Cry of a Seagull (The Messenger Series) - Softcover

Dickens, Monica

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0006926479 ISBN 13: 9780006926474

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers, 1986

Synopsis

Favour! Since the beginning of time, this mystical horse had been coming and going on the earth to rescue the victims of evil and injustice, and wipe out the haunting legacies of past wrongs done through human violence and stupidity. Being still only a horse, although a spirit free in eternity, he used living people as messengers to carry out his work. People like Rose, at this special age when anything is possible. With the horse, she could transcend time and space to travel to other scenes in the past, present and future that were as real as her everyday life. Rose, chosen messenger of Favour, a magical grey horse that stands for the power of good, is not having an easy summer. Her grandfather is ill, and her mother has been called away to look after him, leaving thirteen-year-old Rose and her clueless father to manage without her. This means taking control of the hotel her mother runs by the sea in the full clamour of tourist season. Between complaining guests and her father upsetting the staff, Rose has her work cut out for her. All this work gets in the way of riding with her friend Abigail, and sailing with Ben, an older boy that comes to stay at the hotel every summer with his father. Overshadowing her earthly woes are her duties as a magical messenger. She is transported through time by Favour, witnessing important clues that all lead up to an injustice that Rose must prevent. To make matters worse, the evil Lord of the Moor is trying to stop her with his ghostly army. The distractions of her real life struggle against the importance of her mission, but Rose must overcome all difficulties, if good is to prevail. Cry of a Seagull, first published in 1986, is the last part of The Messenger fantasy series written by Monica Dickens.

About this title

About the Author:

Great granddaughter to Charles Dickens, Monica (1915-1992) was born into an upper middle class family. Disillusioned with the world in which she was brought up, she acted out - she was expelled from St Paul's Girls' School in London for throwing her school uniform over Hammersmith Bridge. Dickens then decided to go into service, despite coming from the privileged class; her experiences as a cook and general servant would form the nucleus of her first book, One Pair Of Hands, published in 1939. Dickens married an American Navy officer, Roy O. Stratton, and spent much of her adult life in Massachusetts and Washington D.C., but she continued to set the majority of her writing in Britain. No More Meadows, which she published in 1953, reflected her work with the NSPCC - she later helped to found the American Samaritans in Massachusetts. Between 1970 and 1971 she wrote a series of children's books known as The Worlds End Series which dealt with rescuing animals and, to some extent, children. After the death of her husband in 1985, Dickens returned to England where she continued to write until her death aged 77.

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
• Publication date: 1986
• ISBN 10: 0006926479
• ISBN 13: 9780006926474
• Binding: Paperback