Rosemary Sutcliff. who has made a quiet corner in the

retelling of things past, snatches- us back to Norman England with. The Witch's Brat (Oxford University Press 16s), which tells how a humpbacked boy helps to found the hospital and priory of St Bartholomew's. Miss Sutcliff has a compel- ling way with a phrase ('a tone as soothing as

run honey') and an ability to portray the caper and bustle of history without all the 'forsooth'-saying of some historical writers.

My Kingdom for a Grave Stephanie Plow- man (Bodley Head 30s) is the second and final volume about a family at the end of Tsarist Russia. Wonderfully-documented, it is scholarly as well as having a narrative-tug of steel.

Madeleine L'Engle, who wrote the beautiful A Wrinkle in Time, has written Prelude, (Victor Gollancz 20s), a story with which any teenage girl is bound to identify. Daughter of a concert-pianist mother, gone to alcoholic seed after an accident, the heroine goes to boarding school, finds everything against her (is even suspected of lesbianism, yet!), but comes to terms with life. Too contrived- ly self-pitying for me.

To Kill a King Madeleine Polland (Hutch- inson Junior Books I 8s), is about the incipi- ent worm of revolution at the core of William the Conqueror's England. Powerful stuff, with a tense poetry of mood.

Towards a High Attic Elfrida Vipont (Hamish Hamilton 25s), is about the early life of George Eliot. Fairly predictable, but has some neat surprises in the telling.

With Super Nova and the Frozen Man Angus MacVicar (Brockhampton Press I8s), we're in the science-fiction future with author Angus MacVicar. Surprisingly, it's all rather quaint and a bit too simple; my sons prefer Robert Heinlein.

A Cat called Camouflage Cordelia Jones (Deutsch 22s). Unusually perceptive about being thirteen, female, lonely, cat-fancying, with parents separated and living in horrible digs. Splendid everyday detail, gleaming in- telligence; really first-class.

Boy in a Barn Ursula Moray Williams (Allen and Unwin 30s). James spends a week half hiding in the barn where his father sheltered during the war and was saved by an old Austrian woman, becoming strangely invol- ved in the past. Middling but feelingly told.

The House on the Brink John Gordon (Hut- chinson I8s). Enormously exciting story with a modern fenland setting and an ancient mystery. Hard, energetic, effective style; farfetched but credible happenings.

The Gypsy's Grand-daughter Margaret Dun- nett (Deutsch 21s). Mild, attractive little tale about a girl torn between her gypsy back- ground and her respectable 'settled' present. Romance or reality? Squalor or neatness? Finally, folklore or science?

Castle Steep Beryl Netherclift (Hutchinson I8s). Holiday story about an island mysteri- ously linked with Tennyson's Lady of Shalott. Pale girlish adventure; pleasant. forgettable.

Jim Grey of Moonbah Reginald Ottley (Collins 21s). Boy on Australian sheep station gets involved in rustling and worse. Good plot but a leaden style.

Myna Bird Mystery Paul Berna translated by John Buchanan-Brown (Bodley Head I8s). French shanty-town with international popu- lation is exploited by the hated Mangler; Cady and his gang of local kids unmask him and run him out. Another of Berna's ener- getic tales of urban working-class French life.

Jason's Quest Margaret Laurence ( Macmil- lan 21s). Selfcontained fantasy about moles and other animals in a human-style subcul- ture teeming away around the ankles of human life. Cool and literate.

The Peculiar Triumphs of Professor Brane- staw►n Norman Hunter (Bodley Head I8s). Further adventures of the sage of Great Pagwell, inventor of mad machinery, for those that love him (not me). George Adam- son illustrates where Heath Robinson used to, and fails to show just how the mad machines work.

The Last Man Alive A. S. Neill (Gollancz 24s). A green cloud turns everyone to stone except Neill and some of his pupils at Sum- merhill school. Peculiar period flavour and interest (it was first published in 1938) and vile illustrations. For social historians rather than kids.

Zlatc•h the Goat and other stories Isaac Bashevis Singer (Longman 21s). Seven mid- dle-European Jewish stories told with tender- ness, funniness and occasional grief. For adults as well as children and for the haunt- ing pictures by Maurice Sendak as well as the text.

The Man from the Sea J. S. Andrews (Bodley Head 18s). The Bronze Age reaches North- ern Ireland in the shape of Hadra, a ship- wrecked stranger washed ashore. Serious, likeable story about the gradual expansion of minds and possibilities 3.600 years ago. The Bull Leapeis James Watson (Gollancz 20s). Ingenious interpretation of the legend of the Minotaur, but by comparison with better treaters of the ancient past it is dull in style and academic in tone.

Tamlane Anne Rundle (Hutchinson .16s). Celtic love story told in the first person by Seonaid, seventeen-year-old daughter of a Border chieftain. Fey and unsatisfying.

The Writ of Green Wax Edmund Bohan (Hutchinson 18s). Middleweight historical novel about Jack Cade and the Men of Kent. The present high standard of historical story- telling makes it seem dated in technique.

The Minstrel boy Aylmer Hall (Macmillan 25s). Lively story about fifteen-year-old Sean, hereditary bard of the O'Sullivans, who joins the Irish army in the late seventeenth century, when King Billy lands.

Whistling Clough Walter Unsworth (Goll- ancz 20s). Unusual and extremely exciting historical novel set in nineteenth-century Derbyshire, about lead miners and the search for a lost vein of lead. Dark characters and situations, well entrenched in the time.

Isabel Quigly