A series of short novels by bestselling Italian children’s authors, curated by Pierdomenico Baccalario. Stories off limits with a wide range, over time and space, from the Middle Ages to the present day, crossing continents and oceans. Each story develops around a big historical topic or an important historical character. Stories that recall classics for children, told in a fresh and modern way and presented with elegant covers, maps and comparative chronological tables.

GUIDO SGARDOLI, ARRIVANO I FRATELLI HOOD (THE HOOD BROTHERS ARE COMING), 96 pp

Missouri, 1863. Frank and Jesse Hood are two brothers who can’t stand the abuse of power by the Union Army against farmers during the American Civil War. After the umpteenth injustice by the ruthless Lieutenant MacKenzie who burns down their farm, Frank and Jesse decide that enough is enough. Together with their friends, the children of the surrounding farms, they set up a gang of bandits out of necessity who will give the Union Army a really hard time.

MIRIAM DUBINI, POLVERE NERA (BLACK DUST), 96 pp

China, 1275. Qing is thirteen years old and wants to become an alchemist like her father, Shu, who is working on an important experiment: The game of black powder (later, many years later, known in the Western world as gun powder). One terrible day, the girl discovers that her father has been kidnapped, and only the great emperor Kublai Khan can help her. But in order to get to him, Qing will have to join a convoy of travellers coming from very, very far away. Among them, there is a seventeen year old boy called Marco Polo…

DAVIDE MOROSINOTTO, IL TERRIBILE TESTAMENTO DI JEREMY HOPPERTON (THE TERRIBLE WILL OF JEREMY HOPPERTON), 96 pp

Polynesia, 1799. Carrie Stewart is a young eleven-year-old English girl who is about to end up in a boarding school. But she hides in her cousin Harry’s trunk and finds herself on a sailing boat heading to some faraway islands on the Pacific Ocean. What Carrie doesn’t know yet is why Harry has set out on this dangerous journey: It seems that his childhood friend, Jeremy Hopperton, has been murdered by savages. But Carrie is pretty sure that Jeremy Hopperton died in an accident three years ago in England. So who are they really looking for?

PIERDOMENICO BACCALARIO, IL RITORNO DELLO ZAR (THE RETURN OF THE TSAR), 96 pp

Siberia, 1901. In order to escape from a treacherous plot of a dark sect of the Samurai, Tsar Nicholas II, seriously injured, is forced to hide and secretly cross Siberia, with the only company of a boy who says he can communicate with ghosts.

SABINA COLLOREDO, LA RUNA TATUATA (THE RUNE TATTOO), 96 pp

Norway, 1100 B.C. A young Viking leader takes part in the colonization of Great Britain. During the journey, it will be discovered that the young warrior is actually a girl determined to demonstrate her courage, against all prejudices.

EDUARDO JAURÉGUI, LA REGINA PIRATA (THE PIRATE QUEEN), 96 pp

Canary Islands, 1492. Young Daida, warrior of the Awara people, is forced to abandon her island that has been conquered by the Spaniards. But she swears to the sacred stone that she will return. And she will do so, sixty years later, as the most famous female pirate on these worldly oceans.