Though editing work is still continuing on Isle of the Dead, and will be for some time (interrupted by a modest holiday in a nearby forest) I am already thinking about Super Maxwell 4 - The Crimson King.
What can I tell you without giving too much away? Well, the book will be set on at least 3 planets - a pirate planet (which at some point in the future I plan to feature in another book, 'Captain Farr') - Earth (ie Virporta Island and also, probably London) - and Mars ... and maybe the Moon too - you'll have to wait and see on that one!
Several of the things I have promised myself faithfully on pain of death is that Billy and Maxwell will undertake this next adventure together; you will finally find out what really happened when the Eternal Engine exploded; you will discover where the Long Men really come from and why they came to exist; and I will definately, definately, definately not be writing a single word of Maxwell 4 until January 1, 2012.
Well, probably not, anyway.
In the meanwhile while the brain juices are stewing and I check my directions in Realmpedia I will be aiming to get the Super Maxwell website up and running, I will (definately!) be writing at least another two Trevor stories and I will be attempting - yet again - to finish my long-cherished unfinished project, the non-Maxwell book The Tell-Tale Boy.
I will, of course, keep you up to speed without giving too much away, and I promise faithfully that I will start Tweeting again very soon - you can find me on Twitter @Virporta.

Tony Kerr

I did say, a couple of days ago, that I would be writing "The End" within an hour - I didn't quite manage that, but Super Maxwell and the Isle of the Dead, 1st draft, was finished at 5.10pm today (June 29). There are a few reasons for this...
First of all, a most seriously, the place I spend most of my time writing in has a massive TV screen in it. Most of the time this isn't a problem as I generally sit behind the screen, and even when I'm not it's usually the news that's on with the sound off. But today it was Andy Murray's match at Wimbledon. I love tennis, so this really put me off - but I persevered, dear reader, thinking of you I turned my back to the screen and drank a caffeine-heavy drink and carried on.
The other reason, of course, is that even though you might have a pretty good idea of how, when and where a story will end you never quite know how - well now I do know, page 455 with the word "string". It was heck of a journey!
But for you, of course, the journey hasn't yet begun - but I can promise you that it is Maxwell and Billy's most thrilling, terrifying and heartbreaking story so far. I'll let you know how its going - but, for me, this is how it ended...


Tony Kerr

I am so close to finishing Isle of the Dead now that I can practically smell the flowers on top of Arcania Hill - it's September 11th at the end of the book, just as the flowers are blossoming, and an ideal time for the whole of the village to head for the hill for a communal barbecue! (Honestly, I almost live in Virporta Village!). I am perhaps an hour away from writing the words "The End" - but then, of course begins the whole process of rewrites, reconsideration, regrets and, hopefully, a sense of relief!
Still, to keep both you and I going until then I will be pinging you some tasty treats - more Trevor, of course, lost chapters from Isle of the Dead, some more entries for Realmpedia - and here's the first, John Gallagher's first rough colour rendering of the cover.

Monster - Maxwell - rooftops - clues?! Come on, you should know by now you'll get no spoilers from me...
Tony Kerr

Yes, I know I promised you Trevor and the Time Thieves, but time, that horrible thief, has not allowed me to pull that together quite yet.
So, by way of compensation here is another Trevor Smethurst story - quite a short one, but quite fun too - and yes, the picture does mean something...!
Tony

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Trevor and the Emperor

By Tony Kerr

A Super Maxwell Short Story

1.

The Universe is big. Few people realise quite how big. They think of the Universe in terms of planets and solar systems and galaxies – but that is not the Universe, that is the “universe”, a small part of the vast and never ending expanse of everything. The real Universe is an everyth

Maxwell is nearing the end of his adventures on The Isle of The Dead - though of course you won't be able to read about them for a while. But we are revving up for that Christmas 2011 print spot - and John Gallagher has delivered the first of his concept sketches for the cover of IoD. Why is Maxwell trapped on a rooftop, where is that rooftop, and what is that strange thing rising into the night behind him...?
Like I'm going to tell you! Tony

It is, of course, impossible for a hyper-intelligent, moronic teenage t-rex to be zipping around time and space, barging into famous people and generally causing a lot of trouble. We would have noticed, surely?
John Gallagher recently came across the following two pictures from the 1950s (as a cat lover I particularly like the second one) - but it couldn't possibly be Trevor, could it? I couldn't see him wearing a bow tie ... Though, as a certain Doctor contends, bow ties are very cool...
Tony

Unfortunately, you're going to have to wait a while for Trevor's next adventure. My plans to get 'Trevor and the Time Thieves' to you before Easter isn't going to happen. I'd like to tell you I've been traveling the world, climbing mountains, or have been abducted by aliens, but sadly the truth is a lot more dull - I have been busy writing Super Maxwell and the Isle of the Dead. Trevor will return, just not yet, and as a real plus when he finally does return this will be your first introduction to Professor Hylton Firebones and the Green Men - both of whom will become very important in the future Maxwell books. Until then, enjoy your Easter chocolate, and the Royal Wedding, and Trevor and I will escape the icy grip of Halruga very soon for our next adventure.
Tony

The problem with being a writer is the same as the problem of being a reader - the overpowering frustration that stems from that gap between my racing brain, my slow moving hand and my abysmally slow typing. I would like to pour Maxwell's adventures straight from my brain into yours, but I can't ... There's not an App for that quite yet!
This is often a good thing - if that particular 'Brain Snack App' did exist you would have been reading a very different version of 'Isle of the Dead' right now, for instance - a book called 'The Wooden Kingdom' in which Maxwell Jones would not appear at all - you wouldn't have found out what happened to him until book 6. Well, now Book 3 and Book 6 are one story, and the better for it, I think - but you'll have to wait until Christmas to find out how and why.
The only way I know of to keep Maxwell alive in your mind, while his big adventures ferment in my mind, is through the small adventures of Trevor Smethurst. I don't mean small in scope - Trevor's adventures are a huge part of the Maxwell stories, and take place across many of the planets mentioned - though never visited - in the 'big' books, and will feature some of the characters you never get to see - though you will hear of - in the main books. I am particularly looking forward to introducing you to Professor Hylton Firebones and the work of RISE (the Realmic Institute of Scientific Exploration). They are, however, short in term of number of pages, which means I write them faster, you read them faster, and Trevor gets in more trouble quicker than ever before!
But still - the end of March for the first part of 'Trevor and the Time Thieves' - argh! That's forever! - so here's a little taste - piping hot from my imagination to yours...

