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Why wouldn’t ya? Here’s sort of what it’s about:
The Vale folk have been cut off from the rest of England for a thousand years. Every aspect of their lives is controlled by the Alchemist Bede, who captures a young boy named Archer. Archer refuses to live a life of slavery and resolves to escape the Alchemist’s Tower.
Floor by floor he discovers others prisoners known as Writer, Weaver, Keeper and a dragon named Burp. They must survive a magic storm, face enchanted wolves and battle the dangerous redcoat who has broken through the failing spells into the Moon Forest.
Archer will learn to control the wind, find his true self and discover that the strongest power in the world is the bond of friendship. Together they will change the course of history.
White Wind Rising is the amazing first instalment in this coming of age historical fantasy series which will entrance readers of all ages. It is suitable for children in the same way that His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman is. As in, there’s no swearing but the themes and style get increasingly complex as the characters experience more and mature (do you remember the bit in that where a polar bear gets its jaw ripped off? Brutal). Anyway, I know for a fact that kids love this series because kids and their parents have said so in reviews.
Here’s a bit of it right here, for your reading pleasure:
Chapter 1 – A Terrible Mistake
‘Alchemist!’ Archer called. His voice came out quietly and blew away on the wind. He cleared his throat and tried again, louder. ‘Alchemist!’
The Alchemist’s Tower stretched above him. Tall and white and silent but for the wind that whistled in his ears.
The Tower stood in the centre of the Vale upon a great rock plinth. The Vale was a long flat floodplain surrounded by hills and the Moon Forest.
There were no doors on the Tower and no windows either. The only way in had to be through magic.
Archer did not want to go in. The thought was terrifying. All he wanted was to make a perfectly reasonable request and then get home.
‘Alchemist!’ he called again. ‘I have come to ask a favour.’
Archer wondered how to ask it but, in truth, it was simple enough.
‘Please, this year would you allow my mother and father to keep more of their grain? Just a little more would make all the difference.’
When the grown-ups spoke of the Alchemist at all, they did so in whispers. They said that the Alchemist was all-powerful. He watched everyone in the Vale from the top of the Tower. There was a dragon inside. If you were naughty then the Alchemist would come and take you away. The Alchemist walked the Vale, hooded and cloaked.
When it was dark, they said, you might see his eyeball gleaming through the keyhole in your front door. Archer did not believe that was true but he could not walk by the door of the farmhouse at night without glancing at it.
‘Alchemist,’ he cried. ‘It’s me, Archer.’ Then he felt foolish because of course the Alchemist would surely have no idea who he was. He was just a farmer’s boy from up Vale way.
If the Alchemist were really up there, looking down, then Archer would look like nothing. He would be a speck. Like a flea on the back of a great white sheepdog. All Archer had was his bow and a few arrows. What defence that would be against the powers of the Alchemist?
His heart hammered at the thought of his insignificance compared to the Tower and to the Alchemist. He could not run away, not now that he had come all the way down the Vale. He had walked halfway to Morningtree!
Archer ran up and kicked the Tower.
‘Ouch!’ Archer danced back, holding his toes through his boot. He hopped around, shaking his foot.
‘Who do you think you are, anyway?’ Archer shouted, his voice louder than it had ever been. ‘You will never see me. Will you? You will never speak to me. You just sit up there forcing us to work but you know nothing of the troubles of the Vale folk. You force us to give you almost everything we grow or make, every year. My parents cart up our wheat and our wool. And what do you give us in return? Nothing, that’s what.’
A white anger gripped his heart.
‘You should not treat us this way. We deserve better.’ Archer struggled to find words for his feelings. ‘All you do is take. You are a bad person. We would all be better off if you were not up there. Why don’t you just go away and leave us all alone?’
The Tower filled his vision and stretched up into the blue sky above. The wind blew about his ears and kicked up a cloud of white dust underfoot. In the distance, a sheep bleated.
Archer opened his mouth to call one last time before he gave up and went home.
Then.
A flash of light. Purple and white sounds filled his head.
Everything went slow.
There was a rushing through his heart like a cold white wind, down in the core of himself. It was frightening, even terrifying but also good. It was new. It was familiar. The white wind made him feel strong. It made him feel connected to something. If he could reach out and touch it, then he would know….
