The Stones are Hatching

The stones are hatching, the worm is waking! Only reluctant hero, Phelim Green, can save the world from the Stoor Worm and her monstrous hatchlings. Accompanied by his maiden, his fool and his horse, he embarks on a terrifying odyssey that brings successive encounters with creatures named in tales of folklore and demonology; bugganes, dracs, merrows, ushtays, the nuckalavee and Shuck the black dog. It seems as though the landscape itself is unleashing terrors. Across the channel in France, the earth is scarred by the horrors of trench warfare. Gunfire is waking the worm. War! Another madness of human consciousness. At its best the aural quality of McCaughrean's writing awakens the reader's senses and her poetic vision is realised through carefully wrought prose. The musicality and cadence of the writing touches the soul, capturing moments of beauty as well as horror. The final reflections invite us to consider how 'the world will explain away its nightmares.'