The former Waterstones Children's Book Prize winner and author of The Explorer and The Golden Mole delivers the first instalment of a thoroughly immersive epic fantasy series which finds an ordinary boy and a flying girl enmeshed in an adventure with a host of magical creatures.
Waterstones Book of the Year 2023
The Books Are My Bag Reader's Awards Children's Fiction Winner 2023
Winner of the Children's Fiction Book of the Year at The British Book Awards 2024
Shortlisted for the Wainwright Prize for Children's Writing on Nature & Conservation 2024
'It was a very fine day, until something tried to eat him.'
A boy called Christopher is visiting his reclusive grandfather when he witnesses an avalanche of mythic creatures come tearing down the hill. This is how Christopher learns that his grandfather is the guardian of one of the ways between the non-magical world and a place called the Archipelago: a cluster of magical islands, where all the creatures we tell of in myth live and breed and thrive alongside humans. They have been protected for thousands of years from being discovered; now, terrifyingly, the protection has worn thin, and creatures are breaking through.
Then a girl, Mal, appears in Christopher’s world. She is in possession of a flying coat, is being pursued by a killer, and is herself in pursuit of a baby griffin. Mal, Christopher and the griffin embark on an urgent quest across the wild splendour of the Archipelago, where sphinxes hold secrets and centaurs do murder, to find the truth – with unimaginable consequences for both their worlds. Together the two must face the problem of power, and of knowledge, and of what love demands of us.
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
ISBN: 9781408897416
Number of pages: 368
Dimensions: 216 x 135 mm
There was Tolkien, there is Pullman and now there is Katherine Rundell. Wondrous invention, marvellous writing. This book is her best yet, and that's saying something. Just riveting, quite extraordinary. - Michael Morpurgo
A marvellous imaginative fantasy told with great style and sparkle - a book to race through in a day and keep for a lifetime. - Jacqueline Wilson
I love Katherine Rundell’s writing because it’s so fresh and vigorous, and always so unexpected. The world of this new book is so intriguing and so well put together that I couldn’t resist it. Readers who already know her books will seize this with delight, and new readers will love it and demand all her others at once. - Philip Pullman
A book stuffed full of fantastical, magical delight, and a world of richly imagined wonder - Cressida Cowell
Rundell's book packs a punch with imagination and creativity in its purest form. She has created a story with potential to be adored by fantasy lovers for years to come. - Independent
Katherine Rundell is a prodigiously gifted storyteller and IMPOSSIBLE CREATURES is wildly good. Spectacularly inventive, it is both a thrilling and page-turning epic and a clarion call to young readers to use the special gifts of childhood- love, courage, imagination and open-heartedness - to fight to save precious creatures of all kinds before they vanish before our eyes. My Book of the Year. - Lauren St. John
Fantastically exuberant, wildly imaginative, impossibly brilliant. Rundell’s best, which is something to be marvelled at. It made me want to yell, or laugh, or bite something. - Kiran Millwood Hargrave
The action is gripping. Every sentence sparkles. You can feel the flutter of griffin feathers and the menace of strange poisonous shrews. Magnificent. - The Times
Rundell’s first foray into fantasy is both a deft, rich homage to the greats of children’s literature and an absorbing, profoundly poignant quest story for those aged 9+ – quite possibly her best yet - The Guardian
Rundell is an extraordinary writer and this first in a fantasy trilogy grips, thrills and moves – sometimes to tears. This richly-imagined story is packed with memorable characters – and an unforgettable griffin. - Daily Mail
A rare and remarkable feat of glittering imagination from a truly masterful storyteller. - Catherine Doyle
A fierce, fantastic, wild-hearted adventure that roars and bristles with imagination. I devoured it like a hungry dragon - Sam Sedgman
With a delightful cast of characters, breathless adventure, and an abundance of myth and magic, Impossible Creatures offers the very best of fantasy - Aisha Bushby
A menagerie of delights. So packed with magic you'll want to take notes. Impossible Creatures is a world you'll want to move into. - Patrick Ness
Between the covers of Impossible Creatures is a world as enchanting, as perilous, as richly imagined as Narnia or Middle Earth. - Frank Cottrell-Boyce
A masterpiece to rival Tolkien and Pullman - The Daily Telegraph
Flickers with a rare and fierce beauty – unputdownable. - Abi Elphinstone
One of our most talented writers for children - Observer
It is surely the next classic. - The I
A captivating story - Sainsbury's Magazine
This book !!!!! I don’t think I’ll be able to fully articulate just how much I adored this but I will do my very best. With Impossible Creatures, Rundell has crafted a story that feels both brand new and immeasurably... More
I don't think I can describe just how much I loved this novel - there are some books that instantly feel like a future classic, and this is definitely one! I loved the style of the writing, the story pulled me in... More
I love Katherine Rundell's children's books. They feel like the books I used to read and love when I was growing up, but updated and better for modern times. I also loved her book for grown up people on John... More
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