Into the Dark

by Nicholas Wilde

Overview

Matthew has come with his mother to the north Norfolk coast where she has rented a cottage in the grounds of an abandoned old manor-house. A local boy, Roly, becomes his guide through a lonely and mysterious landscape of dunes and creeks and sea. These and the derelict mansion begin to haunt Matthew's imagination and he gradually senses a shadow of fear lurking beneath his deepening friendship with Roly. The truth proves to be stranger than anything he could have foreseen.

 

In this haunting story with a richly poetic climax, Nicholas Wilde, a master of the English ghost story, deftly combines a supernatural theme with a sensitive understanding of the emotions of a twelve-year-old boy as he explores the joys and the hurts of friendship, the reaching out, and the letting go.

Product Details

BN ID:	2940165653063
Publisher:	Camera Journal
Publication date:	11/11/2021
Sold by:	Draft2Digital
Format:	eBook
File size:	28 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

About the Author

Nicholas Wilde was born and educated in Cheltenham and went on to King’s College, Cambridge. He was Head of German at The Leys School in Cambridge. As well as writing and illustrating his own books, he has spent more than fifty years collecting, researching and curating The Nicholas Wilde Collection: a fine preservation archive of Two Hundred Years of Boyhood, a field in which he has long been recognised as an authority. His collection of books and artefacts is noted as being of national importance.

Nicholas  Wilde’s second novel, Death Knell, is a locked room murder mystery in the classic style.

His third, Down Came a Blackbird, was adapted for television for ITV and nominated for the Carnegie Medal.

Editorial Reviews

Absorbing and suspenseful, this novel concerns a blind boy who, vacationing on the English coast, meets a unique friend. Ages 9-up. (June)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Gr 5-7-- Matthew, 12, and his mother have rented a cottage by the sea for a week. Matt is blind, lonely, and apprehensive about getting around in a strange place. The day after his arrival, he meets Roly, who becomes his friend and his ``eyes'' to the salt marshes, the sea, and the nearby deserted baronial estate. Matt senses a strangeness about Roly and frequently experiences deja vu in his explorations with his friend. After a misunderstanding with his mother and a story from the estate's caretaker, Matt realizes that Roly is a ghost, Matt himself is Roly's reincarnated friend, and Roly's spirit wants forgiveness for causing both of their deaths 100 years before. Thematically, this is an excellent story of friendship and forgiveness. Both boys are liberated, one psychologically and one spiritually, in the final confrontation scene. At times the writing style is descriptive and emotional, evoking vivid images and empathy. Generally, though, the story is melodramatic and protracted, and the plot is too predictable to be suspenseful. Characters are weakly defined and there is far too little background information about Matt and his mother to make readers identify with their situation. --Ellen Ramsay, Amphitheater High School, Tucson, AZ

School Library Journal