An hilarious story, told in letter form, about King Alfred -- he who burnt the cakes, and his battles with the Vikings. Berwin, son of Egfrith, writes to Wulfric, son of Elred using his miraculous new talent of reading and writing. Berry's spellings leave a lot to be desired and in his hilarious letters he tells a tale of mixups and mayhem when King Alfred hides in his family's cottage but is mistaken for a Dirty Dane -- their word for the Vikings. A completely new perspective on why and how those cakes got burned! Fast and very, very funny from the prize-winning author of The Demon Headmaster and other books.

 

 

There are 64 pages in this book.

It is aimed at Young Adult readers. The term Young Adult (YA) is used for books which have the following characteristics: (1) aimed at ages 12-18 years, US grades 7-12, UK school years 8-15, (2) around 50-75k words long, (3) main character is aged 12-18 years, (4) topics include self-reflection, internal conflict vs external, analyzing life and its meaning, (5) point of view is often in the first person, and (6) swearing, violence, romance and sexuality are allowed.

This book was published in 2000 by HarperCollins Publishers .

Gillian Cross is perhaps best known for her Demon Headmaster series and its BBC adaptation. She has won many of the most prestigious awards for children's fiction, including the Carnegie Medal, the Whitbread Children's Book Award and the Smarties Prize.