All things in their time. . . . Candy Quackenbush’s adventures in the Abarat are getting stranger by the hour. Why has the Lord of Midnight sent his henchman after her? Why can she suddenly speak words of magic? Why is this world familiar? Candy and her companions must solve the mystery of her past before the forces of Night and Day clash and Absolute Midnight descends upon the islands. A final war is about to begin. . . .

Clive Barker, author of The Thief of Always, delivers an epic battle filled with fantasy and adventure that readers won't want to put down! A journey beyond imagination is about to unfold... It begins in Chickentown, USA. There lives Candy Quackenbush, her heart bursting for some clue as to what her future might hold. When the answer comes, it’s not one she expects. Welcome to the Abarat, a vast archipelago where every island is a different hour of the day. Candy has a place in this extraordinary land: She is here to help save the Abarat from the dark forces that are stirring at its heart—forces older than Time itself, and more evil than anything Candy has ever encountered. She’s a strange heroine, she knows. But this is a strange world. And in the Abarat, all things are possible. Don't miss this first book in Clive Barker's New York Times bestselling Abarat series.

“I know that many of you here have waited years for this Hour,” Mater Motley said, using that voice that, though it was barely conversational in volume, was somehow heard everywhere. “The waiting is over. Tomorrow there will be no dawn. Only midnight, absolute and eternal.” And so begins a new chapter in the epic story of sixteen-year-old Candy Quackenbush and her journeys through the world of the Abarat, where every hour is an island in one eternal day, and nothing is as it seems. Candy travels through the Abarat from island to island and across the sea with an unlikely band of friends: the escaped prisoner Malingo the Geshrat, the quarrelsome John Brothers, who all share the same body but never the same opinion, and the many other colorful characters they meet along the way. The problem is that trouble finds Candy wherever she goes. And soon she discovers a secret plot, masterminded by the diabolical Mater Motley, who is obsessed with becoming Empress of the Islands. Her method is simple. She will darken the skies, putting out the suns, moons, and stars. She will bring absolute midnight.

The Abarat is a magical otherworld composed on an archipelago of twenty-five islands. Candy Quackenbush, escaping her dull life from the most boring place in our world, Chickentown, USA, finds that in the Abarat, she has another existence entirely, one which links her to marvels and mysteries; and even to murder.

A dazzling fantasy adventure for all ages, the second part of a quartet appearing at two yearly intervals, richly illustrated by the author. Film rights sold to Disney for $8 million on the paintings alone.

For use in schools and libraries only. Candy Quackenbush's adventures in the wondrous world of Arbarat continue.

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