Emil and the Detectives

　　Emil is excited to be taking the train on his own for the first time. He doesn't like the look of his fellow passenger, the man in the bowler hat. Emil will just have to keep his wits about him and his money in his pocket. But Emil falls asleep and when he wakes up the man in the bowler hat is gone - and so is the money! Emil is determined to get it back. He teams up with a gang of young detectives and so begins a hair-raising chase across Berlin to catch the dirty rotten thief...

作者簡介

　　Erich Kastner was born in Dresden in Germany in 1899. Much like Emil himself Erich Kastner was an only child. He was devoted to his mother who worked as a hairdresser to supplement their family income. Erich Kastner went into the army in 1917, and his experiences there made him feel strongly that war and violence were wrong. He published Emil and the Detectives in 1928 and Emil and the Three Twins in 1933. The books were very popular but when Hitler's government - the Nazis- were in power Kastner's books were labelled anti-German. Joseph Goebbels, who was in charge of the Government Propaganda, said "In the name of the fight against decadence and moral corruption! In the name of breeding and rectitude in state and family, I consign to the flames the writings of Heinrich Mann, Ernst Glasser and Erich Kastner!" Erich Kastner was one of the only authors who was present as his books were tossed on to the flames in 1933. Luckily, Hitler and Goebbels may have thrown Kastner's books on to the flames in 1933, but Emil has outlasted them and lives to spy another day. Erich Kastner was awarded the American Library Association Mildred L. Batchelder Award and the Hans Christian Andersen Award.He died in 1974. Walter Trier was the celebrated illustrator of many children's books. He illustrated several other of Erich Kastner's children's books, including The Flying Classroom and Emil and the Three Twins.