The Robe of Skulls: The First Tale from the Five Kingdoms (Tales from the Five Kingdoms) [Hardcover]

Vivian French (Author), Ross Collins (Illustrator)

Book Description

Age Level: 8 and up | Grade Level: 3 and up | Series: Tales from the Five Kingdoms

Fire up your cauldron for an exuberant, fast-moving, wildly entertaining tale with a cast of characters who are good, bad, and very, very ugly.

High above the mountain village of Fracture, trouble is brewing. The sorceress Lady Lamorna wants a skull-studded gown of deep black velvet, but her treasure chest is empty of gold. That doesn’t stop her, however — from kidnapping, blackmailing, and using more than a little magic to get what she needs. Will her plans be foiled by the heroic Gracie Gillypot, two chatty bats, a gallant (if scruffy) prince, the wickedest stepsister ever, a troll with a grudge, and some very ancient crones? Humorously macabre and wickedly illustrated in black and white, THE ROBE OF SKULLS is truly a scream.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Prolific British author French (Once Upon a Time, 1996) serves up a charmingly witty adventure peopled with all manner of fairy-tale archetypes: a bad prince who is really not the least bit evil, a beautiful but nasty stepsister, a beleaguered but brave little girl named Gracie, and a talking bat. Lady Lamorna, an aging, evil sorceress, sets off to buy herself a grotesque gown, while at the same time Marlon the bat rescues Gracie from her cellar prison and leads her into the wilderness and the eventual safety of a group of old crones. Meanwhile, Prince Marcus has been left at home for bad behavior and is thus happily passed over by Lady Lamorna’s wicked and calculating spell that turns his twin and the other princes and princesses into frogs. French is a deft storyteller who keeps all the plotlines crisscrossing as beautifully as the web the crones must keep straight and true. Devotees of fractured fairy tales will be as pleased as Gracie with the results. Grades 3-5. --Francisca Goldsmith

Review

Chapter One
"Skulls," said Lady Lamorna. "Definitely skulls. Rows and rows of dear little skulls, sewn all along the hem." She sighed with pleasure as she imagined the clitter-clatter of bone on her cold stone floors. "After all, it really is time I had a new gown. Black velvet, of course, and long . . . very long. Perhaps embroidered? Hmm . . . yes. A motif of spiders, or maybe twists of poison ivy." Her huge silver eyes gleamed. "In fact, why not interweave the ivy with spiders' webs? That
would be truly beautiful. And petticoats. Layers and layers of blood-red petticoats . . . oh, yes, yes, YES! It will be a robe beyond all compare, and I shall order it this very minute!"

Lady Lamorna snapped her long bony fingers, and within seconds a sharp-toothed bat came flipping in through the open window.

"Yup?"

"I have an order for the Ancient Crones," Lady Lamorna said. "I require a new robe, edged with
skulls-"

"Got it." The bat made a swift circle over the Lady's head. "Skulls, velvet, webs, ivy, petticoats. No prob. Delivery date?"

Lady Lamorna looked put out. "Bat! Listen to me! I would like a new robe, made of deep-black
velvet-"

"Told ya. I got it." The bat circled again. "Heard you a mile away. I'm a bat, right? Bat ears 'n' all that stuff. Now-delivery?"

Lady Lamorna gave up. "As soon as possible," she said stiffly.

"Roger Wilco. I'll be back soon with info on price and delivery. Have the readies ready. Coins of all denominations readily accepted. Ciao!" And the bat whizzed away into the purple twilight.

For a second, Lady Lamorna considered frizzling the bat to a burnt ember as it flew, but then she
remembered her delicious dress. With a smile of happy anticipation, she swept toward her treasure chest, flung open the lid . . . and SCREAMED!



They still talk about that scream in the high mountain village of Fracture. Dogs howled and bit their owners.

Cats' whiskers curled into corkscrews and fell off.

Children clutched their ears and shrieked in agony.

Only the old and extremely deaf were spared . . . the old, the extremely deaf, and Gracie Gillypot.

Gracie had been shut in her stepfather's cold, dark, and spidery cellar for being cheerful, and the cellar had very thick walls. Even in the cellar she heard a faint cry and wondered what it could be-but her ears did nothing worse than tingle. Her stepsister, Foyce, caught the full blast, and when Gracie was finally allowed out of the cellar, Foyce slapped her several times because her
head felt as if it were full of stinging wasps, and she didn't like it.

Gubble, crouched only a few yards away from Lady Lamorna as she hit the highest and most piercing note of her scream, sighed heavily. He'd been the Lady's servant for more than 170 years, and he had heard her scream before. He knew what the scream meant. It meant trouble.
"Ttwenty-four-carat gold. I forgot reading could be this much fun." — Philip Ardagh, author of the Eddie Dickens trilogy — Philip Ardagh

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 8 and up
  
• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Candlewick (July 8, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0763635316
• ISBN-13: 978-0763635312
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 0.9 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,042,309 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Vivian French is an acclaimed children's author with a long and respected list of titles to her name. She lives in Edinburgh and is a regular attendee at the Edinburgh Book Festival where she hosts events with illustrators of picture books.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Courtesy of Teens Read Too, July 12, 2008

By 

TeensReadToo "Eat. Drink. Read. Be Merrier." (All Over the US & Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Robe of Skulls: The First Tale from the Five Kingdoms (Tales from the Five Kingdoms) (Hardcover)

Just above the town of Fracture lies a ghastly castle with an even ghastlier occupant, Lady Lamorna, who is just plain freaky. Her latest wish is a magnificent black velvet gown that is studded with skulls. When she goes to pay for it she finds that her treasure chest is empty. Instead of canceling her order, Lady Lamorna concocts a plan to pay for the dress.

