Released: 28/11/2014
ISBN: 9781784620578
eISBN: 9781784628079
Format: Paperback/eBook
Philip James Longbotham is twelve. His nickname is OC and he possesses a most amazing brain. It might not go round corners but it’s a whiz at science and plays chess like a dream. It also has a nasty habit of seizing up at the wrong moment; Kitty says it only does that because it’s overloaded with maths equations. Kitty and Anna are OC’s sisters and they’re the reason Mum wants to leave home. OC’s best friend is Charles Andrew Sheridan Harris. He lives next door and goes round in an excessively speedy wheelchair. Nicknamed ‘The Cash’, his ambition is to become the world’s greatest villain and make a bankful of money. He’s not doing such a bad job of it either! While OC plays chess and does maths and science homework for lazy kids, Cash has a nice sideline in forging sick notes and shop-lifting. When a chess tournament lures the four friends to Birmingham, Cash takes OC to meet Jim Bowie, one of the all-time great villains, with the intention of asking if he can become an apprentice villain. Told they don’t hire kids in wheelchairs, Cash is devastated. If villains don’t want him, what is he to do with the rest of his life? With Cash in decline and refusing to go to school, OC attends the carol service on his own in Gloucester. He witnesses some suspicious men board his coach and recognises one of them as Jim Bowie. Remembering that Cash has warned him to never talk to Jim Bowie again, OC stays out of sight. The coach trundles him back to Bristol where the men are intending to rob a bank. Unfortunately, the bank they have chosen is where OC keeps his chess winnings, over three hundred pounds, and he’s not about to let them steal that!
'Sunset on Golden Wings' which will be published at the end of April, although it can be read as a stand alone, is actually the sequel to 'The Year the Swans Came' and also brings the five book sereies to a close.
The idea for the series happened in 2010 when I was visiting Holland to celebrate the publication of Running but it was three years before I completed the first draft of 'The Year the Swans Came'. Based on the legend, Leda and the Swan, following a suggestion made by the agent, Felicity Bryan, I also began writing The Click of a Pebble, Book 1 of the trilogy, Children of Zeus, which is about many of the same characters but at a differerent point in their lives. And whereas 'The Year the Swans Came' and 'Sunset on Golden Wings' are narrated by Maidy Bader, the trilogy is written in the 3rd person and details the lives of Yost, Zande and Tatania as they struggle to survive in a world that wants them dead.
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In 1967, considering herself to be destined for a life of mediocrity, Barbara Spencer hi-tailed it to the West Indies to watch cricket, the precursor to a highly colourful career spanning three continents in which she was caught up in riots, wars, and choosing Miss World. An award-winning children's author, over the past decade Barbara has been lucky enough to be invited to Booksignings at Waterstones throughout the Midlands and the south and west, and has visited dozens of primary and secondary schools. In 2017 Barbara decided to change horses in mid-stream and is now writing magical realism for adults and top teens.
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