In Deadman's Castle, Igor and his family are on the run from a man bent on revenge and danger is lurking around every corner—perfect for young readers with a taste for mystery and adventure.I told myself it was impossible that the Lizard Man was there. He had never found us on the first day. Twice my father had heard him prowling around a new house in the first week. And in the first month . . . Well, that had happened more times than I wanted to think about. Ever since he was five years old and his father witnessed a terrible crime, Igor and his family have been on the run from the Lizard Man, a foreboding figure bent on revenge. They've lived in so many places, with so many identities, that Igor can't even remember his real name.But now he is twelve and longing for a normal life. When the people his dad calls the Protectors finds his family yet another new place to live, Igor's dad sets down the rules establishing how far Igor can go in any...

Separated from his siblings in the midst of a dangerous forest fire, 11-year-old Virgil must find a way to survive using only his wits and the lessons his late mother taught him about the wilderness.Virgil is making his older siblings trek to a mountain lake on a trip unlike any they’ve have taken before. They carry precious cargo: the ashes of their beloved mother, who asked that her remains be scattered at her favorite spot. But when a forest fire is sparked by a bolt of lightning at the exact moment when their van breaks down, the journey quickly turns to disaster. While the oldest, Josh, is gone to find help, Virgil and his sister, Kaitlyn, spot fleeing animals and soon see flames flickering above the tree line. Once the sky begins to darken with the haze of burning timber, Virgil finds himself separated from his sister and left alone in the wilderness. He isn’t sure he can make it, but with the memory of his late mother, a science teacher,...

Nicknamed after his hometown of Kakabeka, Canada, Kak dreams of flying with the Allied bombers in World War II. So at 16, underage and desperate to escape his abusive parents, he enlists in the Canadian Air Force. Soon he is trained as a wireless operator and sent to a squadron in England, where he's unabashedly gung ho about flying his first op. He thinks the night ops over Germany will be like the heroic missions of his favorite comic-book heroes. Good will vanquish evil. But his first time out, in a plane called B for Buster, reveals the ops for what they really are--a harrowing ordeal.The bombing raids bring searchlights . . . artillery from below . . . and night fighters above hunting to take the bombers down. One hit, Kak knows, and B for Buster, along with him and his six crewmates, could be destroyed.Kak is terrified.He can't confide his feelings to his crew, since he's already worried that they'll find out his age. Besides, none of...

As Tom Tin nears Australia, where he's to serve a lengthy sentence for a murder he didn't commit, he and his fellow convict, Midgely, plot their escape. No matter that the ship carrying them and the other juvenile criminals is captained by Tom's father. Tom knows his father can't help him clear his name and regain his freedom-not as long as Mr. Goodfellow, a man who wants the ruin of the Tin family, wields power back in London. So Tom and Midgely decide to go overboard! So do other boys who seize their chance at liberty-boys who aren't so innocent, and who have it in for Tom.To make things worse, the islands in the Pacific look inviting, but Tom remembers his father's warnings: headhunters and cannibals lurk there! The boys go anyway. And as conflict among them mounts, as they encounter the very dangers Captain Tin spoke of, Tom must fight to keep himself and Midgely alive.

From BooklistDespite the title, this compelling story-within-a-story is not about giant slayers, but about children with giant spirits. Eleven-year-old Laurie Valentine has a lonely life but an active imagination. When her one and only friend, Dickie, is diagnosed with polio in 1955, she visits the hospital to tell Dickie and other stricken children a magical story about Jimmy, a destined giant slayer. Besides Dickie, there is Chip, an orphaned farm boy, and Carolyn, a 14-year-old girl who has been inside an iron lung for eight years. The three are transformed by the story and begin to see themselves in Laurie’s characters. When the unthinkable happens, Chip, Dickie, and Carolyn narrate the tale without Laurie, revealing truths about themselves. While the author flawlessly integrates Laurie’s fantasy narration with the 1955 story, the cover art of a giant about to squash little Jimmy might throw readers off a bit. Still, this effectively shows how children face life-changing challenges with incredible determination. Grades 4-6. --Kimberly Garnick ReviewReview, The Wall Street Journal, December 5, 2009:"Young Readers...will not quickly forget this moving, imaginative glimpse of the not-so-long ago past."Starred Review, Publishers Weekly, November 16, 2009:"Distinctive, emotionally honest characters and consistently engrossing prose make this book a standout." Starred Review, Kirkus Reviews, October 16, 2009:"This profound, magical, dryly comical novel reminds readers of the power of story, but they will already be feeling it in their bones. Masterful."From the Hardcover edition.

