CHAPTER 1

Books and bumps and bare bottoms

I’m Mim. I’m ten years old and small for my age. My full name is Miriam-Rose Cohen, but I prefer Mim. I have long, wavy hair the colour of chocolate. Not the stuff with nuts or raisins or crispy toffee bits. That would be weird. My hair is just the colour of plain dark chocolate. My eyes are big and brown, and I have a red bump in the middle of my forehead.

The bump is new. Brand new. A book has fallen on my head and startled me awake.

‘Ouch!’

I rub my forehead again, but I don’t cry. I don’t even say, ‘Ouch!’ again. Because I’m used to books falling on my head. It’s bound to happen when you sleep in a bookshop. Especially a travelling bookshop. And especially, especially when the travelling bookshop is an old wooden caravan pulled by a horse called Flossy who sometimes strays off the edge of the road.

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