Trevor and the Time Thieves
A Super Maxwell Short Story

Halruga is a planet so distant that even the most powerful telescope could not even see the galaxy it is in, never mind find the little purple, gold and blue planet itself. But, if you know how to get there, it is a place that is literally just around the corner.
Halruga is best known for its Surf Decadon, ten years of glorious sunshine on its five thousand miles of golden beaches, and is quite rightly called the friendliest place in the 101 Realms. However, if you could leave your home right now and somehow travel in an instant to that distant world you would find a very different place. The planet is in the middle of the Jicker, a period of six year where its lands and seas freeze, and the native Halrugans, amphibians who spend the summer selling, beer, fruit and watches on the thousands of miles of beaches, disappear into their cities beneath the frozen seas and spend their winters farming the seabed and harvesting kelp vodka. Every city on the land is covered in metres of thick snow, and those cities are carefully maintained by robots, known as Gritties, who protect and repair holiday homes and bars during this period of deep freeze, in preparation for another ten years of summer.
There are three things you can be absolutely certain of during the Jicker – that no one could possibly live in this frozen land, that no one could cause any damage to the heavily protected frozen cities, and that no one could possibly get into any sort of trouble.
But then again, you have not met Trevor Smethurst.

More soon...Tony

Though Christmas may seem a long way away, the prospect of Maxwell 3 coming out then makes it look to me like an express train bearing down! The approaching monster (and it IS a monster of a book, as I'll explain in another post, it is actually two books!) is looming even closer now as the cover artist for Burning Boys, John Gallagher, has confirmed he will create the cover for Maxwell 3: Isle of the Dead.
I've got a pretty good idea what that cover will look like - but, of course, I would not even think about spoiling the surprise for you. But, as a little treat, here's the really quite brilliant sketch of Nurgler (under the shadow of The Nurgler) which John created last year.
Tony

As you may know most writers fancy themselves as brilliant multi-taskers. This is rubbish, it's just that they will do anything, ANYTHING to avoid writing for just ten more minutes - draw pictures, put together intricate synopses, work which character's great uncle married whose 80 years ago.
I'm just as guilty of this as anyone else, and this year I am working hard to stay focused - but...
A couple of peripheral things that are going on, apart from me finishing Isle of the Dead before the summer, are that I am putting together - with the help of my gifted brother in law Dave the official Super Maxwell fansite. If you can see the image on the right you will see that it is pretty sparsely populated at the moment, but, if I can work out all the techy stuff Dave bamboozles me with every time we talk, I should be migrating some of the content over to the site by Easter, and thereafter adding some new stuff.
Why? Well, it's easier to find for one thing - www.supermaxwell.co.uk is hard to forget, isn't it? And, secondly it give the chance to avoid having to write something really tricky or complex for just ten more minutes (I am constantly painting myself into a corner - currently trying to work out how Billy can escape, chained up in a highly explosive hydrogen balloon, which effectively renders his fire abilities completely useless - and I don't have a clue how to get him out!)
But, I am cracking on with Isle of the Dead despite these distractions, and all being well - and assuming Billy does escape - it will be hitting the shelves by Christmas.
But before that, of course, the next Trevor Smethurst short story, Trevor and the Time Thieves, will be hitting this site, and hopefully my new, site, by the end of March.
Hmm...maybe I should finish writing it!
Tony

New Year, new beginning and ... er, flu. I have been struck down, and have just got out of bed for the first time in four days. Still, in an attempt to be productive, and not too miserable, I'm am starting work on Super Maxwell and the Isle of the Dead again today - I might get in an hour before I collapse!
I'll start to post bits and bobs again on Twitter (I'm Virporta - follow me (or Bill Bailey, he's good too)) and that King Kong of a book should be ready for you to order by Christmas.
The next big thing you can look forward to is Trevor and the Bunnies of Doom (or, possibly Trevor and the Dragon and the Bunnies of Doom, or possibly Trevor and the Time Thieves) which I will start publishing on Monday, March 28, and will publish in full around about the Easter Bank Holiday. I have tried to think of a way of putting a Royal Wedding in to the story, but haven't come up with anything yet - watch this space.
If you haven't read Trevor and the Dragon yet, the download has gone now, but you can still read it - somewhere below here...
Speak soon, keep checking my sites, and keeping watching the skies - you never know...
Tony

By Tony Kerr
A Super Maxwell Short Story

1.

Trevor Smethurst is, without a shadow of a doubt, the most intelligent creature in the whole of the universe.
Unfortunately Trevor Smethurst is also, without the slightest atom of doubt, the stupidest person in the entire universe.
I don’t really need to explain this to you, as Trevor will do his absolute best to prove this himself in no time at all.
But … if you really do need proof…
Trevor has just invented, alongside Dr Lambton Arcania (probably the second most intelligent creature in the universe) a device called a Chunk. A Chunk is a computer made entirely out of wood, but as well as being the most advanced computer in existence it is also a functioning time machine, a compass, can make coffee and cola and knows all the words to every song ever written in existence (including the ones everyone would much rather forget about).
Brilliant, you might think, absolutely brilliant.
But Trevor being Trevor he decided to test the Chunk on himself…
…Which is why he is currently hurtling through time and space completely out of control.
This sounds extraordinarily exciting. It is not. All of time and space, all packed together all at once, is a sort of dirty beige colour, and by far the most interesting thing about all of time and space is Trevor himself.
Trevor Smethurst looks like a small tyrannosaurus rex dressed in a grey blazer. In fact he is an alien called a Killian dressed in a grey blazer. In one pocket he has five bars of chocolate, in another he has a Monkey Master Blaster collector’s edition ruler (Trevor’s favourite comic book) and on his right inside pocket he has a pair of spectacles. These spectacles are another astonishing invention (created by Dr Arcania) which transform the wearer into whatever species is on any particular planet in any particular time period – which is just about to come in very handy indeed.

