The Cockatrice Boys
by Joan Aiken
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What does a cockatrice enjoy most for dinner? Anyone it can find. So the alarmed inhabitants of England discover when a plague of monsters-known as cockatrices-invade their country and begin gobbling them up. They must be stopped A plucky band of survivors dubbed the Cockatrice Corps- including youngsters Dakin and Sauna-decide to fight back. But how? A rollicking adventure filled with breathtaking twists and turns, "The Cockatrice Boys "is Joan Aiken at her comic best.Tags
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With the UK invaded and the population depleted by swarms of horrible monsters, the surviving populations has been forced to live in hiding. A Cockatrice Corp is formed to battle the menace, travelling the country on an armoured train powered by wind, solar and stellar energy and compressed diesel bricks. Drummer boy Dakin Prestwich is on board, and soon so is his cousin Sauna, along with her mysterious precognitive powers. Travelling first to Manchester and then to Scotland and the heart of the outbreak, fighting monsters every step of the way, can the Corp defeat the monsters once and for all?
A brilliantly demented book that manages to be hilariously funny even as characters get devoured and vanished and turned to stone by the score. show more The premise is amazing, though, and the whole thing is fantastically entertaining. show less
A brilliantly demented book that manages to be hilariously funny even as characters get devoured and vanished and turned to stone by the score. show more The premise is amazing, though, and the whole thing is fantastically entertaining. show less
When I was a kid, I always particularly liked Joan Aiken's books, especially the spooky and grim, 'The Wolves of Willoughby Chase' and the funny 'Arabel and Mortimer' series. Somehow, I never got around to 'The Cockatrice Boys,' (or, looking at her bibliography, a whole bunch of her other books that I guess weren't at my public library!
I also hadn't heard that Aiken passed away last year... a belated R.I.P.!!!
When England is reduced to a near post-apocalyptic state by a sudden plague of monsters, the military builds a great train to attempt to combat the vicious creatures. Laying track up north, and getting decimated by assorted grotesques at every step of the way, they make their way closer to what may be the source of the problem... show more Our heroes are young drummer boy Dakin Prestwich and his cousin Sauna, an orphan who's spent the last few years tied up at her aunt's house so that she doesn't break the china. These two kids may be the last best hope of England...
Deftly melds the dark and the funny.... mixing classic legends of England with superstitions regarding Manchester United, etc... Imagine Terry Pratchett with a gothic horror feel... show less
I also hadn't heard that Aiken passed away last year... a belated R.I.P.!!!
When England is reduced to a near post-apocalyptic state by a sudden plague of monsters, the military builds a great train to attempt to combat the vicious creatures. Laying track up north, and getting decimated by assorted grotesques at every step of the way, they make their way closer to what may be the source of the problem... show more Our heroes are young drummer boy Dakin Prestwich and his cousin Sauna, an orphan who's spent the last few years tied up at her aunt's house so that she doesn't break the china. These two kids may be the last best hope of England...
Deftly melds the dark and the funny.... mixing classic legends of England with superstitions regarding Manchester United, etc... Imagine Terry Pratchett with a gothic horror feel... show less
What does a cockatrice enjoy most for dinner? Anyone it can find.
So the alarmed inhabitants of England discover when a plague of monsters-known as cockatrices-invade their country and begin gobbling them up. They must be stopped! A plucky band of survivors dubbed the Cockatrice Corps- including youngsters Dakin and Sauna-decide to fight back. But how?
A rollicking adventure filled with breathtaking twists and turns, The Cockatrice Boys is Joan Aiken at her comic best.
So the alarmed inhabitants of England discover when a plague of monsters-known as cockatrices-invade their country and begin gobbling them up. They must be stopped! A plucky band of survivors dubbed the Cockatrice Corps- including youngsters Dakin and Sauna-decide to fight back. But how?
A rollicking adventure filled with breathtaking twists and turns, The Cockatrice Boys is Joan Aiken at her comic best.
This book was very odd. The premise was intriguing but it took a while for things to happen. I do not like scary books and this one got really scary at the end and then was resolved so quickly it left me unsettled.
