, and his mother is the war. Peace comes - and Paul buries his gun and goes to school. But it does not last. Soldiers come to burn the school and kill the children, and Paul must flee through the bush to find his gun and then...Will it be war once more or is there another way?

Tad and Cissie are on the run with Khush the elephant. Clammy-fingered, steely-eyed Hannibal Jackson will do anything to capture the animal. Maybe even kill ...Staying ahead means being faster and smarter-but how do you hide an elephant? Especially one with a mind of its own.

Let it be flour babies. Let chaos reign. When the annual school science fair comes round, Mr Cartwright's class don't get to work on the Soap Factory, the Maggot Farm or the Exploding Custard Tins. To their intense disgust they get the Flour Babies - sweet little six-pound bags of flour that must be cared for at all times.

Inez and her brother are amazed to find a huge hole being dug right outside the front door of their father's shop. Then suddenly more holes appear all over the main street and before long the cars can't use the road and everyone has to walk around balancing on planks of wood. It can only be a matter of time before the foundations give way and the whole town collapses. People are traveling from all over the country - the word on everyone's lips is Gold.

When a boy inherits his great-aunt's diary, he begins to learn fascinating things about her life, including the long-hidden secret to a family mystery, as he reads about her youthful dreams to help her father salvage ships wrecked at sea.

From the first day of their friendship, Natalie falls under the spell of bad-girl Tulip--telling lies to classmates, talking back to teachers, and playing evil tricks on people--but when Natalie tries to get away from the menace, she knows that Tulip will get the ultimate revenge."

It's a spaceship from the past - can it change the future? Aquila has been found by boys bunking off a geography field trip. They have no idea where it came from or what it does. But Geoff's discovered that when you sit in it these little coloured lights come on, and if you push one of the big blue oneS . . . WHOOSH!

David Almond's Printz Honor–winning novel is a captivating modern classic.

Ten-year-old Michael was looking forward to moving into a new house. But now his baby sister is ill, his parents are frantic, and Doctor Death has come to call. Michael feels helpless. Then he steps into the crumbling garage. . . . What is this thing beneath the spiderwebs and dead flies? A human being, or a strange kind of beast never before seen? The only person Michael can confide in is his new friend, Mina. Together they carry the creature out into the light, and Michael's world changes forever. . . .

For twelve long years, the dread fortress of Azkaban held an infamous prisoner named Sirius Black. Convicted of killing thirteen people with a single curse, he was said to be the heir apparent to the Dark Lord, Voldemort.

Now he has escaped, leaving only two clues as to where he might be headed: Harry Potter's defeat of You-Know-Who was Black's downfall as well. And the Azkban guards heard Black muttering in his sleep, "He's at Hogwarts...he's at Hogwarts."

Harry Potter isn't safe, not even within the walls of his magical school, surrounded by his friends. Because on top of it all, there may well be a traitor in their midst.

In the astonishing finale to the His Dark Materials trilogy, Lyra and Will are in unspeakable danger. With help from Iorek Byrnison the armored bear and two tiny Gallivespian spies, they must journey to a dank and gray-lit world where no living soul has ever gone. All the while, Dr. Mary Malone builds a magnificent Amber Spyglass. An assassin hunts her down, and Lord Asriel, with a troop of shining angels, fights his mighty rebellion, in a battle of strange allies—and shocking sacrifice.

As war rages and Dust drains from the sky, the fate of the living—and the dead—finally comes to depend on two children and the simple truth of one simple story.

A New York Times Bestseller
A Newsweek Top 100 Book of All Time
An Entertainment Weekly All-Time Greatest Novel
Winner of the Whitbread (now Costa) Book of the Year Award.
Winner of the British Book Award (Children's)
 
"Pullman has created the last great fantasy masterpiece of the twentieth century. An astounding achievement." --The Cincinnati Enquirer
"Breathtaking adventure . . . a terrific story, eloquently told." --The Boston Globe
"War, politics, magic, science, individual lives and cosmic destinies are all here . . . shaped and assembled into a narrative of tremendous pace by a man with a generous, precise intelligence. I am completely enchanted." --The New York Times Book Review
"Masterful. . . . This title confirms Pullman's inclusion in the company of C. S. Lewis and Tolkien." --Smithsonian Magazine