Euan Morton

In 1986, Eddie and his friends spend their days biking around their sleepy English village, looking for any taste of excitement they can get. The chalk men are their secret code: little chalk stick figures they leave for one another as messages only they can understand. But then a mysterious chalk man leads them right to a dismembered body, and nothing is ever the same...

Stax Stonecutter has lived a peaceful - if unremarkable - life in his small town in the Overworld. The son of great adventurers and wise builders, Stax prefers an easier life. It's quiet on his estate, even lonely sometimes, but it suits Stax well enough.

His solitude is shattered when a mysterious stranger arrives with a band of merciless raiders. In one terrible night, Stax's old life is taken from him, and he is left stranded in the middle of nowhere, angry and alone.

But as he begins his long journey back, Stax encounters fascinating travelers who show him that there's more to the Overworld than marauding pirates and frightening mobs; there are beautiful lands to explore, fantastical contraptions to build, and new friends to meet.