'The Marquis lay there, like stone, with a knife pushed into his heart. On his chest lay a piece of paper, with the words: Drive him fast to the grave. This is from JACQUES.' The French Revolution…
It is 1547 in London, and Tom is a pauper. His father sends him onto the streets of London to beg for money every day, and hits him when he brings nothing back. But Edward is a prince, the son of K…
Jan opened his wooden box and took out the silver sword. 'This will bring me luck,' he said to Mr Balicki. 'And it will bring you luck because you gave it to me.' The silver sword is only a paper …
Soon I felt something alive moving along my leg and up my body to my face, and when I looked down, I saw a very small human being, only fifteen centimetres tall... I was so surprised that I gave a …
In a hole under the floorboards Silas Marner the linen-weaver keeps his gold. Every day he works hard at his weaving, and every night he takes the gold out and holds the bright coins lovingly, feel…
One winter’s day in 1673 young John Ridd is riding home from school, across the wild lonely hills of Exmoor. He has to pass Doone valley – a dangerous place, as the Doones are famous robbers an…
When Black Beauty is trained to carry a rider on his back, or to pull a carriage behind him, he finds it hard at first. But he is lucky - his first home is a good one, where his owners are kind peo…
Careful, Connie, please. Your little sister's eyes are looking angry. Look at the sudden lines around her mouth. Connie, a sister is a good thing. Even a younger sister. 'Mercy, who are you going o…
Nani Tama looked at each of us - Dad, Auntie Hiraina, my cousin Timi, and myself. His eyes were angry. 'You fullas want me to die here in this room? Looking at these four walls? When the whakapapa…
In our world today a hummingbird is a small, brilliantly coloured bird that lives in the tall trees of tropical forests. In the far distant future, Hummingbird (Hummy for short) is a girl of sixte…
Little Mary Lennox is a bad-tempered, disagreeable child. When her parents die in India, she is sent back to England to live with her uncle in a big, lonely, old house. There is nothing to do all …
'I wish I could get through into looking-glass house,' Alice said. 'Let's pretend that the glass has gone soft and . . . Why, I do believe it has! It's turning into a kind of cloud!' A moment late…
When a large plane is hijacked, the Prime Minister looks at the list of passengers and suddenly becomes very, very frightened. There is a name on the list that the Prime Minister knows very well - …
In Edinburgh a detective listens to a confession; in Orkney an old man lives with the ghosts of his past. In the Outer Hebrides some travellers learn a lesson; in Glasgow a young woman steals a me…
Richard Walton is in trouble again. He has lost his job, and he has borrowed money from his sister, Jennifer - again. And now he has disappeared. Jennifer is looking for him, and so are the police.…
One day, a farmer tells a farm boy to take everything out of an old building and throw it away. "It's all rubbish," he says.In the middle of all the rubbish, the boy finds a beautiful old piano. He…
In the jungle of Southern India the Seeonee Wolf- Pack has a new cub. He is not a wolf - he is Mowgli, a human child, but he knows nothing of the world of men. He lives and hunts with his brothers …
All they could hear was the wind, and the waves crashing on to the rocks. All they could see was the night. They could not see the ship, broken in two. They could not see the people holding on to t…
When the children dug a hole in the gravel-pit, they were very surprised at what they found. 'It' was a Psammead, a sand-fairy, thousands of years old. It was a strange little thing - fat and furr…
There were six of them - three Katherines, two Annes, and a Jane. One of them was the King's wife for twenty-four years, another for only a year and a half. One died, two were divorced, and two wer…