Ghost Abbey

An eerie and atmospheric ghost story from a Carnegie Medal winning author.

Robert Westall was born in 1929 on Tyneside, and he grew up there during the war. He went to the local Grammar School and then studied Fine Art at Durham University, and Sculpture at the Slade School of Fine Art in London. He worked as an art teacher in Cheshire and for the Samaritans. 
 
His first novel for children, The Machine Gunners, published in 1975, was an instant success and was awarded the Carnegie Medal. His books have been translated into ten languages, dramatised for television and he won the Carnegie again in 1982 for The Scarecrows, the Smarties Prize in 1989 for Blitzcat, and the Guardian Award in 1991 for The Kingdom by the Sea. Between 1986 until his death in 1993, he devoted himself to his writing.

'Ninety-eight keys, none of them labelled. Ninety-eight keys, and they say there are ninety-nine rooms . . . What will you find in the ninety-ninth room, I wonder?' 
 
Maggi is delighted when her father takes a new job, renovating a crumbling stately home in Cheshire. It's a chance to escape from the North-East, from the predatory Doris Streeton, and perhaps from the grief at the heart of Maggi's family. But Maggi gradually comes to realize that their new home holds secrets far more sinister than anything they have left behind . . .

Break Of Dark

Chilling and utterly absorbing, this short story collection grabs hold of the imagination and doesn't let go.

Is there a barrier that divides the dark unknown from the everyday world around us? 
 
If so, is it broken sometimes by the dead returning, by the undead, or by alien creatures? 
 
What else could account for the chance meeting (or was it?) between a young student and hitch-hiker who turns out to be so much stranger than she seems? Why else should three successive crews flying a Second World War bomber - Blackham's Wimpey - be driven to madness, despair, even to death, though the plane returns from each mission without a scratch? Who are Fred, Alice and Aunty Lou; the figments of Peter's imagination that become a real life nightmare for Roger and Biddy? 
 
There is St Austin Friars, too: a church without a congregation - until a burial service, oddly arranged a month ahead, is attended by a sinister assortment of the living and the dead. And Sergeant Nice, an ordinary policeman in an ordinary seaside town faced with a series of quite extraordinary thefts; the work surely, of no human hand. 
 
Chilling, but often humorous as well, these stories creep up on you and take you by surprise.

Robert Westall

Powerfully blends an exceptionally chilling drama with a story of insight and compassion about unhappiness

Robert Westall is the father of the golden age of children's literature in this century, quite unrivalled in his sharpness of observation and pace of narrative

A brooding story about jealousy, hatred, murder and love

A hard-hitting book . . . a must-read from this ever popular author

There were three people, standing in the darkest place, watching him. 
 
Simon is outraged that his Mum plans to remarry. He can't bear her new fiancé or the way his mother and sister seem to have forgotten his late father. Overwhelmed by hatred and anger he seeks solace in a nearby abandoned water mill. But another, powerful hatred lingers within its walls. And it is about to be unleashed... 
 
Westall's immense talent is evident from the opening line - Simon's anger and unhappiness are tangible, and the Scarecrows' ill-intentions terrifying.

Scarecrows

About us

About Us (Header 4)

Best-Jane-Austen-quotes_Online-Desktop_Penguin

James-Baldwin

Marian-Keyes

haruki-murakami-320×320-1

Richard-Osman

Malorie Blackman

Lisa-Jewell

Charlie-Mackesy

Authors (Header 3)

Children&#039;s

Company

Discover

Fiction

Non-fiction

Penguin Classics

Penguin Shop (Header 5)

Useful links

Work with us

sectionTitle

isEnabled

anchor

anchorLabel

prhuk/featured-book

prhuk/praise-section

maxBooks

showViewMore

prhuk/books-section

hideAuthorAlert

formName

iterableDivision

iterableBrand

buttonText

description

heading

legalText

successHeading

successText

image

alignment

variation

prhuk/email-section

prhuk/series-section

prhuk/biography-section

prhuk/articles-section

prhuk-authors

Frankenstein

Wings

Flesh

Robert Westall

Praise for Scarecrows

Powerfully blends an exceptionally chilling drama with a story of insight and compassion about unhappiness

Robert Westall is the father of the golden age of children's literature in this century, quite unrivalled in his sharpness of observation and pace of narrative

A brooding story about jealousy, hatred, murder and love

Powerfully blends an exceptionally chilling drama with a story of insight and compassion about unhappiness

Robert Westall is the father of the golden age of children's literature in this century, quite unrivalled in his sharpness of observation and pace of narrative

A brooding story about jealousy, hatred, murder and love

Powerfully blends an exceptionally chilling drama with a story of insight and compassion about unhappiness

Robert Westall is the father of the golden age of children's literature in this century, quite unrivalled in his sharpness of observation and pace of narrative

A brooding story about jealousy, hatred, murder and love

Books by Robert Westall

Follow penguin

Follow ladybird

Follow puffin

Sign up to the Penguin newsletter