The first volume of the bewitching ‘Chrestomanci’ series by Diana Wynne Jones. Charmed Life arrives in an explosion of magic in this edition illustrated by Alison Bryant and introduced by Katherine Rundell.
Castle in the Air
Book 2 of the Moving Castle trilogy
Illustrated by Marie-Alice Harel
Abdullah dreams of adventure, but dreams can be big trouble in Castle in the Air, Diana Wynne Jones’s delightful sequel to Howl’s Moving Castle. This Folio edition is illustrated by Marie-Alice Harel.
£49.95
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‘The best children’s writer of the last forty years’
- Neil Gaiman
Diana Wynne Jones’s sequel to the much-loved Howl’s Moving Castle explores more of her gorgeously imaginative world, taking the story to a distant land infused with the flavours of The Arabian Nights. Castle in the Air tells the sort of fairy tale only Jones could – warm, clever and enriched with humour, like gold silk in a magical carpet. Marie-Alice Harel, winner of the ninth Book Illustration Competition, returns with more of her exquisite artwork, including six gorgeous full colour images, black-and-white chapter head illustrations, and a wraparound binding design that floats the impossible castle of the title across a night’s sky of silvery stars. This beautiful edition of Castle in the Air also features delicately glittering endpapers depicting the gardens of Abdullah’s dreams, and a splendid decorated slipcase.
Bound in printed and blocked textured paper
Set in Agfa Wile
256 pages
6 colour illustrations, 10 black & white chapter openings and a title-page spread
Printed endpapers
Printed slipcase
9˝ x 6¼˝
Abdullah the carpet seller is prophesied to become a great man, but it all seems like so much hot air until a temperamental magic carpet causes him to cross paths with a beautiful princess called Flower-in-the-Night. When his true love is whisked away by a powerful djinn, suspicion falls on Abdullah and his quiet life is unceremoniously upended. Can he find her before the furious Sultan catches up with him? Will a grumpy genie and a soldier of dubious morals help or hinder his progress? And what will happen when he becomes involved in the affairs of a certain Royal Wizard? The answers lie in a mysterious floating castle, where Abdullah will find courage, his heart’s desire and more princesses than you can shake a tiara at.
Castle in the Air is packed with all the particular delights and pleasures of Jones’s stories. The world of Howl and Abdullah is written in the language of fairy tales, yet is shot through with a marvellous pragmatism and compassion; as Marcus Sedgewick put it, she was ‘wise about the ways of people’. Harel’s illustrations capture the author’s delicious brand of chaotic magic with dreamlike hues of hazy purple, blue and orange, while each image bursts free of its framing as if it can’t sit still. As with Jones’s extraordinary magical worlds, there is a new wonder to be enjoyed around every corner, making this an irresistible edition for anyone who ever dreamed of their own castle in the air.
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