The Lord of the Rabbits

Some places are older than the people who find them. Some secrets are worth keeping forever.

When nine-year-old Pip Warren is sent to spend the summer at his grandmother's farm, he expects eight weeks of nothing. Instead, he finds a gap in a fence, a meadow that doesn't quite belong to the ordinary world, and a rabbit with one white ear who is waiting — very patiently — for exactly the right person to come along.

Thatch is the Lord of the Rabbits, forty-third in an unbroken line stretching back three hundred years. Beneath the meadow lies the Great Warren: two hundred and fourteen rabbits, tunnels that follow ancient roots, and records kept so carefully that nothing truly important has ever been forgotten. Thatch has been watching the farm for some time. He has been hoping.

When yellow survey stakes begin appearing at the meadow's edge, Pip and Thatch must work together across the boundary of their two worlds — one armed with photographs and a grandmother's careful wisdom, the other with three centuries of knowing how to survive. Along the way, Pip meets Briar, the fastest rabbit in the Warren and the most reluctant to trust him; discovers that his great-grandmother left something extraordinary behind; and learns what it means to pay attention to a place the way a place deserves to be paid attention to.

The Lord of the Rabbits is a story about belonging to something longer than yourself, about the courage it takes to sit still, and about what happens when the right person finally finds the right gap in the right fence.

Perfect for readers ages 8–12 and for anyone who has ever felt the pull of a place that seemed to be waiting for them.