Showing results by author "F. E. Higgins" in All Categories

When Ludlow Fitch's parents cruelly betray him, he steals away to the country. He arrives in a remote village, where he meets the tall and limping figure of Joe Zabbidou - a pawnbroker with a difference. For Joe trades secrets, not goods. Employed as Joe's assistant, Ludlow records the villagers' fiendish confessions in an ancient leather-bound volume: The Black Book of Secrets. There's the gravedigger who has been resurrecting bodies; the butcher who made a mouse-meat pie; the wizened bookseller who went to murderous lengths to get her hands on a priceless tome.

An earthquake has rumbled through the twisted city of Degringolade, stopping the town Kronometer and the infamous Phenomenals in their tracks. Legend has it that if the ancient clock stops ticking a terrible event will occur, and there's no denying that the super mundane entities of the tar pits are behaving strangely. They know something that the townspeople don't: deep below the city, something has woken up. And it's hungry.

Since his father disappeared under a dark cloud of scandal, Pin Carpue has been alone in the world. His work for the local undertaker keeps him busy, but his life is bleak. Then Pin encounters the Bone Magician, a man who can raise corpses and make the dead speak. As Pin is drawn into an intoxicating world of mystery and intrigue, he becomes suspicious of Juno, the Bone Magician's young assistant. A strange darkness haunts her when the Silver Apple Killer stalks the streets at night - and as Pin pieces together the secrets of Bone Magic, his own life becomes fraught with grave danger.

When his butterfly-collector father is swindled to within an inch of his life, a vengeful Hector leaves the city of Urbs Umida in pursuit of a fiendish villain with a glass eye. The trail leads to Withypitts Hall, a forbidding Gothic mansion as warped as its inhabitants and their secret schemes. Soon Hector finds himself embroiled in mysterious deeds more poisonous than his worst imaginings, but every twist and turn brings him closer to his revenge.

In the centre of the freezing Lake Beluarum stands an inescapable asylum, enclosed by the sheer cliffs of Drop Rock island. When Ambrose Grammaticus, famous inventor and master engineer, viciously attacks his own son, Rex, he is hauled to the island and imprisoned.

The Giant, the Huntress, the Rich Girl, the Thief: these haphazard heroes will save us from grief.... Down in the tar pits, an unlikely new alliance is being formed: they call them The Phenomenals, and only they can save us from a hideous fate that will befall the town.... Citrine Capodel, heiress to a corrupt empire and framed for a murder she did not commit; Folly Harpelaine, who dabbles in the dark arts; Jonah Scrimshander, a deadly harpoonist, and Vincent Verdigris, light-fingered and even lighter on his feet.