Extract - The Travelling Bookshop by Katrina Nannestad illustrated by Cheryl Orsini

Nat giggles at one final star that clings to his toenail. He wriggles his toes until it vanishes. We hold our breath and squeeze each other’s hands. Coco presses her head against my cheek. A delicate gold vine creeps out of a crack in the wall. It weaves its way across the spines of the books, tracing new gold and silver letters. It twists and loops and grows until, at last, the title of each and every book has reappeared in Dutch. At the same time, a spider drifts down from the ceiling on a fine black thread, swings to the nearest book and disappears between its pages. His web will work the same magic inside the books as the vine did on the covers, rewriting every word in Dutch. I know the words are Dutch because I can read them. Just as Dad, Nat and I will now be able to speak Dutch. It’s all in the magic of the

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