A thrilling collection of myths, legends and ghost stories from *War Horse* author and former Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo.
Since the beginning of time, strange and mysterious things have happened here . . . At the furthest edge of Britain, where the sea gently washes over the land and myths brush against reality, lies Zennor. Set in a church town where men become beats and ghosts roam freely, these are haunting and unforgettable tales where magic lies around every corner.
Morpurgo is the master storyteller of such modern classics as *An Eagle in the Snow, Listen to the Moon*, *Private Peaceful*, and *An Elephant in the Garden. He *has written more than one hundred books for children and won the Whitbread Award, the Smarties Award, the Circle of Gold Award, the Children’s Book Award and has been short-listed for the Carnegie Medal four times.
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### From School Library Journal
Grade 5-7 Set in contemporary Cornwall, these short stories have an old-fashioned flavor of sentimental pathos. All are more of less tinged with the occult. Two involve Knockers, the little folk who bring luck to farmers; one is about a determined child who makes her way home through a storm only to find that her grieving family cannot see her ghost. In another, an ostracized boy with a twisted foot swims off to live with the seals. These tales portray a world in which kindness is a rare virtue, and good ends are sometimes achieved by dubious means: the Knockers use something very like blackmail to persuade farmer Barbery to respect his land, and the child Kate relies on a rather deceitful capitalist venture to help Miss Marney , a witchy recluse. The characters seem remote, and the dialogue is unconvincing. Children will be better served by real Cornish folk tales or by Eleanor Farjeon's longer and more sophisticated Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard (Lippincott, 1961; o.p. ) . Gale Eaton, formerly at Berkshire Athenaeum, Pittsfield, Mass.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.
### From Booklist
In this reissue collection of older stories, master British storyteller and Children’s Laureate Morpurgo spins tales of gentle fantasy, otherworldly transformations, kind deeds, and just rewards. Set on the Cornwall coast in the tiny town of Zennor, one story tells of a little girl lost at sea who encounters some old tin miners of the last century. In another yarn, a great white horse appears to rescue a farm from ruin after the farmer’s children do a good deed for a “little person” known as a Knocker. The last story of Mad Miss Marney hints, in a delightful twist, that the kindhearted but misunderstood Miss Marney, assumed to be a witch, has actually concocted the previous stories. Wonderful read-alouds, the lyrical style and fable-like plots of these tales pay tribute to the power of imaginative storytelling. Grades 4-7. --Anne O'Malley
Description:
A thrilling collection of myths, legends and ghost stories from *War Horse* author and former Children's Laureate Michael Morpurgo. Since the beginning of time, strange and mysterious things have happened here . . . At the furthest edge of Britain, where the sea gently washes over the land and myths brush against reality, lies Zennor. Set in a church town where men become beats and ghosts roam freely, these are haunting and unforgettable tales where magic lies around every corner. Morpurgo is the master storyteller of such modern classics as *An Eagle in the Snow, Listen to the Moon*, *Private Peaceful*, and *An Elephant in the Garden. He *has written more than one hundred books for children and won the Whitbread Award, the Smarties Award, the Circle of Gold Award, the Children’s Book Award and has been short-listed for the Carnegie Medal four times. ** ### From School Library Journal Grade 5-7 Set in contemporary Cornwall, these short stories have an old-fashioned flavor of sentimental pathos. All are more of less tinged with the occult. Two involve Knockers, the little folk who bring luck to farmers; one is about a determined child who makes her way home through a storm only to find that her grieving family cannot see her ghost. In another, an ostracized boy with a twisted foot swims off to live with the seals. These tales portray a world in which kindness is a rare virtue, and good ends are sometimes achieved by dubious means: the Knockers use something very like blackmail to persuade farmer Barbery to respect his land, and the child Kate relies on a rather deceitful capitalist venture to help Miss Marney , a witchy recluse. The characters seem remote, and the dialogue is unconvincing. Children will be better served by real Cornish folk tales or by Eleanor Farjeon's longer and more sophisticated Martin Pippin in the Apple Orchard (Lippincott, 1961; o.p. ) . Gale Eaton, formerly at Berkshire Athenaeum, Pittsfield, Mass. Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc. ### From Booklist In this reissue collection of older stories, master British storyteller and Children’s Laureate Morpurgo spins tales of gentle fantasy, otherworldly transformations, kind deeds, and just rewards. Set on the Cornwall coast in the tiny town of Zennor, one story tells of a little girl lost at sea who encounters some old tin miners of the last century. In another yarn, a great white horse appears to rescue a farm from ruin after the farmer’s children do a good deed for a “little person” known as a Knocker. The last story of Mad Miss Marney hints, in a delightful twist, that the kindhearted but misunderstood Miss Marney, assumed to be a witch, has actually concocted the previous stories. Wonderful read-alouds, the lyrical style and fable-like plots of these tales pay tribute to the power of imaginative storytelling. Grades 4-7. --Anne O'Malley