2.

Trevor opened his eyes and found himself looking up at a ragged wooden hole through which white cloud floated across a blue sky. The first thing he noticed was the atrocious smell, the second thing he noticed was the rather odd, rather squishy something he was lying on.
The answer to both the terrible smell and his odd resting place became apparent when Trevor sat up and looked around. He was in a filthy old cowshed that stank of years and years of manure. Specifically he was sitting in a line of cows, the cows to his right and left looking at him balefully – the cow he had landed on was squashed underneath him with its legs sticking out and was … Well, it was as flat as a cow pat.
Trevor wondered briefly if he had landed in Prezema. ‘Hello?’ he said to the nearest cow. The cow looked at him stupidly and licked its wet nostrils with a long grey tongue, and Trevor breathed a sign of relief. Prezemans looked exactly like earth cows, and for a moment he had wondered if he might be tried for ungulate slaughter instead of just malicious damage.
Trevor stood and stretched. He took a bar of chocolate out of his pocket, took a bite and looked through the hole in the roof, speculating idly how far he’d fallen when the big beige space time continuum had spat him out. Falling from extreme heights was not at all unusual in Trevor’s experience – he had often woken at the base of a tower or in the middle of a forest with a smashed trail of foliage above his head. Trevor was a Good Man, a sort of teenage superhero, and falling off high things was, he supposed par for the course – and being virtually indestructible falling from very high places didn’t particularly concern him…
‘D-D-D-‘
Trevor looked around, grinding chocolate between his wicked-looking t-rex jaws.
‘D-D-D-‘ Trevor’s eyes met those of a doughy-faced boy with long, limp hair, dressed in what looked very much like a brown carpet. ‘D-D-D-‘ the boy stammered. ‘D-Dragon!’
Trevor looked around. ‘Where?�

So there it is - as Gordon Ramsey would say - Dragon - done!
It has been great fun writing this story, and I hope you have enjoyed this little Christmas treat and it has stopped some of you who really, really want to know what happens in the Isle of the Dead hunting me down like the dog I am and demanding "What happens NEXT!"
I've attached the whole story below as a Word document for you to download/print off and read at your leisure, and this will be online until early in the New Year, I hope it passes a few pleasant moments for you.
Trevor will return - unless I get stuck! - at Easter in a story provisionally called Trevor and the Bunnies of Doom. Bob the Dragon will return, alongside Trevor, Chunk and the horrid Boshers - who are hatching a dastardly pre-Easter plot.
In the meantime enjoy Christmas, keep checking my site, and Trevor and I will see you again soon.
Trevor and the Dragon - A Super Maxwell Short Story for Christmas

19.

‘How apt,’ said the Wizard, ‘the farmer is a cow.’
‘My name is John Dylan,’ said the cow, ‘I am an Agent of Change, assigned to find the Ring of Argo. A ring which you and your organisation stole. Now – hand it over.’
Trevor goggled at John Dylan. He looked precisely like a cow, only, if you looked closer you saw that beneath his front hooves were two thick grey fingers and a misshapen thumb, and his rear hooves were just a little too long – perfect for standing on your hind legs, in fact.
Trevor also saw that that, Agent of Change or not, he was still a cow in nicked and rusty armour with a dirty sword, surrounded by very large men with very big longbows, and a maniac with a sonic disruptor.
‘I am Merlyn of Persia,’ said the Wizard with a bow, ‘I have heard of you, John Dylan, defender of Prezema, it is an honour to be in your presence.’
‘Then perhaps you will do me the honour of lowering your gun,’ said Dylan, stepping forward and raising his sword once more. All around him bowstrings groaned as the archers drew them back. ‘Unless you would like to explain to the Agency why you are stealing a valuable and dangerous artefact?’
‘I am not stealing the Ring, John Dylan,’ said the Wizard. Smiling his cold, stone smile, he slipped the gun back into his robes and raised both hands. ‘Lower your bows,’ he commanded, and the Dragon Rouge archers obeyed immediately. ‘We are the Army of the Dragon Rouge, and dedicated to the pursuance of peace and truth. We took the ring, Agent Dylan, recognising it as a dangerous artefact, as you say,’ the Wizard reached into his robes and brought out a large, ornate, rather battered ring. ‘But our mission,’ he said, as Dylan took a step towards him, ‘was to find that boy.’ The Wizard pointed at Trevor.
‘Me?’ Trevor exclaimed, as the tent was once more filled with the groan of tightening bowstrings – only now the arrows were pointed at Trevor. ‘What the bleeding hell have I done? I was just minding my own business!’
‘This boy is an agent send from the future,’ said the Wizard. He reached once more into his robes, and brought out a small white tablet, which he threw to Dylan. ‘Look at the readings, Agent Dylan, this boy is a Killian, from over a thousand years in the future. It is my belief that he been sent here to steal the Ring of Argo.’
Agent Dylan stared at Trevor, who spluttered angrily. ‘What a flipping cheek!’ he said at last, ‘That berk over there,’ he pointed at the Wizard, ‘isn’t no Merlyn of Persia, he is—‘
Trevor never finished. One moment Dylan was staring at him uncertainly, and the next there was a flash of blinding light.
When Trevor had blinked away the blinding after image all that stood where Dylan had been was his swords, bent neatly in two and glowing white.
‘As I said, captain, we can not be seen to oppose the Agents of Change,’ said the Wizard.
‘No my lord,’ agreed Thomas Hook.
Trevor caught a momentary glimpse of the Wizard’s cold and grinning face as he lifted his black scarf to cover his eyes once more. Where his eyes should have been were two open pits of white hot blazing fire.
‘Now then,’ said the Wizard Aeoson. ‘What are we to do about you, Sir Lee?’
But when he turned around Trevor had vanished.

