An endearing animal fantasy story from master storyteller Dick King-Smith. The story begins with a mysterious egg washed up on a Scottish beach, the morning after a great storm. Kirstie and her brother Angus find the egg and take it home. The next day it has hatched into a tiny greeny-grey creature with a horse's head, warty skin, four flippers and a crocodile's tail. The baby sea monster soon becomes the family pet - but the trouble is, it just doesn't stop growing!
Florence Nightingale, a historical drama, a superb love story - from the Richard & Judy bestselling author of EAST OF THE SUN. Catherine Carreg has grown up a tomboy, spending her days racing her ponies with Deio, the drover's son, in a small Welsh village. But Catherine is consumed by a longing to escape the monotony of village life and, with Deio's help, runs away to London. Alone in the unfamiliar bustle of the city, Catherine finds a position in a rest home for sick governesses in Harley Street, run by Miss Florence Nightingale. Then, as the nation is gripped by reports of the war in the Crimea, Catherine volunteers as a nurse - and her life changes beyond all recognition. Arriving in Scutari, she is pitched into a living nightmare and, against the passion and heroism of one of the most traumatic wars in history, she is forced to grow up quickly and painfully, and learn the hardest lessons of love and war.
Winona LaDuke is a leader in cultural-based sustainable development strategies, renewable energy, sustainable food systems and Indigenous rights. Her new book, To Be a Water Protector: Rise of the Wiindigoo Slayers, is an expansive, provocative engagement with issues that have been central to her many years of activism. LaDuke honours Mother Earth and her teachings while detailing global, Indigenous-led opposition to the enslavement and exploitation of the land and water. She discusses several elements of a New Green Economy and outlines the lessons we can take from activists outside the US and Canada. In her unique way of storytelling, Winona LaDuke is inspiring, always a teacher and an utterly fearless activist, writer and speaker. Winona LaDuke is an Anishinaabekwe (Ojibwe) enrolled member of the Mississippi Band Anishinaabeg who lives and works on the White Earth Reservation in Northern Minnesota. She is executive director of Honor the Earth, a national Native advocacy and environmental organization. Her work at the White Earth Land Recovery Project spans thirty years of legal, policy and community development work, including the creation of one of the first tribal land trusts in the country. LaDuke has testified at the United Nations, US Congress and state hearings and is an expert witness on economics and the environment. She is the author of numerous acclaimed articles and books.
An enchanting tale of magic, friendship and adventure for readers aged 9 and up - from bestselling author, Holly Webb. Olivia is the princess of Venice. So when the waters start to rise, she knows only her magic can prevent disaster befalling the city. Desperate for help, and for a friend, Olivia discovers something incredible: a water horse, hidden in the canals of the city. Invisible to most, Lucian knows the deepest secrets of the sea - secrets that could hold the key to saving the city. But can their friendship overcome those plotting against Olivia, and against Venice itself? The Magical Venice books are all share the same beautiful setting, but can be read as standalone stories. The series includes: The Water Horse, The Mermaid's Sister, The Maskmasker's Daughter, and The Girl of Glass. Discover more by Holly Webb with her Rose and Lily series - also filled with magical adventures.
'The poet of the spy story' Sunday Times A sunken U-Boat has lain undisturbed on the Atlantic ocean floor since the Second World War - until now. Inside its rusting hull, among the corpses of top-rank Nazis, lie secrets people will kill to obtain. The sequel to Len Deighton's game-changing debut The IPCRESS File, Horse Under Water sees its nameless, laconic narrator sent from fogbound London to the Algarve, where he must dive through layers of deceit in a place rotten with betrayals.