The world turned blue.
Then yellow and green.
Red and orange sparks fell in a shower all around him. Archer’s body twisted and turned. He was lighter than a fletch and then heavy like a millstone.
He fell to the ground, the wind knocked out of him.
It was dark. He was on his knees. On flagstones.
He looked up. It took a few moments to adjust from the glare of the sunlight and the flashing, colourful lights. But there was the flickering of a large fire in one side of the room.
He was in a room.
Indoors.
Inside the Tower.
Archer leapt to his feet and his head swam. Bile rose up from his guts and he bent to his knees.
‘Blurgh,’ he said but he was not sick.
He wobbled for a moment until his head cleared. He dusted himself off. He had never had spell cast on him before and he was not sure that he liked it all that much. He felt weak and shaky; the kind of feeling you get after you have vomited yourself empty or if you have not eaten for two or three days. Like last winter.
Taking a deep breath, he looked around.
He was near the centre of very large room, a room with a wall that went all the way round in a vast circle.
Light came from the fire in the vast fireplace against the wall. The deep orange-red light casting flickered shadows everywhere. It was hot. A good fire. Even though the room was so enormous he could feel the warmth of the fire on his face from the other side.
There was a solid old table by the fire with a jug and cups and bowls on it. The side of the room opposite the fire was dark. Up beyond the rafters it was too dark to even see a ceiling.
Around the wall to one side was hundreds of sacks of grain, on the other were vast stacks of logs. Hanging from the rafters on long strings were row upon row of dried herbs and garlics and dried vegetables.
It was a kitchen. A very large kitchen, ten times bigger and more than the one in his house. But it was still a kitchen.
Next to him, in the centre of the room there was a stone-walled well with a bucket and coil of rope.
There was no way out.
No door. No window.
He was alone.
‘Hello?’ Archer said, his voice echoing softly around the cavernous space.
‘YOU DARED APPROACH MY TOWER.’
The voice boomed out of the walls and ceiling so loudly that Archer clamped his hands over his ears.
‘Yes,’ said Archer, speaking up toward the dark ceiling. He cleared his throat and said what he had come to say. ‘I come to you humbly to ask if you would please stop asking for quite so much of our wheat and our wool. My parents give you almost all of it, every year. And then there is never quite enough bread to eat. And there is not enough left over to sell at the markets in Bures or Morningtree or to trade for the other things we need. I hope you will not think I am asking too much.’
‘NO.’ The voice of the Alchemist boomed out again. ‘YOU ARE A FOOL.’ The voice was thunder. ‘YOU DEMAND FAVOURS YET YOU OWE YOUR EXISTENCE TO ME. I PROTECT YOU ALL FROM THE WORLD BEYOND THE VALE.’
Archer realised then that he had a terrible mistake in coming to the Alchemist’s Tower.
‘I see,’ he said, his heart pounding in his chest, the voice so loud it hurt his head. ‘I am sorry. I will go back home.’
‘NO,’ the Alchemist’s voice hammered. ‘YOU ARE MY NEW BAKER. EVERY DAY YOU WILL BAKE FIVE LOAVES OF BREAD.’ The echo of the voice boomed round the small room. ‘EVERY DAY YOU WILL FILL FIVE JUGS OF WATER. NOW, MY LITTLE BAKER. GET TO WORK.’
The echo bounced around the walls and all was then still. The fire crackled.
‘What?’ The boy whispered to himself, then looked up at the distant ceiling. ‘No. Alchemist, please. I did not mean to offend you. Please, let me go home. My parents will not know where I am. You must let me go.’
‘GO?’ The voice returned, slamming into him, knocking him to his knees. The voice laughed a slow, deep, humourless laugh. Archer, on all fours on the floor, pushed his forehead against the stone floor and wrapped his arms around his head. ‘YOU WILL BAKE MY BREAD OR YOUR FAMILY SHALL KEEP NOTHING.’
‘But,’ Archer said. ‘I want to go home.’
‘YOU HAVE CHOSEN. YOU ARE MINE NOW.’
‘For how long?’ he asked.
‘FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE.’
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