by Sam Copeland
Charlie wandered over, trying his best to look nonchalant. ‘Hello, Dylan,’ he said.
‘McGuffin. I might have guessed it was you.’
‘Well, you didn’t guess. You just watched me walk up to you.’
‘What do you want, McGuffin?’ sneered Dylan.
‘I … I want answers.’
‘Ha! We all want answers! What is the meaning of life? Why are you such a loathsome goody two-shoes? Why do I want to talk to girls AND not talk to them at the same time? So many questions, so few answers. Yet you expect answers from me.’
‘Dylan, you could have told on us. You could have got all my friends in serious trouble. You could have told your dad about us breaking in to the office and destroying everything and yet you didn’t. Why?’
‘Are you really that stupid, McGuffin, or are you just pretending?’ Dylan said. ‘Can you imagine how that conversation would go? “Dad, Dad, you know you thought that your office got destroyed by an earthquake? Well, actually it was an idiot boy at my school who broke in and changed into a whale, destroyed everything and then changed back into a boy again.” “Oh, really, Dylan? That sounds like a perfectly reasonable explanation and you haven’t lost it at all. Here, have some extra pocket money for bringing this important and totally believable news to me.” Yeah right. I’d be packed off to some School for Strange and Dangerous Children before you could say “Charlie McGuffin is a freak of nature.”’
Charlie was beginning to think that a School for Strange and Dangerous Children might not be such a bad place for Dylan.
‘But you were recording me. You could have shown them the recording. Unless …’
Charlie left the sentence hanging in the freezing air between them.
Dylan reached in his pocket and pulled out his phone. He turned it towards Charlie and started playing a video. It was grainy, wobbly footage of Charlie in Dylan’s dad’s office. Charlie was about to change. He could hear shouting in the background. And then, just as Charlie was about to change, just as he was about to start growing and expanding, the camera suddenly jerked and all he could see was upside-down footage of Dylan running down the corridor. And then the video stopped.
‘But you could have shown that to your dad,’ Charlie said. ‘Or the police. It might have been enough to get them to investigate.’
Dylan sneered. ‘And I still might do that. To tell you the truth, though, Charlie, you’re the only thing that interests me in this tedious school. In short, I enjoy our little dance, McGuffin, and I’d like it to continue just that bit longer. I feel we have one more contest in us. A final battle of minds and wit and strength. Then we shall see who the final victor is. Until next time, Charles McGuffin.’
Dylan nodded, turned and walked off, nose in the air.
That boy, thought Charlie, is absolutely bonkers.
A single feathery snowflake drifted down and landed on Charlie’s scarf. He lifted his head back and looked into the sky. More snow was to come.
And more danger …
Puffin Books
80 Strand
London
Dear Valued Reader,
Once again, we have reached the end of a book by Sam Copeland, and found ourselves in an awkward situation.
Despite the cover showing Charlie turning into a T-Rex, there are clearly no dinosaurs in this book.
First, you were cheated out of chickens, and now dinosaurs.
As the publisher, we humbly apologize.
Although it’s totally not our fault. It’s Sam Copeland’s fault.
We hate him. He’s a liar and he smells weird – a bit like a cross between burnt toenail clippings and frog poo.
Furthermore, his decision to pretend to put dinosaurs into this story merely as a greedy scheme to sell more copies to dinosaur-loving children is entirely deplorable. Please know that we, your beloved publisher, would NEVER be so cold, calculating and ruthless as to try to entice children into reading a book in this way.
Yours faithfully,
The Publisher
Dear Reader,
They totally would.
Sam Copeland
Dear Reader,
No, we wouldn’t.
The Publisher
Dear Reader,
Yes, they would.
Sam Copeland
Dear Sam Copeland,
You’ll be hearing from our lawyers.
The Publisher
Dear Publisher,
OOOOOOH I’M SOOOOO SCARED!
Sam Copeland
Dear Valued Readers,
Following a letter from the lawyers of Puffin Books, I have been instructed to make the following statement:
I am really very sorry for being a big horrible liar and making false accusations about my lovely publisher, who really are the best publisher in the world. Also, I smell of burnt toenail clippings and frog poo.
Yours faithfully,
Sam Copeland
Read more
Read more
Charlie McGuffin was late again.
And he really couldn’t be late this time or he was a dead man.
Charlie had eighteen minutes to get to school if he didn’t want to miss the coach, which was due to leave at precisely 9 a.m. to take his whole year to the zoo. Miss Fyre, the headmistress, had given them all a warning in assembly the day before: anyone who missed the bus would spend the whole day scrubbing the teachers’ toilets with the caretaker, Mr O’Dere.
Charlie hoovered up his cornflakes,fn1 flung on his coat and jumped into his shoes,fn2 trying to ignore the sound of his parents arguing again. He flew out of the door,fn3 hopped onto his trusty bike and started pedalling. That was when disaster struck.
His front wheel immediately started making an odd clicking noise and began to deflate. Charlie groaned. He couldn’t have a puncture.
But a puncture it was. Dug deep into the tyre were four drawing pins. Four? How had that happened? Charlie looked down at the pavement and saw at least twenty more pins scattered all over the ground.