20.

‘Right, that is it!’ snarled Trevor. ‘We are getting out of here and we are getting out now!’
‘WHAT ABOUT ROBERT COLCHIS?’ asked the Chunk.
‘Keep your voice down!’ hissed Trevor. ‘Have you got woodworm in your brains or what?’
Trevor was crouched behind the tent. When the Wizard had blasted Dylan he had whipped off his spectacles and promptly vanished while everyone was watching the unfortunate Agent evaporate. After that it had been an easy matter to simply slip out of the tent. He was still invisible - apart, of course from two reptilian eyes, the only part of him he w

Tomorrow (December 21) is National Short Story Day, and, all things being equal, I will have finished Trevor and the Dragon, and publish it online in its entirety for you to enjoy over Christmas. It has been great fun writing, and I hope you have enjoyed reading it.
Between Super Maxwell and the Burning Boys and Super Maxwell and the Isle of the Dead (which will, all things being equal again, published in time for Christmas 2011) 150 year pass, completely unexplained, for Trevor - so these short stories are an attempt to fill that gap, but also serve another important function.
There are, I know, a huge amount of unanswered questions just in the first two Maxwell books - what is Virporta Island, which can grow its own buildings, woods and mountains seemingly at will and is, according to Dr Arcania, literally alive? What happens to the potatoes that are shipped from Virporta to Vir? Why did the Argonauts build the Watchmen Academy, and what happened to them? Where did all the Boshers go when Virporta was attacked? A lot of these questions will, of course, be answered in the Super Maxwell books, but quite a few of them will also be answered in the Trevor short stories. So, do keep looking on this site because Trevor will return again - perhaps with a dragon in tow, perhaps not - you'll just have to wait and see, won't you?
Tony

15.

The knights sat in a miserable huddle around the guttering fires, drinking revolting-smelling mead and fearfully watching the black skies. It had begun to snow, flakes as big as flowertops that tumbled across the skies and instantly melted on the muddy land below. Most of the knights were little more than farmers, men who lived in lodges made of mud, straw and a little wood who collected taxes for their local king (and, more often than not themselves) punished minor crimes (and occasionally major ones, such as sheep stealing) and kept bandits away from the farmers who looked to them for protection. They knew what those first snow flakes meant. Tomorrow there would be patches of white on the hills, then on the lower ground, and then, before long, there would be drifts feet deep, and these farmer knights, who should be at home eating and drinking and administering minor justices, would be freezing in winter with no food and a dragon roaming the land.
It was the thought of the dragon that kept them here. Not the glory of killing a dragon, glory didn’t keep the lodge fires lit or feed the livestock, but the thought of the beast roaming the lands killing women and children, and, more importantly, eating valuable livestock, kept them huddled around the poor fire.
But they, of course, were not the only kind of knight here, there were others too.
‘Right, you miserable dung-spattered, cow-bothering wretches,’ drawled Sir David Hylton, drawing his sword and staggering drunkenly into the firelight, ‘who wants a dual?’
To Sir David’s surprise one of the dirty knights rose to his feet. But he did not draw his sword, instead he raised a hand and pointed. ‘Look,’ he gasped, ‘look!’
Sir David turned unsteadily and squinted into the darkness, and his pale, arrogant face turned paler still.
Light glowed on a distant hilltop, as the knights watched the light grew brighter and brighter, and then, with a deafening roar, the huge bat wings of the dragon appeared over the hilltop. It roses and rose into the air, its body impossibly long, and spat out a mushroom head explosion of fire.
‘Fetch the archers!’ someone cried among the disorganised clatter of armour and the scrape and clang of swords, short lances and morningstars.
‘Damn the archers!’ roared Sir David, raising his own sword above his head, ‘Stand and fight you dung-stinking women! Saint George! Saint George! Saint—‘
Sir David disappeared in a sudden blinding flash, and when the farmer knights looked again all that was left of him was his breast plate, spinning on its end like a coin, his sword stuck blade up and smoking, and, glittering in the mud, a large ornate ring.

16.

‘Did you do that?’ Trevor exclaimed, peeking from where he sat, unseen, behind Bob’s neck. ‘Good shot!’
‘It wasn’t me!’ Bob replied, looking down at the smoking remain of Sir David Hylton as the soared over the field. ‘I wouldn’t kill anyone!’
‘Oy, Twiggy!’ Trevor barked at the featureless block of wood strung once more around his neck. ‘What’s going on? Did they get another dragon or something?’
‘I FEAR IT IS MUCH WORSE THAN ANOTHER MALTRUSION, TREVOR SMETHURST,’ the Chunk replied, ‘I FEAR—‘
Trevor did not hear the Chunk’s next words. Something hit him in the face with the force of a punch, and he was thrown helpless back. He felt himself sliding over the rough scales of the dragon’s tail, and then, even as he heard Bob shout out in alarm and felt the Maltrusion twist beneath him he slid over the edge and into the dark night.

17.

‘Bring him to my tent.’
‘To your tent? But why? The poor lad is dead, Wizard, and should be buried.’
‘You think to defy me, farmer? Bring him to my tent or my men will shoot you down and take him.’
‘Farmer I may be, but this is my land, and I won’t have a Christian soul subjected to your dark—‘
Trevor let out a groan a

12.

