Literary agent for children's books
LAURA CECIL
Shadowgate by Lene Kaaberbøl
translated by Lene Kaaberbøl & Don Bartlett
Age range: 12 plus
“Once my father told me that if you travelled far enough you would end up where you started.
I wrote to him: You’re just saying that because you can never be bothered to travel anywhere.
He looked at me askance.
“No,” he said. “What I meant was the earth is round and you can always come home, even if you have to take the longest way round.”
I shook my head. You’re crazy, I wrote.
He just smiled and stroked my hair.
I hope he is right. I have never been further from home than now, and it doesn’t matter if the earth is round because I am not on the earth any more, and I cannot see how I will ever find my way home.”
Fourteen-year-old Anna can't speak. At school they call her Miss Schtumm and worse, but Anna does not care. She has more pressing problems right now, like hearing her mother's voice in her head all the time. And the voice is calling for help. Her mother vanished without a trace seven years before and Anna knows that now is the time she has to find her. Her quest takes her to the deserted house where she and her parents once lived, and through the mysterious Shadowgate. From there she sets out on a terrifying journey through Nightland. In this dangerous twilight world filled with surprises, treachery and menacing enemies she has to find her lost mother and herself.
In her latest novel, published to great acclaim in her native Denmark in 2006, Lene Kaaberbøl weaves a pattern of fantasy and realism into a gripping story about loneliness, disappointment and emerging love in the transition between childhood and adulthood .
The film rights to SHADOWGATE have been sold to Nordisk Film and a full-length feature film is planned.
Rights : Laura Cecil
World English language
Phabel & Plott
All other rights
Publishers:
Denmark : Phabel & Plott
Faroe Islands : Bokadeild
Norway : Det Norske Samlagel
Sweden : Raben & Sjogren
“Lene Kaaberbøl uses the same words as all other writers. Darknesss. Dream. Shadow. Gasping for breath. But when she uses them something happens, they have new meaning. They form new images. She can do that. Is it magic ? " Stefan Larsen POLITIKEN