The 1000 Year Old Boy

Alfie Monk has been eleven years old for a thousand years, and he has finally decided he would rather grow up than keep starting over. Ross Welford's novel mixes present-day friendship with long stretches of remembered history, following Alfie as a fire and a chance meeting push him to look for a way out of an unending childhood. The story carries real grief alongside its humour, and the middle-grade pacing keeps the chapters short while the questions it raises about time, loss and belonging stay genuinely open. Good to know: • A narrator who has lived across a thousand years of history • Alternating chapters that move between the past and present-day events • Friendship, loss and the wish for an ordinary life at the centre • Short chapters pitched at middle-grade readers Written for readers of roughly nine to thirteen and for families reading together, published by Harper Collins and stocked at Boipoka.