The Wolves of Willoughby Chase

A beautiful new paperback edition, featuring a delightful new Afterword by Lizza Aiken - Joan Aiken's daughter - on how the story came to be written, plus fascinating material from the author's archive to celebrate the 60th anniversary of this wild, evocative and timeless fantasy. A fast-paced Dickensian adventure set in an alternative 19th Century England - with wolves! In a period of English History that never happened, when Good King James III is on the throne, and the whole country is ravaged by wolves which have migrated through the newly-opened Channel Tunnel. Young orphans Bonnie and Sylvia fall into the hands of evil Miss Slighcarp, they need all their wits - and the help of Simon the goose-boy - to escape unscathed, for the governess is more cruel and merciless than the wolves that surround the great house of Willoughby Chase. Illustrated by Pat Marriot and filled with brilliantly-drawn Dickensian characters The Wolves of Willoughby Chase makes an excellent choice for confident pre-teen readers who like a strong plot and good characterisation. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase often appears on lists of the best books for children such as The Telegraph's Top 100 Best Children's Books and the BBC's 100 Books to Read before You're Fourteen.