Somebody must have accidentally dropped a box and not picked them up, Charlie thought, without a hint of suspicion, which he really should have had, considering this is the start of the book and suspicious goings-on always happen at the start of books.
Well, that’s just really bad luck, Charlie thought. No one would put drawing pins on the pavement outside my house on purpose.
Anyway, there was nothing he could do about it now. He was definitely going to be late and miss the school trip. Unless …
Unless …
Unless I change into an animal, Charlie thought. Then he might JUST have the time to fly to school or run there super-fast, change back without being seen AND catch the coach.
Charlie had been changing into animals for several months now, and had learned how to do it whenever he wanted. It was choosing which animal that he hadn’t quite mastered … No matter what he did, it still seemed almost completely random.
Even so, changing was his only chance. It was a risk he had to take.
Charlie dumped his bike underneath a bush in his front garden, and glanced around to make sure there was nobody watching.
It looked like the coast was clear.
Charlie closed his eyes and balled his fists, allowing stress to flow into his body. He thought about the rumble of his parents’ arguments, which seemed to be non-stop these days. The sound of their raised voices and slammed doors made Charlie feel like his lungs were too tight and his stomach had been dropped in icy water. He remembered running upstairs to his bedroom and finding the Great Catsby lying on his bed, out of his box in the kitchen for once, and burying his face in the cat’s fur, sobbing.
Charlie recognized the feeling of electricity rippling through his body almost immediately.
He was changing, and changing fast.
Charlie tried imagining the quickest animal he could think of: a great, soaring bird sprang into his brain, a golden eagle with huge wings, designed for maximum speed.
He kept the picture in his mind as the electricity built and built, ripping apart every atom in his body and rebuilding them. He could sense himself shrinking and feel wings sprouting out of his back. But then, to Charlie’s dismay, he continued shrinking. Smaller than a golden eagle …
Way smaller …
Maybe I’m going to be a pigeon again, Charlie thought with a groan. PLEASE not a pigeon. ANYTHING but that!
No, he realized with relief. I’m even smaller than a pigeon.
A sparrow?
No, smaller than a sparrow. And anyway, he wasn’t growing feathers.
He had grown four new legs, some bristly hair and three new eyes on his forehead, but no feathers. And his two original eyes had split into thousands of tiny eyes, and he’d grown antennae out of his head. Charlie was pretty sure no bird looked THAT freaky. He rubbed his two front legs together and buzzed a pair of fragile, transparent wings.
He was tiny now. The size of a –
Charlie was a fly.
Ah well, thought Charlie. It could be worse. He could still whizz to school super-fast, and while an eagle over the playground would have probably drawn a bit of attention, nobody would notice a boring old house fly, so Charlie reckoned he was pretty safe.
As long as he kept focused and didn’t forget who he really was, that is. Because, as Charlie had discovered, becoming an animal sometimes made him start to forget that he was actually a human. And that meant trouble …
Charlie’s antennae twitched, and a sudden shiver of nervousness shot through his body. It felt like his body had some sort of tingling fly sixth sense, on high alert to any danger.
With a final rub of his front legs, Charlie buzzed his wings and zipped into the air. He had a curious feeling he was being watched but, despite his many eyes, he couldn’t see anybody, so he put it to the back of his tiny fly-mind and started off in the direction of school.
Charlie zoomed happily along, his wings whirring so fast they were a blur. He would never get bored of the feeling of flying – he felt so free, so agile. Plus, his new fly-vision gave him an incredible 360-degree view of the world. It was strange to be flying forward but able to see behind him at the same time. The people and cars below seemed to be moving incredibly slowly. Compared to Charlie, they were crawling in slow-motion. He could see a boy cycling below him who looked like he was peddling through water.
Suddenly, Charlie’s antennae twitched again.
He could smell something delicious.
Well, Charlie thought, I did miss out on my cornflakes. And I’m making such good progress, I reckon I’ve got time for a quick snack …
Charlie the fly followed the irresistible smell drifting through the air, zig-zagging closer and closer.
Finally, he spotted the source.
There, on the ground.
A scrumptious, exquisite, delicious-looking mound of brown steaming poo.
Yum, thought Charlie.
THE BEGINNING
Wait – you didn’t think that was it, did you?
Puffin has LOADS more stories for you to discover.
Find your next adventure at puffin.co.uk, along with:
• Quizzes, games and apps starring your favourite characters
• Videos, podcasts and audiobook extracts
• The chance to check out brand-new books before anybody else!
puffin.co.uk
Psst! You can also find Puffin on PopJam
PUFFIN BOOKS
UK | USA | Canada | Ireland | Australia
India | New Zealand | South Africa
Puffin Books is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.
www.penguin.co.uk
www.puffin.co.uk
www.ladybird.co.uk
First published 2019
Text copyright © Sam Copeland, 2019
Illustrations copyright © Sarah Horne, 2019
The moral rights of the author and illustrator have been asserted
Illustrated by Sarah Horne
Text design by Janene Spencer
ISBN: 978-0-241-34626-6
This ebook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licensed or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. Any unauthorized distribution or use of this text may be a direct infringement of the author’s and publisher’s rights and those responsible may be liable in law accordingly.