Her plan includes a couple of members of the royal party, some frogs, and blackmail.

Then there is Gracie Gillypot, a shy girl who spends most of her days locked up in the cellar under the stairs of her house. When she's not spending time with the spiders under the stairs she is running after her stepfather and complying with his every wish. When a talking bat finds her one day, he promises her a better life and takes off. Days later he returns and helps Gracie escape. He's taking her to see the Ancient Crones, who will hopefully be able to help her with her wicked stepsister and stepfather problem.

Last but not least there is the prince that scoots under Lady Lamorna's radar. Marcus is a rather curious prince who really doesn't want anything to do with royalty. When his brother is turned into a frog he is determined to find the person who committed this heinous crime. Through a twist of fate he is paired up with Gracie and they set off to put Lady Lamorna in her rightful place.

This book was an absolute riot. While it is a super-fast read, you will find yourself enthralled with the quirkiness of the characters and loving the story. The illustrations are very comical, too! While this is definitely a middle grade novel, it is definitely suited for older and younger readers alike. I really enjoyed the quick-moving plot that keeps taking twists and turns. I loved how the author connected everything in a way that wasn't predictable and added to the hilarity of the book.

Overall, I really liked THE ROBE OF SKULLS and highly recommend it!

Reviewed by: Tasha

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A fun children's fantasy, July 11, 2008

By 

Brendan Moody (Randolph, ME, USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Robe of Skulls: The First Tale from the Five Kingdoms (Tales from the Five Kingdoms) (Hardcover)

For an adult, reviewing a children's book can be an awkward task. You're not a member of the book's target audience, and it isn't always easy-- or even possible-- to read or think the way a child would. In such circumstances, the most you can do is offer your own, adult opinion on the book's merits, with perhaps a guess as to how kids might feel. The best juvenile fiction is, of course, equally enjoyable for children of all ages. Vivian French's The Robe of Skulls isn't quite that good. Its world, characters, and plot are too simple to capture the imagination of most adults. But it is a charming and often funny story that's likely to delight some preteens, and might even provide adults who have a soft spot for such books with a couple hours of suitable entertainment.

The evil sorceress Lady Lamorna has decided that what she wants more than anything in the world is a new dress: a black velvet robe with motifs of ivy and spiderwebs-- and with skulls sewn along the hem. To pay for this fine garment, she plots to turn the princes and princesses of neighboring kingdoms into frogs and then offer to restore them, for a great reward, of course. Can Gracie Gillypot escape her tyrannical stepfather and cold, beautiful stepsister to thwart this scheme? Will Prince Marcus, twin brother to the threatened Prince Arioso, be any help? And just who are the Ancient Crones?

It's probably clear from this plot overview that the book makes liberal use of familiar fantasy motifs. The plucky orphan girl, the evil stepfamily, the bored young prince, the evil sorceress, her dimwitted servant, the magical weavers: they're all here. And their fates are what you might expect from every fairy tale you ever read. But originality is far from the most important ingredient in a good children's book; very few kids are going to be as jaded about genre cliches as the average adult reader, after all. French's writing is strong where it matters: in the humor that runs throughout the book. The jokes are pretty broad, but even so this adult found himself chuckling every few pages, whether at the anachronistic slang of the talking bat Marlon or the stupid yet loyal troll Gubble. Humor-tinged dark fantasy seems to be very fashionable in children's fiction lately, and The Robe of Skulls is a welcome addition to the subgenre.

It's also a very handsomely designed book. The delightful illustrations by Ross Collins offer the same balance between humor and creepiness as the book itself; the cover art is a fine example, though its vivid color makes it even more striking than the black-and-white internal art. The dust jacket is on decent paper stock and catches the light nicely; the physical dimensions of the volume are well-proportioned. In both content and presentation, The Robe of Skulls is well worth the $15 price tag.

When I first sat down to read, I worried that this book would feel like old hat, an unmemorable echo of other ghoulish children's books from recent years. I needn't have worried. The Robe of Skulls doesn't break new ground, but it's a skillful variation on a familiar theme, and I'd guess it will be quite entertaining for kids who enjoy this sort of book. Certainly I had some fun reading it. The dust jacket bills this as the first in the Tales from the Five Kingdoms series. If future volumes do appear, I can't say I'll rush out and buy them, but if I found them in the library I'd certainly pick them up and look forward to another couple hours of light-hearted fairy tale.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Robe of Skulls, July 20, 2008

By 

Shelly - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Robe of Skulls: The First Tale from the Five Kingdoms (Tales from the Five Kingdoms) (Hardcover)

The Robe of Skulls is a delightful story about an old sorceress, a young girl, a prince, an evil stepsister, and a troll whose head is frequently getting knocked off.

Lamorna, the sorceress, orders a new robe only to discover she has no gold left to pay for it. To make the money she needs she and her troll hatch a plan to secretly turn several princes and princesses to frogs then to charge their parents an exorbitant fee to turn them back. In order to complete her task Lamorna must leave her castle for the first time in a hundred years.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that I didn't know where the story was heading until after I'd read several chapters. Even then, it didn't quite go where I expected it to. The story has twists and turns as it bounds ever forward to an equally surprising ending.

My congratulations to Vivian French for writing such an entertaining story that I'll gladly recommend to family and friends. The Illustrations by Ross Collins added equally to my pleasure.