Barnaby Grimes
Barnaby Grimes is a series of children's books by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell, which takes place in a fictional city modeled on Georgian/Victorian-era London. Barnaby Grimes is the hero of the stories, and works as a 'Tic-tock Lad', a courier specialising in high speed errands and deliveries. Barnaby is one of the best at the job, due to his expertise in 'highstacking', which involves highly dangerous rooftop acrobatics as a means of traveling the city.
The series has a historical flavour, using period fashions and slang, but also involves a variety of supernatural elements, and can be gory at times. Barnaby acts as the stories' narrator, giving accounts of some of his more fascinating cases, while referring to others taking place either in the past or in between the events of each case, indicating that he has an extremely busy and exciting life.
As well as appealing stories, the Barnaby Grimes books also incorporate illustrations by illustrator Chriss Riddell, which fit into the tone of the series and form a significant part of the books' charm.
The books in the series include:
- Barnaby Grimes: Curse of the Night Wolf
- Barnaby Grimes: Return of the Emerald Skull
- Barnaby Grimes: Legion of the Dead
- Barnaby Grimes: Phantom Of Blood Alley
- Absent-Minded Professor: Professor Pinkerton-Barnes, a zoologist who enjoys coming up with odd theories and having them disproven.
- Badass Bookworm: Barnaby is intelligent and spends his spare time at "Underhill's Library for Scholars of the Arcane", reading through old journals. He also takes on werewolves and is rather lethal with a sword-cane.
- Parkour/Roof Hopping: Highstacking seems to partake of a bit of both.