There was once a village bred by evil. On the barren coast of Cornwall, England, lived a community who prayed for shipwrecks, a community who lured storm-tossed ships to crash upon the sharp rocks of their shore. They fed and clothed themselves with the loot salvaged from the wreckage; dead sailors' tools and trinkets became decorations for their homes. Most never questioned their murderous way of life.Then, upon that pirates' shore crashed the ship The Isle of Skye. And the youngest of its crew members, 14-year-old John Spencer, survived the wreck. But would he escape the wreckers? This is his harrowing tale.From the Trade Paperback edition.

Product DescriptionIn the forests of Siberia, in the first years of the 20th century, a white pony runs free with his herd. But his life changes forever when he's captured by men. Years of hard work and cruelty wear him out. When he's chosen to be one of 20 ponies to accompany the Englishman Robert Falcon Scott on his quest to become the first to reach the South Pole, he doesn't know what to expect. But the men of Scott's expedition show him kindness, something he's never known before. They also give him a name—James Pigg. As Scott's team hunkers down in Antarctica, James Pigg finds himself caught up in one of the greatest races of all time. The Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen has suddenly announced that he too means to be first to the Pole. But only one team can triumph, and not everyone can survive—not even the animals.From the Hardcover edition.About the AuthorIAIN LAWRENCE's previous novels include The Giant-Slayer, The Seance, Gemini Summer, B for Buster, Lord of the Nutcracker Men, Ghost Boy, The Lightkeeper's Daughter, as well as the Curse of the Jolly Stone trilogy: The Convicts, The Cannibals, and The Castaways; and the High Seas trilogy: The Wreckers, The Smugglers, and The Buccaneers.

Harold Kline is an albino--an outcast. Folks stare and taunt, calling him Ghost Boy. It's been that way all of his 14 years. So when the circus comes to town, Harold runs off to join it.Full of colorful performers, the circus seems like the answer to Harold's loneliness. He's eager to meet the Cannibal King, a sideshow attraction who's an albino too. He's touched that Princess Minikin and the Fossil Man, two other sideshow curiosities, embrace him like a son. He's in love with Flip, the beguiling horse trainer, and awed by the all-knowing Gypsy Magda. Most of all, Harold is proud of training the elephants, and of earning respect and a sense of normality. Even at the circus, though, two groups exist--the freaks, and everyone else.Harold straddles both groups. But fitting in with those who are "normal" comes at a price, and sometimes it's recognizing the truth beneath what's apparent that ultimately leads to happiness . . . and turns a boy into a...

Readers will relish this companion to the highly acclaimed adventure, The Wreckers:Young John is charmed by the Dragon, the schooner he is planning to sail to London and use for the honest wool trade. But a mysterious gentleman delivers an ominous warning to "steer clear of that ship," because the ship was "christened with blood." The ship looks clever and quick, and the crew seems to know how to man it, but with such a warning John is left to wonder how well he really knows what lies ahead. Will he heed the advice given by the mysterious man? Or will he brave the unknown on his own?From the Hardcover edition.

Award-winning author Iain Lawrence presents this modern-day adventure and classic in the making, in the vein of The Call of the Wild, Hatchet, and The Cay. Less than forty-eight hours after twelve-year-old Chris sets off on a sailing trip down the Alaskan coast with his uncle, their boat sinks. The only survivors are Chris and a boy named Frank, who hates Chris immediately. Chris and Frank have no radio, no flares, no food. Suddenly, they've got to forage, fish, and scavenge the shore for supplies. Chris likes the company of a curious, friendly raven more than he likes the prickly Frank. But the boys have to get along if they want to survive. Because as the days get colder and the salmon migration ends, survival will take more than sheer force of will. Eventually, in the wilderness of Alaska, the boys discover an improbable bond--and the compassion that might truly be the path to rescue.

