Robert Westall – författare

Caught in a freak storm, John Webster takes shelter in an old barn with weird symbols carved in the doors. The landowner offers him a place to stay and John, on leave from University, takes him up on the offer.But it turns out the barn has more history than he first suspected. A portal back in time, to be precise. He meets the beautiful Johanna, who is being tracked by the Witch Finder General. Modern science says that witches aren''t real... but then, neither are portals back in time, so what can John believe?John finds himself torn between the past and the present, caught in a web of magic, mystery, suspicion and witchhunts.

Cam is quick-witted and clever - sometimes too clever for his own good. When he finds himself in a spot of trouble, he''s keen to take a job that will get him out of the way for a while, even if it means he doesn''t look at it too closely.Tasked to take a letter to a far-off city - simple enough, you would think - he instead finds himself caught up in intrigue and dangers beyond those he was escaping, and in possession of a cursed knife he cannot get rid of. And that''s before he even looks at the city''s cats.The city''s very unusual, unexpectedly intelligent cats.The city''s unusual, intelligent and slightly magical cats, whose fates are now entwined with his.

Life is simple where Ralph lives, up in the Pennines. It''s peaceful. Ordinary.Until one day, when out with the sheep, he finds something strange, too strange to be from Earth. The alien grave holds secrets of the past, but also draws Ralph into the middle of an epic war between two alien races, taking place among the stars above his head. Has he thrown his planet into a battle it can''t possibly fight? This war has raged for centuries, but perhaps Ralph could hold the key to ending it once and for all.