Free Lance and the Lake of Skulls

Today I was making my way to the off licence to buy some crisps and copious amounts of booze, when I noticed the mobile library was parked up alongside the offy. I'm sure that this was coincidence and that librarians aren't all sloshed and bombed off their faces on cheap bottles of grog. Armed with my trusty library card, (just like the main character in The DaVinci Code - snigger) I hopped aboard.





The first book I saw, and which I am reviewing as my first post, was: Free Lance and the Lake of Skulls by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell.


Regular readers of children's fantasy fiction will know these two lads as the pair that created The Edge Chronicles, an award winning fantasy series. For my sins, I have only ever read a couple of those books, but they were excellent so I was quite looking forward to this novella.







Here's the blurb:

Free Lance is hacked off and cold. His horse is lame. Now some great oaf is trying to pick a fight. Business as usual for a knight down on his luck.

But things are about to get interesting. A scheming lord, a hideous hag, an enchanted crown and an appointment with terror at the Lake of Skulls.


Sounds ace, don't it? And it was. Free Lance and the Lake of Skulls is a very short book, but it's packed with humour, violence, gore and adventure. It also has a good looking, buxom bar wench, which is always good in my book.


Written in the first person, the tale of Free Lance the knight begins with our hero, down on his luck, entering a poor village upon his trusty, but aging, warhorse, Jed. The village oaf picks a fight with the knight, who manages to fend him off. The lord of the manor approaches the knight and offers him money to travel to a small island in the middle of a lake, where lies, upon a skull upon a mountain of skulls, a fabled crown that supposedly has the power for the wearer to rule the world.


Free Lance, not believing in such nonsense, gladly accepts the challenge, stables his horse and trundles off to retrieve said crown. And then he meets the murderous hags of doooooooooooooooooooooooooom!


My only concern with this story is that it was very short and, at £6.99, a little steep in the asking price. I think many kids will end up borrowing this from the library like I did.

Overall, a fun little read, with some excellent illustrations throughout (especially of the barmaid!)

3 out of 5.

Free Lance and the Lake of Skulls by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell.
Published by Hodder in 2003.
ISBN: 0-340-87409-0