Dear Friends,

Publishers and Chickens really wake up in the spring – as the longer days mean more time reading great books!

May blasts off with the latest scary underground installment in the TUNNELS sequence –FREEFALL by Roderick Gordon and Brian Williams, as our friends discover there is more than one evil empire beneath the surface, and we have much more to worry about from the latest ‘flu’ than we thought!!!

The kids in THE PICKLE KING by Rebecca Promitzer come across a grizzly evil conspiracy too – but they solve the mystery in a funny and fast moving original gang adventure which is a perfectly horrible holiday read! In our picture book world THE SNAGGLEGROLLOP by Daniel Postgate and illustrated by Nick Price, delightfully shows how the strangest pet can find love…and a home for good.

For older readers, new author Lucy Christopher confronts our fears with a real life kidnap and its consequences in STOLEN, set in the wilds of the Australian outback, it is thrilling and emotional.

Later in the summer watch out for Cornelia Funke’s bestselling climax to the INKHEART TRILOGY in paperback – INKDEATH. There is a wonderful romantic story of betrayal, love and a secret message that can save a whole civilization in Gill Arbuthnott’s THE KEEPERS’ DAUGHTER, the story of three friends who must go on the run in an imagined, but oh-so-real world of islands and old magic.

Finally in August bare your teeth for a ‘boy and his dog story’ with a difference! Di Toft’s WOLVEN is a fantastic werewolf-in-reverse story about a mutt who turns out to be a lost mystical beast, and who defeats an awful plot to engineer animals into vampires, werewolves and weapons of destruction. The first in a series, it will soon sink its teeth into younger readers’ reading muscles and have them drooling for more.

Happy reading!!!

Barry Cunningham

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WINNER OF THE TIMES/CHICKEN HOUSE CHILDREN'S FICTION COMPETITION 2009

THREADS by Sophia Bennett

A treat… elegant and funny and has real narrative verve.
DAVID ALMOND, AUTHOR

From the moment Nonie and her friend Jenny spot Crow sketching a dress wearing dungarees and a pair of pink fairy wings …you’re enchanted.
AMANDA CRAIG, TIMES

As witty as Clueless, as structured as Dior …I can’t wait for a sequined sequel.
JONATHAN DOUGLAS, NATIONAL LITERARY TRUST

After much deliberation by the judges, Threads by Sophia Bennett was announced as the winner of the second Times/Chicken House Fiction competition. The author was praised for her creation of a vibrant, funny, totally absorbing and thought provoking novel for fashion-conscious girls.

Fashion fairy tales really can happen. Nonie, Edie and Jenny are best friends. Nonie’s passion is fashion. Humanitarian Edie wants to save the world. And budding actress Jenny has just landed a small part in a Hollywood blockbuster. But when these three friends meet a young African refugee girl called Crow, sketching a dress at the Victoria and Albert Museum, they get the chance to pool their talents and do something truly wonderful.

Threads deals with modern friendships and contemporary world issues in an honest and inspirational way and Sophia Bennett’s style totally won the judges over. “It’s fashion with compassion,” says publisher Barry Cunningham.

Sophia Bennett has always wanted to write books – and as a child, adored the stories of Noel Streatfeild. ‘Every three years or so I become a penniless writer and hope for the best,’ she says. She’s mad about the fashion world and has written several newspaper articles. She lives in London with her husband and four children.