AUTHOR’S NOTE II
1 I’m not really sorry. I lied. Dunderhead.
2 I don’t.
CHAPTER 3
1 In Book 1, the internationally bestselling and stunningly reviewed Charlie Changes Into a Chicken, Charlie had to break in to his head teacher’s office and shave a monkey. A toy monkey, not a real one.
2 Unfortunately, Charlie being Charlie, he then tripped over and the opportunity went flying out of his hands high into the air before hitting the ground and smashing into tiny pieces …
CHAPTER 4
1 You will find this joke in Guinness World Records 2019, in the section ‘World’s Worst Jokes’, subsection ‘Jokes So Bad They Will Make You Want to Go and Live the Rest of Your Life in a Dark, Damp Cave’.
2 Which is totally unsurprising, when you think about it. Finding out that your brother keeps changing into animals isn’t the sort of thing you forget in a hurry.
CHAPTER 5
1 In Book 1 there was an incident with some pigeons, and it’s highly unsurprising that Charlie was left a little suspicious of them.
2 ‘Improvise’ means to make things up on the spot, and being able to improvise is a very good thing. So if your teacher asks you why you haven’t done your homework, and you can quickly make up a reason, such as ‘Aliens broke in to the house and thought my homework was toilet roll and they wiped their massive green alien bum-tentacles on it’, then that is improvising. Some might call it ‘lying’, but that’s because they haven’t got the imagination to improvise.
3 Even Dylan knew this wasn’t one of his best.
CHAPTER 6
1 Charlie’s dad had named his company McGuffin & Sons in the hope that one day his sons would take it over. His hopes of that had faded as both of them switched off as soon as he tried explaining what the company did.
2 What’s a neuron? Well, how am I supposed to know? I think it’s a type of smelly Dutch cheese. I’m not sure really. What do you mean I’m the author and I’m supposed to know? FINE – I’ll go and look it up. One minute …
Right – turns out it’s nothing to do with cheese. So apparently neurons are tiny cells in your brain and they make electrical signals that send messages to other cells in your body and tell them what to do. That makes more sense than cheese actually. Neurons are basically the bosses of your body, ordering everybody around. A bit like parents. Or teachers. But if you didn’t have any neurons, you’d be about as clever as a piece of wet broccoli.
3 Skunks don’t actually spray bad smells out of their bums. They spray out of two little holes either side of their bum called glands. The smell can be so bad it can be detected 3.5 miles away and is strong enough to make fully grown bears run away in terror. What do you mean that’s too much information?
4 This is a hundred per cent true comment from this author’s school report. Well, look at me now, Miss Twomey! You might have had a good laugh at my expense when you were writing it, but I bet you’re not laughing now you’re reading this book! Well, actually, I hope you are laughing while you’re reading this book. YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN!
CHAPTER 7
1 What do you mean, ‘Yes, we do actually. This would be a much better book if it had exciting dinosaur chases and colossal dino-poos’? Look, you don’t get to choose what’s in the book, OK?
Oh. Apparently, you do. I’ve just done som
e research and apparently books with dinosaurs on the cover sell twice as many as books that don’t. So – watch out for exciting Dino-Charlie munching action later in this book!
2 Around sixty-five million years ago there was a giant snake called a Titanoboa. Titanoboas could grow up to 14 metres long, weighed as much as a car and would happily snack on crocodiles. If you’re reading this before bedtime, sleep well.
3 The skunk smell had clung to the four friends all weekend. It would be fair to say it had not helped their popularity at school.
4 This was actually the first time Charlie had closed his bedroom door since the skunk incident. Charlie’s mum had forced him to keep his windows open all day and night despite the freezing temperatures. She had also made Charlie promise to make sure that Wogan never ate beans before visiting their house ever again.
5 Charlie was close. He wasn’t a baboon but a monkey called a mandrill. Baboons and mandrills are totally different animals. The Latin name for a baboon is Giganticus bummus, whereas the Latin name for a mandrill is Spectacula buttox. Mandrills are the world’s largest monkey and their bums really are wild and definitely worth a Google.
6 Dylan didn’t literally waltz off. Dylan is weird, but he’s not that weird. He just walked away.
7 Not a baboon. A mandrill. I refuse to correct this again.
8 Unbelievable. I give up.
CHAPTER 8
1 What does ‘morally correct’ mean? It basically means ‘the right thing’. Simple, yes? Well, sometimes doing the right thing isn’t so simple. Lying is ‘morally wrong’ – you are told that from an early age. But what if a friend drew a picture and asked you what you thought of it? It may be a terrible picture, but surely it’s better to lie and say it’s a wonderful picture? Obviously it is. Just like if you think this book is the worst book you have ever read, it is ALWAYS better to lie and tell everybody you think it is actually the GREATEST book you have ever read and you should also give it the best reviews online because that is the MORALLY CORRECT thing to do. Is that clear? Good.