‘The Ring of Argo is an ancient ring. It is an object if some power, but it is itself part of a much more powerful object - the Key of Argo, a key which they say can open the doors of time and space, and release from limbo the greatest army the universe has ever known. The army known as the First Heroes.’
‘Hmm,’ said Trevor, ‘That’s interesting.’
‘The Agency of Change became aware that someone was hunting for the Key of Argo,’ said Squire Bob, ‘Though we can not imagine why anyone ...’ Bob paused, ‘Are you listening to me?’ he asked angrily.
‘Muh?’ Trevor looked up.
‘You aren’t listening to me! People are dying and all that you are interested in is your damned chocolate!’ cried Bob.
‘Look, Dragon boy,’ Trevor sighed, putting his half eaten bar of chocolate back into his pocket with a resigned sigh. ‘I’m not being funny, but I’m not that bothered. I told you I’m from the future already, so why should I care what happens to these people? They’re all dead anyway, as far as I’m concerned it’s all the same to me. My time machine will be fixed in a bit and I’ll be off out of your hairy bum hole and you can get on with saving this stupid world, and I can get back to where I belong.’
‘And where,’ Bob asked tightly, ‘Do you belong?’
Trevor reached into his pocket and took out a glossy poster. ‘Halruga,’ he said, his eyes glittering with excitement as he passed Bob the poster, which showed a group of tanned young people surfing beneath a sky with three suns, standing on surf boards while eating cream cakes, ‘It’s the Halrugan surf decadon, ten years of surfing, boozing, chomping and—‘
Bob grabbed the poster in both hands, tore it in half, and threw the pieces over the edge of the cliff.
‘What the ...’ Trevor gasped, watching the pieces of his beautiful Halrugan poster disappear into the distance, ‘I’ve been carrying that around for sixty blinking years...’
‘You must help me,’ Bob insisted grimly, ‘The Key of Argo could spell disaster for everyone on this planet, on all the Realms. Don’t you understand that you’ve already changed history when you killed Dylan? You can’t go back to your time, if history has changed, your time will not exist any more, there is nowhere for you to go back to!’
‘MY POSTER!’ roared Trevor, and he leapt at Bob, who fell back with an astonished expression, and they both rolled over the cliff.
They hit the cliff wall with a jarring impact, and something smashed in Bob’s pocket, letting out a dischordant howl and spitting sparks and pieces of metal into Trevor’s face. Bob transformed into a red and green dragon, smashed again into the rocks, and then with a crack of unfurling wings, flew into the air and vanished. Trevor flew down the wall of the cliff, and let out a resigned sigh. He took of his spectacles, stowed them into his pocket and crossed his arms over his chest and waiting patiently for the impact.

13.

‘You idiot!’
Trevor looked up blearily, and found himself looking into the fierce jaws of a dragon. Maltrusion, thought Trevor. Of course! He remembered it from history now – Maltrusion, a race of intelligent dragons. How could he have forgotten that? Maybe a diet of constant chocolate wasn’t that great an idea after all. Trevor sat up, and a talon as long as his own body pinned him back to the ground.
‘You’ve smashed my Xenomorphic Transubstantiator!’ Bob roared. ‘I’m stuck in this shape now! I can’t change back to my human form!’
‘Ho-hum, never mind, such is life,’ Trevor replied, the dragon’s eyes widened in fury, but before he could shout at – or incinerate – Trevor, the small t-rex grabbed his thick ankle and hurled him back against the cliff. Trevor sprang to his feet. ‘You’ll just have to go home now, won’t you, and let the universe save itself from the hoops of horror, or whatever they’re called.

8.

‘You!’ Trevor felt a lump of chocolate that felt like a chunk of brick lodge in his throat. ‘What are you doing here!’
Trevor made a strangulated choking noise and spat out a large chunk of chocolate. ‘Bloody Nora!’ he gasped. ‘Are you barmy, you whey-faced chimp?’
Trevor found himself looking at a wide puzzled face beneath a curl of yellow hair. ‘Chimp?’ said the broad shouldered boy. ‘What is a chimp?’
Trevor goggled at the boy. He was dressed in a dirty jerkin that might have once been white but was so thick in sweat, dirt, blood and dung that it had turned an oddly colourless green-brown. But that, Trevor reckoned, was probably par for the course on this filthy planet – what was surprising about the boy was that his body was criss-crossed with the thick leather belts, and the belts were strung with swords, knives and short handled lances.
‘It doesn’t matter what a chimp is,’ the boy snapped anxiously before Trevor could reply. ‘You must leave here now!’
‘Eh?’ Trevor frowned at the boy. ‘I ain’t going nowhere chuckles.’ He shoved his chocolate back into his pocket, and glanced down at the wooden edge of the chunk that was sticking out of the manure pile, stood up and pushed it out of sight under his foot. ‘Who are you, king of Vir? I was here first, chimp face, and I’m not going nowhere!’ Trevor blew a loud raspberry just in case the boy didn’t get the message.
‘Listen to me,’ he whispered urgently, ‘I am Bob, squire of Sir David Hylton, and if he should find—‘
‘What is this?’ interrupted a loud, strident voice. ‘What is this peasant doing here, squire? Does he not know that this is the haunt of the dread demon dragon? Or,’ there was the snickt sound of steel drawn on steel, and suddenly Trevor found the blade of a sword under his chin, ‘is this serf under their control perhaps?’
‘Serf!’ Trevor exclaimed angrily. He glared at the face which had appeared over his shoulder. It was a ruddy red face, with thick black hair and an impressive handlebar moustache. Pale grey eyes looked disinterestedly from above aristocratic cheekbones. Sir David Hylton, Trevor noticed, had the cleanest face he had ever seen in his life. In the ordinary life the knight would have looked unusually clean – in this mucky, clarty brown and grey world he looked positively obscene.
‘When you’ve finished playing with your little pal—‘ Sir David began.
‘Hold the phone, cheekbones,’ Trevor snarled. ‘What do you mean serf? Eh? Who you calling a peasant, you curly haired gimp?’
The knight lowered his sword and stared at Trevor in dumb astonishment. Squire Bob let out a squeak of fear. ‘How… How dare—‘ Sir David spluttered.
‘I am Sir William Lambton of Killius,’ Trevor interrupted imperiously, taking what looked like a threatening step towards the knight, but was actually an attempt to sink the Chunk further into the enormous dung heap. ‘And I am here to kill your monster!’
‘You?’ spat Sir David, looking the filthy ragamuffin up and down in frank amazement.
‘Oh yes,’ Trevor replied proudly.
‘Really?’ exclaimed Squire Bob.
‘Are you deaf, turnip breath?’ Trevor replied. He reached into his pocket and took out a fresh chocolate bar. He looked around the dung-filled cave as if the dragon where right here, though oddly not only was there no dragon, Squire Bob had vanished also. ‘Now then, where’s this dragon whatsit?’
Sir David raised a shaking finger as a long shadow fell over them.
‘Right behind you,’ he squeaked.
Trevor turned just as a massive pair of jaws opened, and then snapped closed on him.

