Books with author Charles Fredeen

Maxwell Finch decides to take his desperately ill brother, Tommy, to the shopping mall so that Tommy can tell Santa Claus his Christmas wish. Max enlists the help of his friend Lydia and together, they intend to present a three-powered wish asking Santa to help Tommy. The trip is a disaster; they never make it out of the backyard and are almost caught by Max's mother who comes home early due to a fierce snow storm. Max and Lydia head off without Tommy and reach the mall. While in line to to see Santa, their fear that they will be spotted by schoolmates and their fear that the mall Santa is a fake, come true. Max and Lydia lose all hope.As they sit on a bench discussing what to do next, the lights grow dim, all becomes quiet, then suddenly, there's a stiff puff of air from behind. Out of nowhere, Willoughby, the real Santa Claus' brother, appears via his latest invention, the "time-beater," to help Max and Lydia. Willoughby explains that just before his other invention, the "sincere-wish-sensor," exploded, he had intercepted Tommy's wish and was surprised to find that Tommy didn't ask Santa to make him well again, but rather, he asked Santa to bring Max a new brother --- one that wasn't sick all the time. With the knowledge that Tommy is truly a good Kid, Willoughby wants to help, so he gives Max and Lydia the golden key to the one hundred and fifth tunnel to the North Pole. He tells them that there will be three chimes and they must follow the sound through the mall to find the door. Once inside, the tunnel will lead them north. However, Max and Lydia don't know that Santa has just cancelled Christmas and won't grant any wish because the Celestial Beacon has been stolen. He needs the Beacon to tell the good kids from the bad kids. Willoughby figures that if Santa meets Max and Lydia, he'll find some way to help his little brother. After a battle with a mall security guard and shopkeeper, Max and Lydia reach the tunnel with the golden key and are joined by the shopkeeper's son, Walter, who stumbles through the opening just as it closes up. Along the way, the three of them fight off giant pill bugs, discover an underground desert, find the ancient city of Atlas, are chased by a crazy man that wants their hair, meet baby throat monster eggs, and run into Delmore Doodle, an elf that has been branded as a coward by the other citizens of Elf City. Three themes are woven into this tale; good verse evil; the bond between brothers; and the importance of time.

Unlike some other reproductions of classic texts (1) We have not used OCR(Optical Character Recognition), as this leads to bad quality books with introduced typos. (2) In books where there are images such as portraits, maps, sketches etc We have endeavoured to keep the quality of these images, so they represent accurately the original artefact. Although occasionally there may be certain imperfections with these old texts, we feel they deserve to be made available for future generations to enjoy.

Excerpt from The Boys of Highfield, or the Hero of Chancery HouseTo-day there was something unusual going on, for although it was now dusk, the boys remained talking together as if some important point had to be settled, which was both difficult and disagreeable.Presently a police sergeant appeared at the gate, and, opening it, walked directly towards the spot where the boys were assembled.As soon as the boys saw him coming, several whispered to Clement Brand, Now, Brand! You talk to him and Clement stepped forward as the spokesman of the club, to meet the representative of the law. Tall for his age, which was seventeen, Clement looked almost a young man, and, to judge from his bearing, he regarded him self as such. 'what is it, sergeant?' he inquired, in a pleasant voice, which betrayed no anxiety as to the interview. The police sergeant was a big man with a good-humoured face, and he knew every member of the club as well as they knew him.Which of you young gentlemen threw a cricket ball into Mr. Blyth's conservatory just now he inquired of Clement.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

Excerpt from The Boys of Highfield, or the Hero of Chancery HouseTo-day there was something unusual going on, for although it was now dusk, the boys remained talking together as if some important point had to be settled, which was both difficult and disagreeable.Presently a police sergeant appeared at the gate, and, opening it, walked directly towards the spot where the boys were assembled.As soon as the boys saw him coming, several whispered to Clement Brand, Now, Brand! You talk to him and Clement stepped forward as the spokesman of the club, to meet the representative of the law. Tall for his age, which was seventeen, Clement looked almost a young man, and, to judge from his bearing, he regarded him self as such. 'what is it, sergeant?' he inquired, in a pleasant voice, which betrayed no anxiety as to the interview. The police sergeant was a big man with a good-humoured face, and he knew every member of the club as well as they knew him.Which of you young gentlemen threw a cricket ball into Mr. Blyth's conservatory just now he inquired of Clement.About the PublisherForgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.comThis book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.

This book was originally published prior to 1923, and represents a reproduction of an important historical work, maintaining the same format as the original work. While some publishers have opted to apply OCR (optical character recognition) technology to the process, we believe this leads to sub-optimal results (frequent typographical errors, strange characters and confusing formatting) and does not adequately preserve the historical character of the original artifact. We believe this work is culturally important in its original archival form. While we strive to adequately clean and digitally enhance the original work, there are occasionally instances where imperfections such as blurred or missing pages, poor pictures or errant marks may have been introduced due to either the quality of the original work or the scanning process itself. Despite these occasional imperfections, we have brought it back into print as part of our ongoing global book preservation commitment, providing customers with access to the best possible historical reprints. We appreciate your understanding of these occasional imperfections, and sincerely hope you enjoy seeing the book in a format as close as possible to that intended by the original publisher.

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This is a reproduction of a book published before 1923. This book may have occasional imperfections such as missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. that were either part of the original artifact, or were introduced by the scanning process. We believe this work is culturally important, and despite the imperfections, have elected to bring it back into print as part of our continuing commitment to the preservation of printed works worldwide. We appreciate your understanding of the imperfections in the preservation process, and hope you enjoy this valuable book.