About the AuthorIain Lawrence is the author of numerous acclaimed novels, including The Cannibals, The Convicts, Gemini Summer, B for Buster, The Lightkeeper's Daughter, Lord of the Nutcracker Men, Ghost Boy, and the High Seas Trilogy: The Wreckers, The Smugglers, and The Buccaneers. He lives on Gabriola Island, B. C. Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.ALL AT SEAWe steamed along below the stars, half a thousand miles from land. All I could see were the dim shapes of the boys, and the hulk of the engine in the middle of the boat. But up from the bow flew splashes of green, like emeralds sliced from the black sea. In our wake they lay scattered, swirled by the churning of our paddle wheel.All night I listened to the chant of the steam engine, the chuckatee-chickadee, chuckatee-chickadee that shook every plank and every nail. When the sun came up behind us, our smoke hung over the sea like a greasy pennant streaming from the funnel, a tattered flag that could be seen for many miles. So Gaskin Boggis pulled the fire from its box, dousing each stick over the side with a hissing gout of steam.Through eleven nights we'd bored through the blackness; through eleven days we'd drifted on a blazing sea. On this morning, our twelfth since we'd last seen land, it was Walter Weedle's turn to stand watch, to keep a lookout for the black sails of the Borneo pirates. As usual, he went grumbling to his place atop the dwindling pile of firewood."There's some what never take a turn," he said, with a dark look in my direction. "Should be turn and turnabout, that's what I say."Only Midgely bothered to argue. "No one minds what you say, Walter Weedle. You can hop it, you can."Weedle's clumsy feet knocked the logs askew. "There ain't no pirates. We ain't seen a pirate yet. Don't know why we have to stop at dawn.""'Cause you're a half-wit," cried Midgely. In his blindness he was squinting toward the engine, mistaking its shape for Weedle. "Try steering by the sun, and you'll go in circles, you stupid. But the stars is like a compass, and that Southern Cross is the needle. Ain't that so, Tom?""Yes," I said."It's going to lead us home. Ain't it, Tom?""Of course," I said, as though I actually believed him. Midge thought the Southern Cross hung in the sky like a painted sign. He didn't know how strange and pale a thing it was, so hard to find that I wasn't certain I had ever really seen it. I feared we were already lost."Tell him about them other islands, Tom," said Midgely. "Tell him how the Cross will take us there." He rattled off their names again, the Cocos, the Chagos, the Mascarenes. "We can't miss 'em, can we? We'll hop from one to the other like on skipping stones."He was smiling now, proud as Punch of this notion of his. He had made it sound so simple that we'd all believed it was possible. We had tackled the oceans as only boys might dare to do, chasing the Southern Cross toward islands rich with food and firewood. But now, if we didn't find land within the week, we would have no water left to drink, no food to eat, no wood to burn.The sea was too huge, the sun too hot. I felt like a candle melting away. Weedle and Boggis and Benjamin Penny were as brown as old figs, while poor Midgely--red and peeling--looked like a lobster boiled in his skin.He was taking shelter now as the sun climbed over the bow. He tucked himself into the shade of a sea turtle's shell, the last remains of a beast we had slaughtered ten days before. It was nearly as long as Midge was tall, and the boy peered out from one end like the turtle itself.His eyes were gray, almost covered by his drooping lids. It seemed at times he had no eyes, when all I could see were the darkened crescents below his lashes. But he still smiled in his cheerful fashion. "All's bob, Tom," he said. "We'll reach them islands tomorrow, I think."I didn't understand how he could never lose hope. I felt like flinging myself down in the kicking tantrum of a child, screaming about the unfairness of it all. I was the owner of a fabulous jewel, of a wealth beyond imagining. I had only to get home to London to claim it. But the Fates, it seemed, would never allow me that.As I settled down beside Midgely, my thoughts ran their endless circle, beginning--as always--with the notion that I was cursed by the Jolly Stone. I believed absolutely that it brought ruin to all who touched it, and I vowed that I would one day unearth the jewel from its London grave just to pass on the curse to Mr. Goodfellow. I imagined with great pleasure how his greedy eyes would glow when I put the stone into his butter-soft hands.Then, as always, doubts leapt in to chase this thought. How could a simple stone, a thing of the earth, carry such unearthly power? Wasn't Mr. Goodfellow really to blame? It was he who had sent my father to debtors' prison, and me to the South Seas in the hold of a convict ship. Give the diamond to him? Hardly! I would keep the stone for myself, and use its wealth to crush the man like a cockroach.But what if the Stone were cursed, I wondered; and round I went again.I could sometimes spend hours thinking in circles. But today I had only begun when the boat suddenly rocked, and my head banged against its ribs. Benjamin Penny shouted, "Watch where you're going, you great oaf!" Gaskin Boggis was moving to his place beside the engine. That was where he always slept, nestled with the machinery. To him it must have been like a favorite old dog, a friend to be fed and watered by night, to be petted through the day.I tried to find a bit of shade behind Midgely's turtle shell. But with each roll of the boat, sunlight flashed across my face.I lay on planks that were, at most, an inch in thickness. On their other side was water so deep that it made me dizzy to think of it. What manner of things lurked down there?With the engine silenced, I could hear the slop of water beneath the boat. My horrors paraded in my mind: man-eating fishes; serpents and leviathans; storm and tempest; and every man who'd ever drowned. Of them all, this last fear was my greatest. The splash against the planks became the thrashing of lost sailors swimming up behind us. Every scratch and tap of wood was the sound of their fingers feeling at the boat, and I dared not lift my head lest I see them reaching for the gunwale.