Is it...dead?" asked Tom, his voice all quivery with fright. "A town just ran over him," said Hester. "I shouldn't think he's very well.

Godshawk looked surprised, the way that people generally do when you ask them philosophical questions in shrubberies in the middle of the night.

Is it...dead?" asked Tom, his voice all quivery with fright. "A town just ran over him," said Hester. "I shouldn't think he's very well.

It was a dark, blustery afternoon in spring, and the city of London was chasing a small mining town across the dried-out bed of the old North Sea.

But we're alive, and together, and we're going to be all right.

But boys will be boys, even the ones who are only girls dressed up: That's one of the rules of the world.

Even tiny children looking at a picture book are using their imaginations, gleaning clues from the images to understand what is happening, and perhaps using the throwaway details which the illustrator includes to add their own elements to the story.