9.

Hook saw the tent flap rise, and immediately fell to his knees and bowed his head. All around him his men knelt and bowed their own heads, while the knights muttered uncomfortably.
A pair of black l

4.

Just moments later the archers flew around the corner and were met with a terrible sight. On the ground, covered in blood, mud and cow dung, lay a small boy. He was groaning pitifully, and the archers saw immediately the trail that led away from the boy and into the woods.
‘Dragon prints,’ said the archer called John of the Dale.
Their captain, Thomas Hook, traced the claw-footed prints towards the woods. ‘Follow,’ he said, and then he crouched by the small boy as his men ran off.
‘Dragon,’ groaned the boy. Hook had seen some scruffy-looking boys in his time – in the countryside in winter it was rare to see anyone looking clean – but this boy was by far the scruffiest he had ever seen. He was dressed almost in rags and wore a most unusual pendant – a featureless block of wood tied around his neck on a length of twine.
Hook picked up the groaning boy – noting with some surprise that he was remarkably heavy, despite his small size – and carried him back into the cow shed and lay him on a bed of hay.
‘Stay there, lad, I’ll send someone to help you,’ he said. The boy nodded, moaning.
Hook ran out of the barn, and after his men, wondering briefly as he went how a boy so scruffy and ill-kept could afford a pair of wooden spectacles.
He had not gone a hundred yards before he met them coming back the other way. ‘Tracks stop, captain, just over the hill,’ said John of the Dale. He added, with a perplexed expression. ‘There’s footprints coming back, captain, but...’
‘But what, lad? Spit it out.’
‘They ain’t dragon prints, captain. They’re a child’s footprints.’
By the time they ran back to the barn the small boy had gone.

5.

Anyone watching closely would have seen a pair of small footprints appear in the mud outside the cow shed. Knights, however, are large, loud and permanently angry, and not by nature observant. And these particular knights, faced with the unenviable task of facing a very large, very angry dragon, had been drinking mead and cider all day long, and were less observant than most. The small footprints stamped themselves into the thick mud in a most truculent way (if invisible feet can said to be truculent) and then after half a dozen steps transformed into large, lizard claw imprints, which promptly accelerated over the fields at a speed which was, as anyone with any common sense whatsoever would have observed, quite impossibly fast.

6.

The bare branches of the dank forest swayed, though there was not a breath of wind, and then, quite suddenly Trevor appeared out of thin air, half way up a tree. Trevor jammed himself firmly in the branches, and slipped on his spectacles. He transformed into the small, horribly mucky boy who the soldiers mistakenly believed they had rescued from the dragon.
‘Chunk?’ Trevor lifted his shirt and wiped the blood from his chest. The arrow, which would have gone right through a normal boy’s body like a hot knife through butter, had merely nicked Trevor’s almost indestructible hide. ‘Chunk? Wake up!’ he grabbed the wooden block in both hands and shook it. ‘Wake up! I need you!’
The Chunk made a loud choking, rattling noise and then fell silent.
‘Wake UP!’ Trevor roared, and then looked around warily at the creaking branches surrounding him. ‘Listen Chunk,’ he continued in a whisper, ‘those soldiers, they’re Dragon Rouge. I saw them. They had the sigil on their chests! They’ve followed me, Chunk! They’ve follow me from Mab!’
The Chunk vibrated unpleasantly in Trevor’s hands. ‘DRAGON ROUGE,’ it grated. ‘THE ARMY OF THE RED DRAGON, ESTABLISHED IN THE NEO-BABYLONAIN EMPIRE IN 547 BC. THE DRAGON ROUGE ARE ALSO KNOWN AS THE IMMORTALS—‘
‘I blinking known all that, you wooden-headed, leaf-brained—‘
But the Chunk did not seem to hear Trevor. ‘THE IMMORTAL KING AEOSON, FATHER OF JASON OF ARGO – argon is a che

It has been a while since I wrote short stories. They used to be my stock in trade - in fact the first Super Maxwell book was published because of a short story I wrote for the British Council called "Surf City" - now I find it almost impossible to write anything under 400 pages! But with Trevor and the Dragon I am sticking strictly to 40 pages...well, maybe 50!
The other problem, of course, is that I am living in Trevor's future. The last time you saw Trevor in Super Maxwell and the Burning Boys he was stuck in Mab with Pugg, Bella and Mickey Prickle. The last time I saw him he was in New Paris, a city under siege, eating a chocolate bar and talking to Billy Barker. So I am having to be very careful not to give away any of the plot of the new Maxwell book, Isle of the Dead, and am having to reread the first two books, Last Heroes and Burning Boys to remind me what YOU know about Trevor!
Actually, they're a pretty good read - if you don't have them you should pick up a copy...
More Medieval tomfoolery with Trevor next Monday.

1.

