The Dark is Rising (by Susan Cooper)

It’s over twenty years since I first came across Susan Cooper. My sons had been given a copy of ‘Over Sea, Under Stone’ which they enjoyed - and which I re-read in December. Not long afterwards I spotted the sequel, ‘The Dark is Rising’, in a discount store. It was very good value and we were delighted to learn that there were others in the series.

‘The Dark is Rising’ does not, at first, seem to be a sequel. The children in the first book are not mentioned. Instead the book focuses on a boy...