Spike Carbuncle and the Truly Enormous Egg

By Karen Wallace and Helen Flook

Set in the Viking world of long boats, looting and grand adventure,
The Goose Pimple Bay Sagas relate the hilarious tales of a noble family
with a difference.

Spike Carbuncle is sick of being second in command to his weedy
brother. So, when Spike's wife, Fangtrude, comes across a dragon's egg,
together they formulate a plan to get rid of Whiff Erik, once and for
all. There's just one hitch - dragon training isn't as easy as it
sounds. What do you do when your dragon is terrible at breathing fire
and prefers eating onions to live goats?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: May 24, 2012
• ISBN: 9781408153246

Karen Wallace

Karen Wallace is an award-winning author of children's books. Her first novel for older readers, Raspberries on the Yangtze (Simon & Schuster) was shortlisted for the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize. The first in her series for younger readers, The Crunchbone Castle Chronicles, published by A&C Black, was selected for the Summer Reading Challenge in 2006. The Goosepimple Bay Sagas was a World Book Day recommended read in 2008 and Li Fu's Great Aim was chosen for the recent Boys into Books promotion.

Book preview

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Chapter One

Spike Carbuncle walked through the forest behind the Great Hall at Goose Pimple Bay, whacking the heads off all the flowers with a big, knobbly stick. Every time a bunch of petals exploded and fell to the ground, he thought of his brother, Whiff Erik. And thinking of his brother, put Spike into a very bad mood.

Whack! Whack! Whack! Soon the path was covered in petals.

The truth was, Spike Carbuncle was furious. He was the oldest son in his family. He should be chief of Goose Pimple Bay. It was only right and it was what he wanted more than anything else in the whole world. Instead, his brother was chief and Whiff Erik was nothing more than a weedy wet who spent his whole time gardening.

And as for his brother’s daft wife, Fernsilver. Spike flattened a pretty daisy with the heel of his boot. She spent her time breeding goats, and making cheese and pots of sloppy white stuff, which everyone poured over their berries at meal times.

Spike Carbuncle hated cheese. And as for the sloppy white stuff – while all the other Vikings gobbled theirs up, Spike dumped his behind Whiff Erik’s chair. He was secretly hoping his brother would slip on it and break his neck, but