When eleven-year-old Brian Pankhurst has to stay with his grandparents, he's not exactly enthusiastic. He barely knows them, after all, and they're a little strange.They're stranger than he realises, in fact. Very soon after he arrives at their ancient house, Brian starts to feel that something isn't right. Why has someone sent his granddad a completely blank letter? Why don't people who go in to the local bookshop ever seem to come out again? What does his granddad mean when he says Brian's father wasn't really an accountant?Then Brian wakes in the middle of the night and finds he's going to have to adjust to three things very quickly: magic is real, monsters are real, and he and his family are in terrible danger...