Leon Garfield

A Dickensian tale of a child thief caught in the middle of evil forces. Kids who love adventure, history, and a strong protagonist will love this middle-grade classic and Carnegie Medal-winning book. Twelve-year-old Smith is a denizen of the mean streets of eighteenth-century London, living hand to mouth by virtue of wit and pluck. One day he trails an old gentleman with a bulging pocket, deftly picks it, and as footsteps ring out from the alley by which he had planned to make his escape, finds himself in a tough spot. Taking refuge in a doorway, he sees two men emerge to murder the man who was his mark. They rifle the dead man's pockets and finding them empty, depart in a rage. Smith, terrified, flees the scene of the crime. What has he stolen that is worth the life of a man? Smith is a gripping, engrossing, and utterly diverting tale of high adventure related by a writer whose scintillating style is matched only by the dazzle of his plotting. In the words of Lloyd Alexander, "Garfield is unmatched for sheer exciting storytelling. The reader simply can't stop reading him."

Harris thinks up harebrained schemes and Bostock gets in trouble for them. When Harris puts his baby sister Adelaide in the words to see if she will be adopted by a fox, little do they realize that they are starting a chain of events that will be remembered in their little seaside town as the Strange Affair of Adelaide Harris.

Mr Corbett is a cruel employer and his young apprentice Benjamin can't help but wish he were dead. Sure enough, Mr Corbett meets an untimely death, but the tables turn on the terrified apprentice who finds himself cursed with the ghost of the man he hated most in the world .

Shakespeare's plays tell some of the best stories in the English language. In Six Shakespeare Stories Leon Garfield has turned them into short readable tales bringing the plays to life in an ideal introduction to Shakespeare.

Twelve dramatic and often funny tales of city life for young apprentices, set in the atmospheric backdrop of the streets of eighteenth century London.

Twelve Shakespeare plays presented afresh by Leon Garfield in narrative form. These are not simple retellings, but more like a refashioning of the dramas as stories, which remain true to the essential spirit of the original versions. The author has captured all the richness of character, plot, mood and setting in Shakespeare's works. It is the perfect introduction to Shakespeare for the young.