In her now classic novel Outlander, Diana Gabaldon told the story of Claire Randall, an English ex-combat nurse who walks through a stone circle in the Scottish Highlands in 1946, and disappears . . . into 1743. The story unfolded from there in seven bestselling novels, and CNN has called it “a grand adventure written on a canvas that probes the heart, weighs the soul and measures the human spirit across [centuries].” Now the story continues in Written in My Own Heart’s Blood. 1778: France declares war on Great Britain, the British army leaves Philadelphia, and George Washington’s troops leave Valley Forge in pursuit. At this moment, Jamie Fraser returns from a presumed watery grave to discover that his best friend has married his wife, his illegitimate son has discovered (to his horror) who his father really is, and his beloved nephew, Ian, wants to marry a Quaker. Meanwhile, Jamie’s wife, Claire, and his sister, Jenny, are busy picking up the pieces. The Frasers can only be thankful that their daughter Brianna and her family are safe in twentieth-century Scotland. Or not. In fact, Brianna is searching for her own son, who was kidnapped by a man determined to learn her family’s secrets. Her husband, Roger, has ventured into the past in search of the missing boy . . . never suspecting that the object of his quest has not left the present. Now, with Roger out of the way, the kidnapper can focus on his true target: Brianna herself. Written in My Own Heart’s Blood is the brilliant next chapter in a masterpiece of the imagination unlike any other.
The rescue of the last diving horse in America and the inspiring story of how horse and animal rescuer were each profoundly transformed by the other—from the award-winning animal rescuer of retired racing greyhounds and author of the best-selling Adopting the Racing Greyhound It was the signature of Atlantic City’s Steel Pier in the golden age of “America’s Favorite Playground”: Doc Carver’s High Diving Horses. Beginning in 1929, four times a day, seven days a week, a trained horse wearing only a harness ran up a ramp, a diving girl in a bathing suit and helmet jumped onto its mighty bare back, and together they sailed forty feet through the air, plunging, to thunderous applause, into a ten-foot-deep tank of water. Decades later, after cries of animal abuse and changing times, the act was shuttered, and in May 1980, the last Atlantic City Steel Pier diving horse was placed on the auction block in Indian Mills, New Jersey. The author, who had seen the act as a child and had been haunted by it, was now working with Cleveland Amory, the founding father of the modern animal protection movement, and she was, at the last minute, sent on a rescue mission: bidding for the horse everyone had come to buy, some for the slaughterhouse (they dropped out when the bidding exceeded his weight). The author’s winning bid: $2,600—and Gamal, gleaming-coated, majestic, commanding, was hers; she who knew almost nothing about horses was now the owner of the last diving horse in America. Cynthia Branigan tells the magical, transformative story of how horse and new owner (who is trying to sort out her own life, feeling somewhat lost herself and in need of rescuing) come to know each other, educate each other, and teach each other important lessons of living and loving. She writes of providing a new home for Gamal, a farm with plentiful fields of rich, grazing pasture; of how Gamal, at age twenty-six, blossoms in his new circumstances; and of the special bond that slowly grows and deepens between them, as Gamal tests the author and grows to trust her, and as she grows to rely upon him as friend, confidant, teacher. She writes of her search for Gamal’s past: moved from barn to barn, from barrel racer to rodeo horse, and ending up on the Steel Pier; how his resilience and dignity throughout those years give deep meaning to his life; and how in understanding this, the author is freed from her own past, which had been filled with doubts and fears and darkness. Branigan writes of the history of diving horses and of how rescuing and caring for Gamal led to her saving other animals—burros, llamas, and goats—first as company for Gamal and then finding homes for them all; and, finally, saving a ten-year-old retired greyhound called King—despondent, nearly broken in spirit—who, running free in the fields with Gamal, comes back to his happy self and opens up for the author a whole new surprising but purposeful world. A captivating tale of the power of animals and the love that can heal the heart and restore the soul.
"Stunning pictures and engaging words. . . . An accomplished entrée to early science topics." — Booklist (starred review) Dive into the warm ocean and swim around amid the coral and waving sea grass. Do you see an eye like a small black bead peering out at you? Linger for a while and discover the secrets of the sea horse — one of the shyest fish in the sea. With a head like a horse, a tail like a monkey, and a pouch like a kangaroo, the sea horse acts like a chameleon, changing color to ward off danger or to show that he and his mate are a lifelong pair. Watch their fascinating mating dance, as the two of them twine their tails together and twirl, before she places her eggs in his pouch to be born. Could there be a more intriguing creature of the sea? Back matter includes an index, and a note about sea horses.