A charming, strange tale in which Britain is overrun by monsters previously thought to be imaginary. It has a definite sort of "War of the Worlds" flavor, with British soldiers complaining about the quality of the tea, then dashing off to perform heroic acts. It's billed on the jacket as Aiken's "first adult fantasy," but I would also recommend it to teens who like a touch of the bizarre.
Joan Aiken wrote my favorite childhood book, The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. This one wasn't nearly as good, but the opening scene hooked me. Monsters arrive to invade England via the baggage claim carousel at the Manchester Airport!...
Plot:
The United Kingdom is facing a plague of monsters, called cockatrices, of all shapes and sizes that pretty much overran the entire country. But there are the Cockatrice Corps, an army special unit dedicated to fight the monsters. As they ride the train across the country fighting monsters along the way, they are joined by Dakin as a drummer boy and a little later by his cousin Sauna who seems to have a way of knowing things she couldn’t know and who has spent the last few years tied up at her aunts place so she doesn’t break anything. And maybe those two are just what the Corps needed to finally get ahead in the fight.
The Cockatrice Boys didn’t really convince me, unfortunately. I thought it was often confusing and rarely all show more that funny. It just left me scratching my head.
Read more on my blog: https://kalafudra.com/2016/11/10/the-cockatrice-boys-joan-aiken/ show less
The United Kingdom is facing a plague of monsters, called cockatrices, of all shapes and sizes that pretty much overran the entire country. But there are the Cockatrice Corps, an army special unit dedicated to fight the monsters. As they ride the train across the country fighting monsters along the way, they are joined by Dakin as a drummer boy and a little later by his cousin Sauna who seems to have a way of knowing things she couldn’t know and who has spent the last few years tied up at her aunts place so she doesn’t break anything. And maybe those two are just what the Corps needed to finally get ahead in the fight.
The Cockatrice Boys didn’t really convince me, unfortunately. I thought it was often confusing and rarely all show more that funny. It just left me scratching my head.
Read more on my blog: https://kalafudra.com/2016/11/10/the-cockatrice-boys-joan-aiken/ show less
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215+ Works 19,786 Members
Joan Delano Aiken was born in Rye, Sussex, England, on September 4, 1924, the daughter of the Pulitzer Prize winner, writer Conrad Aiken. She was raised in a rural area and home schooled by her mother until the age 12. She then attended Wychwood School, a boarding school in Oxford. Her work first appeared in 1941 when the British Broadcasting show more Corporation, where she worked as a librarian, broadcast some of her short stories on their Children's Hour program. Aiken also worked at St. Thomas's Hospital, and in 1943 she moved to the reference department of the London office of the United Nations, where she collected information about resistance movements. She worked for the UN until 1949, all the while continuing to write stories. In 1953 a collection of short fiction called All You've Ever Wanted and Other Stories was published. While writing The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, begun in 1952, her husband became ill and died of lung cancer in 1955. After working for five years as a copy editor at Argosy Magazine, and at the J. Walter Thompson Advertising Firm, she returned and finished the book in 1963. The Wolves of Willoughby Chase won the Lewis Carroll Shelf Award and was made into a successful film in 1988. In 1969 The Whispering Mountain won the Guardian Children's Book Award, and in 1972, Night Fall won America's Edgar Allen Poe Award for juvenile mystery. Aiken is best known for her adult "fantasy" stories. She has received awards for children's fiction and for mystery fiction, and has also written ''sequels'' to Jane Austen books. She collaborated with her daughter to write many episodes of her Arabel and Mortimer the raven series for the BBC. In all, Aiken wrote 92 novels - including 27 for adults - as well as plays, poems and short stories, although she was best known as a writer of children's stories. Joan Aiken died in January of 2004 at the age of 79. (Bowker Author Biography) show less
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Common Knowledge
- Original publication date
- 1993
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- Members
- 151
- Popularity
- 216,186
- Reviews
- 7
- Rating
- (3.29)
- Languages
- English
- Media
- Paper, Ebook
- ISBNs
- 9
- ASINs
- 2
