Books published by publisher Collins Cler-Type Press

Set during the First World War, Age 14 is a heartbreaking and powerful story about growing up quickly in the face of war. Twelve-year-old Patrick Condon wants to escape his impoverished and tedious life in Ballybricken, County Waterford, so he hatches a plan. Not wanting to wait until he is old enough to join at sixteen, Patrick gives the army the name, John, and age, seventeen, of his older brother, and is enlisted. In the army, Patrick, now John, makes friends easily. The man's world is just what he always desired; if only there was more action. John gets all the action he is looking for when the war breaks out following the murder of the Austrian Crown Prince in 1914. Before he knows it, he is training with bayonets but it is nearly a game so long as no blood is spilled. The battle seems so far away. But the war is very real, and it is only a matter of time before John is at the front of it all. Based on a true story, this faction is about dreams, about war and peace, and the lives lost to achieve both. It is about a young boy named Patrick, and named John, the adventure and glory he so craved, and the tragic way he achieved both.

Master storyteller Vincent McDonnell relates the exciting story of Ireland from the earliest times, as Stone Age settlers arrived 9,000 years ago, through to the present day. From the building of the mysterious and magnificent tombs, such as Newgrange, to the arrival of Christianity, Ireland’s history is unfolded: invasion first by the Vikings, then the Normans, and the beginning of English rule. Conquered by a foreign nation and brutally oppressed, devastated by the Great Famine, the Irish refused to yield and eventually won freedom.

In April 1875, the whaler ‘Catalpa’ sailed from New Bedford in America, embarking on a hair-raising seafaring mission. Its destination was Fremantle, Western Australia; its goal to rescue six Fenian prisoners from the toughest prison there. The Irishmen, convicted of treason against the British Queen and regarded as traitors, were suffering from hunger, overwork and disease. Fearing they would die, they had pleaded with their comrades in America to be rescued. On Easter Monday 1876, the prisoners made their bid for freedom. But their escape attempt was soon in danger. The alarm was raised and heavily armed soldiers and police were sent in pursuit. Would the prisoners reach safety before they were captured? Was the escape doomed to failure? This is the story of that rescue attempt, a story of courage, endurance and daring, one of the most exciting and thrilling sea stories. By the author of MICHAEL COLLINS: MOST WANTED MAN and TITANIC TRAGEDY.

What animal’s name means ‘riverhorse’? During which war did Anne Frank write her diary while living in the attic of a house in Amsterdam? For the answers check out this new edition of The Whiz Quiz Book. Compiled by members of the National Parents Council (NPC) to meet persistent demands from parents of primary-school children, it is a unique project. Teachers, children and parents worked together to write it. Questions on a wide range of subjects – sport, music, history – are laid out in game format. Each game is ten rounds of ten questions. A round is made up of a good mix of questions so a round or a game can be a quiz on its own. With 1,000 questions, this book offers endless scope and variety for parents, teachers and children to use free time gainfully and enjoyably.

This great historical novel discloses the warm and colorful story of Saxon resistance to the Norman invasion of Britain. The story is a magical achievement: the reader shares, as in an immediate experience, in the life of a Saxon boy. With him, he watches the Danes come over the hill, lives as hostage in a Norman stronghold, escapes to Britain, shares in the memorable ride to the Battle of Hastings, and has to come to terms with a conquest that alters history. Saxon life and landscape, with brilliant reconstructions, take on a wonderful vitality. The eleventh century lives again in its own terms. The world of A.D. 1066 is that of any people whose freedom is ever threatened or whose way of life seems doomed.