The Book of Three

by Lloyd Alexander

  During World War II, Mr. Alexander trained as a member of an army combat intelligence team in Wales. This ancient, roughhewn country with its castles, mountains, and its own beautiful language made a tremendous impression on him, but not until years later did he realize that he had been given a glimpse of another enchanted kingdom.

  After the war, while attending the University of Paris, he met his future wife, Janine. They were married, and moved back to Philadelphia, where Mr. Alexander wrote novel after novel. It was seven years before his first novel at last was published. Ten years later, he tried writing for children. It was, Mr. Alexander says, “the most creative and liberating experience of my life. In books for young people, I was able to express my own deepest feelings far more than I could ever do in writing for adults.”

  While doing historical research for a Welsh episode in his first children’s book, Time Cat, he discovered such riches that he decided to save them for a whole book. He delved into all sorts of volumes, from anthropology to the writings of an eighteenth-century Welsh clergyman to the Mabinogion, the classic collection of Welsh legends. From his readings emerged such characters as Gwydion Son of Don, Arawn Death-Lord of Annuvin, Dallben the old enchanter, and the oracular pig Hen Wen. The landscape and mood of Prydain came from Mr. Alexander’s vivid recollections of the land of Wales that had so enchanted him twenty years earlier.

  The five books in the Chronicles of Prydain are The Book of Three (an ALA Notable Book), The Black Cauldron (a Newbery Honor Book), The Castle of Llyr (an ALA Notable Book), Taran Wanderer, and The High King (winner of the 1969 Newbery Medal). He followed the chronicles in 1973 with a collection of short stories, The Foundling and Other Tales of Prydain.

  Henry Holt® is a registered trademark of Henry Holt and Company, LLC.

  Copyright © 1964 by Lloyd Alexander. Renewed 1992.

  Map copyright © 1964 by Evaline Ness

  Pronunciation Guide copyright © 1999 by Henry Holt and Company

  All rights reserved.

  H. B. Fenn and Company Ltd.

  Revised Edition—1999

  Henry Holt and Company, LLC, Publishers since 1866

  175 Fifth Avenue, New York, New York 10010

  www.HenryHoltKids.com

  Alexander, Lloyd.

  The book of three / by Lloyd Alexander.

  p. cm.—(The chronicles of Prydain; 1)

  Summary: Taran, Assistant Pig-Keeper to a famous oracular sow, sets out on a

  hazardous mission to save Prydain from the forces of evil.

  [1. Fantasy.] I. Title. II. Series: Alexander, Lloyd. Chronicles of Prydain; 1.

  PZ7.A3774Bn 1999 [Fic]—dc2l 98-40901

  eISBN 9781429961943

  First eBook Edition : August 2011

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data