Description

‘Roald Dahl by way of Charles Dickens’ – Vox.com
‘Dark and wildly original urban fantasy tale’ – The New York Times
‘Delightful, eccentric, heartfelt, surprising, philosophical, everything that a novel for children should be’ – Eleanor Catton, winner of the Man Booker Prize 2013
‘A rare work of individual brilliance’ – Inis magazine

The Iremongers have taken up what was not wanted and wanted it.

Clod is an Iremonger. He lives in the Heaps, a vast sea of lost and discarded items collected from all over London. At the centre is Heap House, a puzzle of houses, castles, homes and mysteries reclaimed from the city and built into a living maze of staircases and scurrying rats. The Iremongers are a mean and cruel family, robust and hardworking, but Clod has an illness. He can hear the objects whispering. His birth object, a universal bath plug, says ‘James Henry’, Cousin Tummis’s tap is squeaking ‘Hilary Evelyn Ward-Jackson’ and something in the attic is shouting ‘Robert Burrington’ and it sounds angry.

A storm is brewing over Heap House. The Iremongers are growing restless and the whispers are getting louder. When Clod meets Lucy Pennant, a girl newly arrived from the city, everything changes. The secrets that bind Heap House together begin to unravel to reveal a dark truth that threatens to destroy Clod’s world.

Publisher Review

Edward Carey’s HEAP HOUSE – delightful, eccentric, heartfelt, surprising, philosophical, everything that a novel for children should be. * Eleanor Catton, winner of the Man Book Prize 2013 * My favourite novel for children published this year was the marvelously funny and inventive HEAP HOUSE * The Guardian * Astonishing and inventive, it calls out to be read. — Nicolette Jones * The Sunday Times * Dark and wildly original urban fantasy tale. * The New York Times * This inventive and continually surprising novel evokes a darkly distorted image of Victorian London which is at once frightening, grotesque and often very funny … a peculiar but superbly-realised fantasy – the first book in what promises to be an excellent trilogy. * Booktrust – Books We Like * A rare work of individual brilliance. * Inis magazine * A deliciously macabre trilogy for middle graders and young teens channels Dickens crossed with Lemony Snicket … in turns witty, sweet, thoughtful and thrilling-but always off-kilter-and penned with gorgeous, loopy prose just this side of precious. * Kirkus Reviews, starred review *