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Runemarks by Joanne Harris
Published by Doubleday, 2007

Maddy Smith is a fourteen year old girl from the future and from a land that we are not at all familiar with. She generates even more suspicion because of a mysterious rusty-coloured rune shape on her hand. The villagers of Malbry know that it is a symbol of magic and of communication with the Old Gods. In other words it’s a symbol of Danger.

Maddy enjoys working magic. With the help of the goblin One-Eye she learns more and more about the Norse Gods and the runes. In return for his teaching he urges Maddy to open Red Horse Hill and descend into World Below to retrieve a relic of the old gods.

If she doesn’t, it could be the End of Everything. Again...

Joanne Harris is the author of the best-selling books Chocolat, which was made into an Oscar-nominated movie and The Lollipop Shoes. Runemarks is her first fantasy book for teenage readers and like the other two is full of classic Harris imagination and magic.