‘Bring me something new and exciting. Bring me a BIG story!’ says Rosie’s editor at The Record newspaper.
And, when she leaves the office, Rosie does find a story. A story that is bigger than she expects. A story that takes her across Europe, into a dangerous world of art and art thieves.
Keawe buys a magic bottle that can give him anything he wants. He builds a beautiful house, falls in love with and marries Kokua, and is very happy.
But if you have the bottle and die, you go to hell – and when Keawe tries to get rid of the bottle, it comes back. He wants to sell it, but people are afraid.
Can Kokua find a way to help Keawe? Or will one of them go to hell in the end?
‘I want to fly later this year.’ ‘So it’s a race,’ laughs Lagari. ‘Yes,’ smiles Hezarfen. The time is the 1630s. Sultan Murat IV rules the Ottoman Empire. Two Istanbul brothers – Hezarfen Ahmet Çelebi and Lagari Hasan – dream of flying. Which of them can be the first flying man? And what does the Sultan give to the winner of the race? Read this story and find the answers.
The Happy Prince is a beautiful golden statue high up on a column in the city. Everyone loves him.
He feels sad about the city’s poor people, but what can he do? He can’t leave his column. Then the swallow arrives, and helps the Happy Prince to do many good things.
But what about the swallow’s dream of flying to Egypt? And what does the Mayor do when the Happy Prince loses all his gold?
It’s a cold winter’s day, and a poor little girl can’t sell any of her matches to people in the street. She can’t go home with no money. But how can she stay warm? That 31st December, the little match girl sees rich people’s homes, Christmas trees, and wonderful things to eat. She remembers also her kind grandmother – now sadly dead. Can the New Year make things any better for the poor young girl?
‘It’s my garden,’ says the Giant. ‘People must understand. Nobody can play here – only me!’
So the children leave, and the Selfish Giant puts a wall around his garden. After that, it’s always winter there.
Later, the Giant feels sorry for a young boy in the snow. He knocks down the garden wall – and the children, and the spring, come back. But where is the young boy now? And how can the Giant find him again?
‘I love Owen’s skateboarding,’ Hannah thinks. ‘I want to jump and do tricks, too.’ When a skatepark opens near her house, Hannah is suddenly very interested in skateboarding. How do Mom, Dad, brother Evan, and cousin Justin feel about this? Who helps her? Who laughs at her? And who teaches her to be a true skateboarder in the end? This story has the answers.
‘What’s your job?’ Yukio asks.
‘I’m a sorcerer,’ the old man smiles, ‘And I need a young apprentice.’
One day, Yukio – a young boy from old Japan – leaves his sister in the country and looks for a job in the town. He finds interesting work there, as a sorcerer’s apprentice. But why must Yukio wait to learn magic? And what happens after he puts a spell on a broom when the sorcerer is away?
Prospero, the Duke of Milan, and his daughter Miranda are far away from home, alone on an island in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea. They want to return to Milan…
Then, one day, Prospero sees a ship near the island carrying his greatest enemies. Prospero, with the help of his magic and the island spirit, Ariel, makes a magic storm – a tempest – to bring them to the island.
‘We have some wonderful mosaics in Pompeii, but I’ve never seen a better one than this!’
After the young Roman mosaic designer Felix starts work in Pompeii, his whole life changes. There he falls in love with the beautiful Greek slave Agathe, who can see into the future.
When the volcano Vesuvius sends hot ash over the city, Felix – and Agathe’s brother Alcander – ride to the port of Misenum for help. But will they reach admiral Gaius Plinius in time, and will they ever see Agathe alive again?
Tristan and Isolde are in love, but Isolde must marry King Mark. So a happy love story seems impossible…
The lovers meet every day but then, one night, King Mark finds them together. Now Tristan must leave the castle, but he is badly hurt and dying. Only Isolde can help him.
Can Isolde find Tristan in time? Can their love survive?
‘I see Troy in flames years from now – because Paris brings disaster to us,’ Queen Hecuba says about her son. Paris’s father, King Priam, wants to kills him. But Paris lives, and later loves Helen – King Menelaus’s queen – from Greece. When Paris brings Helen to Troy, war begins between the Trojans and Greeks. What happens when Paris’s brother Hector and the Greek fighter Achilles meet in battle? Who wins the war, and how? Read Troy and find the answers.
The men and the woman in this book – William Tell, Tom Blood, Lord Bao, King Matthias, Johnny Appleseed, and Lady Godiva – are all real people from history.
But every time someone tells an old story, they change things in it, to make them bigger, better, and more exciting. So what is true in this book and what is not? Read all six of the stories, and see what you think.
‘Professor Clark’s work usually helps people. But this is something new.’ Clark’s helper – Tasha Kiara – is telling Chaz – a local TV reporter about the Professor’s new serum. Then an earthquake hits Clark’s California lab, and his serum brings dead bodies in the cemetery alive. Soon the zombies attack! What happens to Professor Clark? How can Tasha and Chaz stop the zombies? Who lives and who dies? Read this story and see.