Trevor Smethurst is, without a shadow of a doubt, the most intelligent creature in the whole of the universe.
Unfortunately Trevor Smethurst is also, without the slightest atom of doubt, the stupidest person in the entire universe.
I don’t really need to explain this to you, as Trevor will do his absolute best to prove this himself in no time at all.
But … if you really do need proof…
Trevor has just invented, alongside Dr Lambton Arcania (probably the second most intelligent creature in the universe) a device called a Chunk. A Chunk is a computer made entirely out of wood, but as well as being the most advanced computer in existence it is also a functioning time machine, a compass, can make coffee and cola and knows all the words to every song ever written in existence (including the ones everyone would much rather forget about).
Brilliant, you might think, absolutely brilliant.
But Trevor being Trevor he decided to test the Chunk on himself…
…Which is why he is currently hurtling through time and space completely out of control.
This sounds extraordinarily exciting. It is not. All of time and space, all packed together all at once, is a sort of dirty beige colour, and by far the most interesting thing about all of time and space is Trevor himself.
Trevor Smethurst looks like a small tyrannosaurus rex dressed in a maroon blazer. In fact he is an alien called a Killian dressed in a maroon blazer. In one pocket he has five bars of chocolate, in another he has a Monkey Master Blaster collector’s edition ruler (Trevor’s favourite comic book) and on his right inside pocket he has a pair of spectacles. These spectacles are another astonishing invention (created by Dr Arcania) which transform the wearer into whatever species is on that particular planet in that particular time period – which is just about to come in very handy indeed.

2.

Trevor opened his eyes and found himself looking up at a ragged wooden hole through which white cloud floated across a blue sky. The first thing he noticed was the atrocious smell, the second thing he noticed was the rather odd, rather squishy something he was lying on.
The answer to both the terrible smell and his odd resting place became apparent when Trevor sat up and looked around. He was in a filthy old cow barn that stank of years and years of manure. Specifically he was sitting in a line of cows, the cows to his right and left looking at him balefully – the cow he had landed on was squashed underneath him with its legs sticking out and was … Well, it was as flat as a cow pat.
Trevor wondered briefly if he had landed in Prezema. ‘Hello?’ he said to the nearest cow. The cow looked at him stupidly and licked its wet nostrils with a long grey tongue, and Trevor breathed a sign of relief. Prezemans looked exactly like earth cows, and for a moment he wondered if he might be tried for ungulate slaughter instead of just malicious damage.
Trevor stood and stretched. He took a bar of chocolate out of his pocket, took a bite and looked through the hole in the roof, speculating idly how far he’d fallen when the big beige space time continuum had spat him out. Falling from extreme heights was not at all unusual in Trevor’s experience – he had often woken at the base of a tower or in the middle of a forest with a smashed trail of foliage above his head. Trevor was a Good Man, a sort of teenage superhero, and falling off high things was, he supposed par for the course – and being virtually indestructible falling from very high places didn’t particularly concern him…
‘D-D-D-‘
Trevor looked around, grinding chocolate between his wicked-looking t-rex jaws.
‘D-D-D-‘ Trevor’s eyes met those of a doughy-faced boy with long, limp hair, dressed in what looked very much like a brown carpet. ‘D-D-D-‘ the boy stammered. ‘D-Dragon!’
Trevor looked around. ‘Where?’ he asked – but the boy didn’t answer, he was too

Work continues at a pace with Super Maxwell 3 - the first draft of which I'm hoping to finish by Christmas. In the meanwhile as a little Christmas present to you all (and to celebrate National Short Story Day on December 21) I am going to be publishing my favourite teenage T-Rex, Trevor Smethurst's, first solo adventure - Trevor and the Dragon.
Between Super Maxwell and the Burning Boys (where we unexpectedly find him in charge of Pugg, Bella and Mickey Prickle in Mab) to when we finally catch up with Trevor (eating a rat on a stick in a steam caravan) in Super Maxwell and the Isle of the Dead Trevor claims 150 years have passed. So where has he been? Well - you will find out very soon!
I will start publishing Trevor and the Dragon online next Monday (November 22) over 4 weeks, and then publish the story in its entirety on National Short Story Day on December 21.
I will (honest!) continue writing The Resurrection Bureau in the New Year - but Maxwell started shouting a bit too loud in my ear and I had to get back to him. I want to find out where Maxwell's adventures take him more than anyone - so the search for Excalibur will have to wait a while...

Tony

Okay, I'll admit it, it was pretty unrealistic to think I could write the whole of The Resurrection Bureau online in two months. Real life, work, fun and various other inconveniences kept getting in the way. But now The Resurrection Bureau project faces its biggest challenge - a small boy called Maxwell Jones.
I stopped writing Maxwell's latest book, The Isle of the Dead, because I was basically exhausted and stuck in the middle of a web of characters, plots and half glimpsed conspiracies - but I had a revelation last week and finally saw a way I could finish the book.
So, my new plan is this - I will continue writing The Resurrection Bureau while I am working on Isle of the Dead. I will post what I can every Monday - which may not be much, but should whet your appetite, anyway. If all goes well I should be finished the first draft of Super Maxwell and the Isle of the Dead by Christmas, and then I can focus a little more on The Resurrection Bureau. Believe me, I want to know what happens to Halcyon, Eve, Mr Grace and Mr Craft just as much as you do - if not more!
So, stick with me, as always all I can promise you is that I will finish it, though it may take a while - and that after Christmas I will not, hand on heart, I will NOT be returning to Maxwell's world until October 2011 - when I start work on Super Maxwell 4 - The Crimson King.
Tony

