Books by Ian Beck

Peter and the Wolf was composed by the great Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev to introduce children to the instruments of the orchestra. This timeless tale is beautifully retold and illustrated with by award-winning Ian Beck, and remains a wonderful introduction to the world of music.

'Ian Beck sees things in these quiet roads and suburbs and captures them for us and for a future time when we shall all be gone. What mysterious stillness haunts these houses! I love them all' Philip Pullman

The first title in a new art-inspired picture book series. Based on the world-famous John Singer Sargent painting, Carnation, Lily, Lily Rose, Ian Beck brings the subjects to life and reveals an inspirational world behind the painting.

Build your child's reading confidence at home with books at the right level

Flame-haired Charity Delafield has grown up in a vast, isolated house - most of which she is forbidden to explore - by her strict, cold father. With only her kindly nurse, Rose, and her cat Mr Tompkins for company, she knows very little of the outside world - or of her own family's shadowy past. What she does know is that she is NEVER to go outside unsupervised. And she is NEVER to over-excite herself, because of the mysterious 'condition' that she has been told she suffers from.But Charity has a secret of her own. All her life, she has had the same strange dream - a dream of a dark corridor, hidden somewhere in the house. Then, one day, Charity stumbles across the corridor. It leads to a door . . . and suddenly she realises things are not quite what they seem.

On a bitterly cold winter's night in 1900, a young boy disappears without trace from the forest near his home in the quiet village of Litton Cheney. He is never found, but the man he was with claims he was snatched by angels.Forty years later, Corporal Jack Carmody is sent to investigate strange reports of mysterious lights above Litton Cheney. The villagers suspect German bombers overhead, but Carmody knows there's something far more intriguing going on. And when a terrified boy appears in the graveyard, convinced it's the year 1900, it's up to Carmody and his boss - the charismatic Captain Holloway - to uncover the truth.

High above the stables the night sky was filled with angels, who gave thanks to God and welcomed the new baby with their beautiful music. A perfect first book of the Nativity; simply told and beautifully illustrated by Ian Beck.