For Ages
9 to 12

Twilight Land is a part of the Looking Glass Library collection.

It is evening at the Inn of the Sign of Mother Goose. In a dark, smoky room, the world’s most famous storytellers gather to weave tales of mystery and enchantment. In this collection of 16 haunting fairy tales, Howard Pyle intertwines each story with the next, crafting a unified world filled with princes and demons, genies and sorceresses, and all the characters that pitch in to wage the age-old battle between good and evil. This Looking Glass Library edition includes an introduction by N. D. Wilson and Pyle’s intricate line illustrations from the original 1894 publication.

An Excerpt fromTwilight Land

1

THE STOOL OF FORTUNE

Once upon a time there came a soldier marching  along the road, kicking up a little cloud of dust at each step--as strapping and merry and bright-eyed a fellow as you would wish to see on a summer day. Tramp! tramp! tramp! he marched, whistling as he jogged along, though he carried a heavy musket over his shoulder and though the sun shone hot and strong and there was never a tree in sight to give him a bit of shelter. At last he came in sight of the King's Town and to a great field of stocks and stones, and there sat a little old man as withered and brown as a dead leaf, and clad all in scarlet from head to foot.

"Ho! soldier," said he, "are you a good shot?"

"Aye," said the soldier, "that is my trade."

"Would you like to earn a dollar by shooting off your musket for me?"

"Aye," said the soldier, "that is my trade also."

"Very well, then," said the little man in red, "here is a silver…