'Hello, I'm looking for Sally Sparks?' looking at the woman's silk flower print dress and cream cardigan Eve was almost certain that this woman was not the person she was looking for - and she was proved wrong a third time.
'You must be from the Bureau,' the woman - Sally Sparks - replied with a smile. She held open the door.
Eve stepped into a large rundown porch. A dusty staircase turned into darkness above them.
'You'd best come up,' Sally Spark said, 'but please be quiet. There are two old gentlemen living on the first floor, and they do so hate to be disturbed.'
She ran up the staircase. Eve noted, with a sinking feeling, that Sally Sparks's feet were bare, and black with dirt. She followed Sally up stairs, barely even able to keep her in sight in the dimly lit staircase; she alomost seemed to vanish, to be little more than a flutter of flowery silk and pale legs in the darkness.
At the first landing Eve slmost ran into the little woman, who held a finger to her lips and pointed at a large, dark oak door. Sally Sparks's two old gentlemen, no doubt - and, Eve reflected, it looked like they had been undisturbed for time - cobwebs ran in curtains down the door.
Probably been eaten by their cats, Eve thought with a shudder.
At the top of the staircase Sally Sparks stood in a shaft of dusty light thrown by a roof window. It was so dim that Eve could barely see her, and the door she stood in front of looked to small to belong to an adult's apartment. Eve felt another twinge of discomfort - she did not even like to think of what lay beyond Sally's Sparks door.
'Before you come in I must ask you a very serious question,' said the dark shape of Sally Sparks's head.
Eve released a shaky sigh. 'Okay?'
'All right,' Sally Sparks said. 'My very serious question to you is - do you prefer tea or coffee?'
'Um...' Eve blinked in the dim light. 'Tea?'
'That's the right answer,' said Sally Sparks, and she threw open the small door, filling the dark space at the top of the stairs with red light. 'Come inside, Eve.'
Eve stepped past the smiling little woman and into the red room. It only occurred to her afterwards that she had not told Sally Sparks her name.

6.

The rooms were large and cold and empty but for spiders, mice and dust.
Old, thick curtains were drawn across the large sash windows. They had been put up sometime around the date of the Battle of Trafalgar, had been drawn closed, and never opened again. The dust that covered everything breathed in to the room from the open fire, its grate long ago blown clean of any coals. Spiders’ webs wreathed the room, and covered its two inhabitants … because the spiders did not fear the two men. Similarly mice and rats had made nests in the chairs in which they sat, the two men (it is easier to call them men than anything else) did not harm them and the little creatures did not fear them.
The men sat facing one another across a small table. One man was large and the other small, their clothes, in the style of the time, were covered in formerly vivid braid and once shining brass buttons. Now their clothes were little more than dusty rags, held together by cobwebs, dusty and entropy.
On the table between them sat two small spherical objects, deeply buried in dust.
In the dark room the only sound was the hiss of rain against the window, dulled by thick and ancient curtains, and the scritch-scratch of mice living in confident isolation.
Suddenly, with a sound like soot fall in a chimney, the smaller of the two men coughed out a wad of dust and mummified spiders.
He reached across the table, picked up the small spheres, placed them into the dusty, empty sockets in his face, and blinked, two, three, four times.
'Mr Grace,' he whispered to his stirring companion in a voice from a dusty crypt. 'I believe there are good works to be done.'

7.

'Well now, here we are, a cup of tea and a nice fire, what could be better tha

Half an hour later Eve sat in the back of a taxi feeling slightly grubby and distinctly uneasy. The taxi driver had done a double take when she had told him the address that the Governor had given her, but then had shrugged and pulled away from the pavement.
The Governor’s brief was short and uninformative. It simply stated:
Sally Sparks, 55b West Green Street.
Miss Sparks has been receiving endowment payments from The Resurrection Bureau for six months. Reports indicate Miss Sparks has recently resigned from her post as a DIY superstore demonstrator.
JJ Crichton
Eve had turned the piece of paper over, but that was all that was written. So she had been sent on a eight hundred mile round trip because a girl had quit her job as a electric drill model. Really?
Outside cold sun filtered through a break in the clouds, revealing large austere buildings and cobbled streets packed with commuters dressed in suits and training shoes. Soon the large buildings gave way to brown, grey, gloomy apartment blocks, stunted, weed filled parkland and dirty single-storey office buildings and schools.
Eve watched the depressing view slide by. As odd as this particular mission was, it was not at all unusual to find yourself in an odd situation working for a charity. Kin her time Eve had found herself running pentathlons, organising bouncey castles and being interviewed by police detectives. Charity work was always, at best, scattergun and chaotic, and at worse a mess of ineptitude and wasted money. But Eve liked it that way. She was never bored, and she was a peerless professional, who took great pleasure in cutting through the bullshit and downright idiocy of her colleagues and got the job done. She had managed, at age only 25, to rise to a position and salary that would have been more fitting for a woman in her mid-forties in private business, and she had done it because charities were mostly run by idiots. Well meaning, affable idiots mostly, but idiots none the less.
‘Here we are, pet,’ the taxi driver said suddenly. ‘You’re sure this is the right place?’
Eve looked out at a dirty red building, the upper stories of which tottered out over the street below. At the top of a cracked cement staircase strewn with discarded beer can was a red door. Holes were hacked into the brick frame of the door, and above one such hole was painted: 55b.
‘Yes,’ Eve answered with a resigned sigh. ‘This is the right place.’
She wasn’t at all surprised that it started raining again as she stepped out of the taxi.

There were no bells or buzzers anywhere around the door. Eve knocked, the sound of her small fist feeble on the thick wood of the old door - but to her surprise her knock received an almost immediate response, the sound of small, quick-moving feet on the bare wood of a staircase.
Eve steadied herself, straightening her suit jacket and running a hand through her frizzy hair. She expected to be met by an overweight depressed hippy, or perhaps a wild eyed teen with piercings wearing pyjamas - and was surprised again. The woman who opened the door was in her mid-forties, her dark hair scraped back into a bun, a puzzled smile on a pretty, olive-shaped face.
'Hello?' she said in a refined, if cautious voice.
'Hello, I'm looking for Sally Sparks?' looking at the woman's silk flower print dress and cream cardigan Eve was almost certain that this woman was not the person she was looking for - and she was proved wrong a third time.
'You must be from the Bureau,' the woman - Sally Sparks - replied with a smile. She held open the door.
Eve stepped into a large rundown porch. A dusty staircase turned into darkness above them.

To be continued...