Aristotle
The philosopher
«Logic. A line of reasoning to follow all the way, without a stumble.»
The animals are disappearing.
And a ten-year-old boy is the only one who can save them.
The animals are disappearing.
And a ten-year-old boy is the only one who can save them.
Sebastiano had a secret gift. He could speak with the animals.
Now, you should know that the gift had come from a Sorceress, and it carried a promise: to use it to protect the animals, never for himself. And he, at ten years old, had promised.
Then one day came a piece of news no one wanted to believe: the animals, in every corner of the world, had begun to vanish. Behind it all seemed to stand a Magician, who kept them prisoner in his palace. A palace everyone knew existed, and that no one could find: hidden in the desert, invisible even to the falcons, to the eagles, to every bird in the sky.
That was when Baltazar came looking for help from Sebastiano himself. Baltazar, the clumsy, greedy, ever so slightly selfish King of the Camels of the East, knew one thing: that this boy was the only human who could speak with the animals. And perhaps the only one who could truly do something about it.
The trials
Inside the palace, behind seven doors, no lock and no key could hold. What waited there was something else: some of the greatest minds who ever lived, set on taking the measure of Sebastiano.
The philosopher
«Logic. A line of reasoning to follow all the way, without a stumble.»
The poet
«Verse. To recognise the right beauty among a thousand words.»
The artist
«The eye. To see what is missing where everyone else sees empty space.»
The composer
«Music. A trial to be heard more than solved.»
The mathematician
«Numbers. The hidden rules that set everything in motion.»
The scientist
«The laws of the universe. Where true and false are no longer enough.»
Each door tests a different part of him. There is no room for a wrong answer.
The characters
Here are the companions who will help him.
The King of the Camels of the East. Greedy and a little clumsy, but determined to save his subjects.
A desert sprite. He can freeze creatures in time, and order gourmet dishes straight from across the universe.
A desert fox who can take human form. The mind of the group: she can talk enemies into letting them pass, or letting them go.
Not your ordinary chameleon: a Chame-Lion. He vanishes by blending in, but when he gets angry he turns into a ferocious beast.
Queen of the desert eagles. Vast, white, regal. She flies high and sees far, where no one else can reach.
A siren-frog, rare and held to be sacred, with a voice that enchants. She dreams of an audience, and perhaps of more.
A girl with copper hair and a clear, bright gaze. Pale, shut away in a room of the palace. Who is she, really?
Who will tell you this story
Sybil never stopped looking for wonder, in a world that grew greyer year after year.
Some people believe in magic, and some go looking for the rule behind everything they can see. Sybil belongs to a small resistance: those who, though they are no longer nine years old, still look at the world wide-eyed.
She wrote and illustrated this book for one reason: to pass that wonder on, to those who are still children, and to those who carry a child inside who never once surrendered to the grey.
I'll send you the excerpt, and let you know on launch day. Nothing else.
Paperback around £12.99. Kindle ebook from £3.99.
The right questions