The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart

A wildly original, fantastical adventure--and now an animated move, Jack and the Cuckoo-Clock Heart--this international bestseller will charm readers of all ages.

Edinburgh, 1874. Born with a frozen heart, Jack is near death when his mother abandons him to the care of Dr. Madeleine--witch doctor, midwife, protector of orphans--who saves Jack by placing a cuckoo clock in his chest. And it is in her orphanage that Jack grows up among tear-filled flasks, eggs containing memories, and a man with a musical spine.

As Jack gets older, Dr. Madeleine warns him that his heart is too fragile for strong emotions: he must never, ever fall in love. And, of course, this is exactly what he does: on his tenth birthday and with head-over-heels abandon. The object of his ardor is Miss Acacia--a bespectacled young street performer with a soul-stirring voice. But now Jack's life is doubly at risk--his heart is in danger and so is his safety after he injures the school bully in a fight for the affections of the beautiful singer.

Now begins a journey of escape and pursuit, from Edinburgh to Paris to Miss Acacia's home in Andalusia. Mathias Malzieu's The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart is a fantastical, wildly inventive tale of love and heartbreak--by turns poignant and funny--in which Jack finally learns the great joys, and ultimately the greater costs, of owning a fully formed heart.

Author: Mathias Malzieu
Publisher: Vintage
Published: 11/29/2011
Pages: 192
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.43lbs
Size: 8.00h x 5.31w x 0.59d
ISBN13: 9780307472137
ISBN10: 0307472132
BISAC Categories:
- Fiction | Literary
- Fiction | Historical | General
- Fiction | Science Fiction | Steampunk

About the Author
Mathias Malzieu is the lead singer of the French band Dionysos. The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart is the basis for an album that Malzieu wrote, and he is codirector of an animated feature-film adaptation produced by Luc Besson. This is his third novel and the first to be translated into English. Born in 1974 near Montpelier, Malzieu now lives in Paris.