by E L Norry
 
“The place was all right, but there was no denying it: us Fablehouse lot had been hushed up and hidden away…All because our mums got too friendly with Black soldiers and when they went back overseas…well, us Brown Babies were the problem left behind. That was the reason none of us would ever forget that we weren’t wanted”.
 
1950s England. Heather (mixed race) lives in a mysterious mansion, shrouded by ancient woods. Along with a group of other children in care, they go roaming about the surrounding countryside until one day, at the bottom of a cairn, they see a figure who slowly uncurls in to a tall, broad, dark-skinned man. He says he’s Palamedes, a knight from King Arthur’s Court  and he warns them that danger is simmering beneath their very feet, a danger they can prevent if they join him against ‘The Champion’ in the magical, fairy world of Fae Feld. 
 
A multilayered fantasy, inspired by the real life secreting away of mixed race children in to orphanages during and just post Wold War II. Fablehouse is based on the real Holnicote House, a children’s home in Somerset. Our favourite character is Pal, Palamedes, a Middle Eastern knight taken and developed from Arthurian legend who makes the children feel like they have a place in the world: “You are not alone. To think that you are is the world’s cruellest trick. More connects us than divides us”. 
 
‘A lot of emotional content from Heather which will resonate with children in care: casual and overt racism, the desire to run, the pain of rejection and the need to be self-sufficient’. (Sylvia, Children's Social Work Director, Letterbox Library reviewer). From an author who herself grew up in children’s and foster homes in Wales. Age 9-12, Paperback 320pp