The Goldsmith and the Master Thief

A classic adventure involving two very different twins by the celebrated author of The Letter for the King

Born to a poor cobbler and his wife in the beautiful city of Bainu in the land of Babina, Laurenzo and Jiacomo are identical twins, as alike as two drops of water. No one can tell them apart (which comes in very handy for playing tricks on their teachers). And no one can split them up. But when tragedy strikes their carefree young lives, they must make their own way in the world. At a fork in the road they decide to split up, and return to meet in the same place one year later. As each brother chooses his own path - hardworking Laurenzo to make beautiful objects from gold and silver, and fearless Jiacomo to travel, explore and become an unlikely thief - it is the start of a series of incredible escapades that will test them to their limits.
Along the way they will face terrible danger, solve cunning riddles, become prisoners in a castle, sail across the ocean, fall in and out of love, stay at an enchanted inn, help save a priceless pearl, even become kings by mistake. They must use all their talents, wiles and wisdom to survive, in this charming adventure through a fairy-tale land.

Tonke Dragt was born in Jakarta in 1930 and spent most of her childhood in Indonesia. When she was twelve, she was interned in a camp run by the Japanese occupiers, where she wrote (with a friend) her very first book using begged and borrowed paper. Her family moved to the Netherlands after the war and, after studying at the Royal Academy of Art in The Hague, Dragt became an art teacher. She published her first book in 1961, followed a year later by The Letter for the King, which won the Children’s Book of the Year award and has been translated into sixteen languages. Dragt was awarded the State Prize for Youth Literature in 1976 and was knighted in 2001.

Laura Watkinson studied medieval and modern languages at Oxford, and taught English around the world before returning to the UK to take a Master’s in English and Applied Linguistics, and a postgraduate certificate in literary translation. She is now a full-time translator from Dutch, Italian and German, and has translated a number of titles for Pushkin Children’s Books including Winter in Wartime, Lampie, and Letter for the King.