The Little Captain

A timeless and enchanting children's fantasy classic by the author of The King of the Copper Mountains 'Paul Biegel has a grain of real gold in his imagination... [A] curiously thrilling narrative' Naomi Lewis One morning, after a fierce storm, the people of the harbour come down to find a strange ship called the Neversink stuck fast on top of the sand dunes. Inside is only a small boy with a big cap - The Little Captain. He and his ship stay marooned on top of the dunes until one day a giant wave sweeps the Neversink to freedom. And so The Little Captain sets sail once more, this time with three of the town's children, Podgy, Marinka and Thomas, as his crew mates. Together they are determined to find the island of Evertaller, where legend has it children turn into grown-ups overnight and never have to go to school again... This enchanting seafaring adventure is beloved by generations of children in the Netherlands.

Paul Biegel was one of Europe's most acclaimed and best-loved storytellers, and the author of more than fifty books for children. Born in the Netherlands in 1926, he studied law but worked as a comic-strip writer before writing his first novel, The Golden Guitar, in 1960. He wrote at a rate of almost a book year for nearly forty years, producing timeless fantastical tales of dwarves, princesses, witches, robbers and talking animals. The Little Captain was first published in 1970 and was Biegel's bestselling title. The King of the Copper Mountains and The Gardens of Dorr are also available from Pushkin Children's Books.