Paul Dixon’s Starfall is a magical adventure for 11 year olds about a girl who is handed a wolf cub from another world at midnight.<\/p>\n
Sam is thirteen and camping at the top of a mountain in Washington State to watch a meteor shower. Her best friend Virginia is in the tent outside. Sam is alone in an old fire lookout tower.<\/p>\n
At midnight a doorway of light opens in the corner. Through it comes an enormous white wolf, bleeding, with a black cub in her mouth. She tells Sam to take care of her baby. Then she turns on the slimy creature coming through behind her, and they both vanish.<\/p>\n
The cub is Starfall, a Star Wolf. She talks straight into Sam’s head, flies on columns of meteor fire and eats stars for breakfast. Well, meteors.<\/p>\n
She’s also a baby, and she’s very funny. Starfall gets stuck in a window. She laughs like a yodelling husky when you find her tickly spot. She has firm opinions about phones (bad things) and about being called a dog (she is NOT a dog).<\/p>\n
Sam tells the story looking back, and you feel her wonder from that very first night. There’s a lot about friendship too. Virginia is growing up faster than Sam, into make-up and boys and her phone, and Sam isn’t sure where she fits any more. Plenty of readers this age will know that feeling.<\/p>\n
And there’s a mystery. Sam’s dad always says he’s a physicist but her mum was a witch. Her mum died when Sam was two. Or did she?<\/p>\n
Some of it is properly creepy, though. When Sam touches the monster’s weapon she gets a horrible vision of slimy creatures with blood-red gills closing in on a flock of sheep. It leaves a stinging black stain around her eyes that won’t wash off. If your reader’s happy with a bit of horror in their fantasy, they’ll be gripped. A more sensitive reader might want to share those pages with you.<\/p>\n
For a younger take on a wolf nobody else believes in, try Emma Barnes’s Wolfie. Lucie’s uncle brings her a present he swears is a dog, and at midnight it starts to talk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Paul Dixon’s Starfall is a magical adventure for 11 year olds about a girl who is handed a wolf cub from another world at midnight. Sam is thirteen and camping at the top of a mountain in Washington State to watch a meteor shower. Her best friend Virginia is in the tent outside. Sam is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":12337,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"lr_next_read_post_id":9778,"lr_next_read_anchor":"Emma Barnes's Wolfie","lr_seo_hook":"A wolf cub from another world, handed to a girl at midnight on a mountain."},"book_tag":[1047],"age_group":[28],"book_type":[1044],"book_author":[784],"class_list":["post-8713","our-books","type-our-books","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","book_tag-magic-books","age_group-books-for-11-year-olds","book_type-paid","book_author-paul-dixon"],"yoast_title":"Starfall by Paul Dixon | Little Reads","yoast_metadesc":"A wolf cub from another world, handed to a girl at midnight on a mountain. For ages 11+. 3,000+ books in the Little Reads app. 7-day free trial.","acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n