Margins
2015
First Published
4.14
Average Rating
128
Number of Pages

Abandoned at the orphanage in Venice as a baby, Laura is mute. Her life is transformed when the composer Vivaldi unlocks her passion for music. The seasons turn, dark turns to light and miracles happen. Carnegie award-winning author, Kevin Crossley-Holland makes every word a masterstroke. This short novel is exquisitely illustrated by acclaimed artist, Jane Ray. Her work is inspired by Vivaldi's Four Seasons and the real girls and boys who lived and laughed and worked in the Venetian Orphanage.

Avg Rating
4.14
Number of Ratings
125
5 STARS
41%
4 STARS
39%
3 STARS
14%
2 STARS
5%
1 STARS
1%
goodreads

Author

Kevin Crossley-Holland
Kevin Crossley-Holland
Author · 34 books

Kevin Crossley-Holland is a well-known poet and prize-winning author for children. His books include Waterslain Angels, a detective story set in north Norfolk in 1955, and Moored Man: A Cycle of North Norfolk Poems; Gatty's Tale, a medieval pilgrimage novel; and the Arthur trilogy (The Seeing Stone, At the Crossing-Places and King of the Middle March), which combines historical fiction with the retelling of Arthurian legend. The Seeing Stone won the Guardian Children’s Fiction Award and the Smarties Prize Bronze Medal. The Arthur trilogy has won worldwide critical acclaim and has been translated into 21 languages. Crossley-Holland has translated Beowulf from the Anglo-Saxon, and his retellings of traditional tales include The Penguin Book of Norse Myths and British Folk Tales (reissued as The Magic Lands). His collaborations with composers include two operas with Nicola Lefanu ("The Green Children" and "The Wildman") and one with Rupert Bawden, "The Sailor’s Tale"; song cycles with Sir Arthur Bliss and William Mathias; and a carol with Stephen Paulus for King’s College, Cambridge. His play, The Wuffings, (co-authored with Ivan Cutting) was produced by Eastern Angles in 1997. He often lectures abroad on behalf of the British Council, regularly leads sessions for teachers and librarians, and visits primary and secondary schools. He offers poetry and prose workshops and talks on the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings, King Arthur, heroines and heroes, and myth, legend and folk-tale. After seven years teaching in Minnesota, where he held an Endowed Chair in the Humanities, Kevin Crossley-Holland returned to the north Norfolk coast in East Anglia, where he now lives. He has a Minnesotan wife, Linda, two sons (Kieran and Dominic) and two daughters (Oenone and Eleanor). He is an Honorary Fellow of St. Edmund Hall, Oxford, a patron of the Society of Storytelling and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

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