Skellig

CILIP Carnegie Medal, 1998

Paperback / ISBN-13: 9780340997048

Price: £7.99

Disclosure: If you buy products using the retailer buttons above, we may earn a commission from the retailers you visit.

When a move to a new house coincides with his baby sister’s illness, Michael’s world seems suddenly lonely and uncertain.

Then, one Sunday afternoon, he stumbles into the old, ramshackle garage of his new home, and finds something magical. A strange creature – part owl, part angel, a being who needs Michael’s help if he is to survive. With his new friend Mina, Michael nourishes Skellig back to health, while his baby sister languishes in the hospital.

But Skellig is far more than he at first appears, and as he helps Michael breathe life into his tiny sister, Michael’s world changes forever . . .

Skellig won the Carnegie Medal and the Whitbread Children’s Book Award and is now a major Sky1 feature film, starring Tim Roth and John Simm. David Almond is also winner of the 2010 Hans Christian Andersen award.

Reviews

Humorous, heart-stopping and haunting...an emotional roller-coaster of a read with a cliff-hanger of a conclusion. Inspired and inspiring.
Newcastle Journal
A bookshelf essential.
The Guardian
Touched with a visionary intensity, this strange, hugely readable and life-affirming tale exercises every muscle of the imagination
The Guardian
Deservedly popular
The Observer
Voted Carnegie Medal's Number one Top Book of the past 70 years
The Times
The sort of children's book that makes adults find excuses to read more of them
Times Educational Supplement
A story full of heart and magic and big confusing emotions, elegantly told by a master craftsman. A perfect piece of art
Lucy Christopher, Big Issue (london)
This modern classic has been reissued in a beautiful 15th anniversary edition
Lorna Bradbury, The Sunday Telegraph
A beautifully told modern fairytale.
Observer
'it's a wonderfully original and beautifully written story and, oddest of all for a children's book, it manages to address the unlikely theme of spirituality with beguiling delicacy.'
The Irish Times
Hard to put down
Liz Lightfoot, The Daily Telegraph
Powerful and moving
Guardian.co.uk
A visionary story...a lyrical, magical kind of book which can be read on many different levels
The Daily Mail
'A deep and lovely book'
The Times
the most lyrical children's author now writing
The Guardian
'Tremendously innovative, highly original and very moving.'
Melvin Burgess
Refusing to read this book on the grounds that you are not a child makes as much sense as refusing to read crime fiction because you are not a criminal. A deep and lovely book.
Nick Hornby, The Times
A beautiful story which will enchant young and old alike
Western Morning News
'Truly original, mysterious and affecting . . . Almond treads with delicate certainty, and the result is something genuine and true'
Philip Pullman, The Guardian
Brings Magical Realism to working-class Northeast England
i (The Independent)
I can't eat a chinese takeaway without thinking about this strange and beautiful book about an angel who seems to have lost his way.
Gill Harvey, The Big Issue
'His characters are proper, complex portraits of children that don't succumb to the gender clichés prevalent in children's fiction.'
The Irish Times
One of those books that you can't put down
Junior Reviewer Conor Neison, aged 12, Evening Echo (Cork)
Lyrical, innovative and moving...unforgettably moving
Cressida Cowell, Sunday Express
. . . gripping, beautiful and brilliantly written . . . Everyone is raving about this unforgettable book.
The Sunday Times
A stunning debut . . . An extraordinary book.
The Sunday Telegraph
The book I wish I'd written is Skellig by David Almond. Almond's book has a great sense of the mysterious; we are left with a sense of wonder. I wish that I had written it!
Joseph Delaney, Books For Keeps
An exquisitely crafted book with a mystical core
The Daily Telegraph
A modern classic Listed as on the of the 100 Best Children's Books Ever (Novels)
The Daily Telegraph
'A bookshelf essential.'
The Guardian
An exquisite book
The Sunday Telegraph
Lyrical, innovative and unforgettably moving.
Sunday Express (Cressida Cowell)
Touched with a visionary intensity, this strange, hugely readable and life-affirming tale exercises every muscle of the imagination.
The Guardian