The Dead Boy Detectives are on the case. When several children go missing in a small English town, a series of strange and unexpected twists take them to Free Country, a place that dates back a millennium, where children never grow old and are free from the abuse and tyranny of adults. But Free Country is failing, and what it needs is the strength of five innately powerful children-including the young sorcerer Timothy Hunter-to restore their uncanny world to what it once was. Collects THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE #1 and THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE #2, written by Gaiman with cowriters Alisa Kwitney and Jamie Delano. A brand-new middle chapter written by DEAD BOY DETECTIVES writer Toby Litt and drawn by artist Peter Gross (THE BOOKS OF MAGIC, THE UNWRITTEN) completes this compelling tale of ancient history, stolen dreams and lost children. Also featuring a new introduction by Gaiman, plus new cover art by DEAD BOY DETECTIVES artist Mark Buckingham.

"For the first time, the two-issue miniseries THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE, written by Neil Gaiman, Alisa Kwitney and Jamie Delano, are collected - and with them, a new chapter written by Toby Litt that completes the tale as Gaiman originally envisioned it. When several children go missing in a small English town, the Dead Boy Detectives are on the case. A series of strange and unexpected twists take them to Free Country, a place that dates back a millennia, where children never grow old and are free from the abuse and tyranny of adults. But Free Country is failing, and what it needs is the strength of five innately powerful children - including the young sorcerer Timothy Hunter - to restore their uncanny world to what it once was. This hardcover collects THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE #1 and THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE #2, written by Gaiman with cowriters Alisa Kwitney and Jamie Delano. A brand-new middle chapter written by DEAD BOY DETECTIVES writer Toby Litt and drawn artist Peter Gross (THE BOOKS OF MAGIC, THE UNWRITTEN) completes this compelling tale of ancient history, stolen dreams and lost children. Also featuring a new introduction by Gaiman, plus new cover art by DEAD BOY DETECTIVES artist Mark Buckingham"--

"Originally published in single magazine form as The Children's Crusade 1 & 2"--Title page verso.

Kurt Vonnegut’s masterpiece, Slaughterhouse-Five is “a desperate, painfully honest attempt to confront the monstrous crimes of the twentieth century” (Time). Selected by the Modern Library as one of the 100 best novels of all time Slaughterhouse-Five, an American classic, is one of the world’s great antiwar books. Centering on the infamous World War II firebombing of Dresden, the novel is the result of what Kurt Vonnegut described as a twenty-three-year struggle to write a book about what he had witnessed as an American prisoner of war. It combines historical fiction, science fiction, autobiography, and satire in an account of the life of Billy Pilgrim, a barber’s son turned draftee turned optometrist turned alien abductee. As Vonnegut had, Billy experiences the destruction of Dresden as a POW. Unlike Vonnegut, he experiences time travel, or coming “unstuck in time.” An instant bestseller, Slaughterhouse-Five made Kurt Vonnegut a cult hero in American literature, a reputation that only strengthened over time, despite his being banned and censored by some libraries and schools for content and language. But it was precisely those elements of Vonnegut’s writing—the political edginess, the genre-bending inventiveness, the frank violence, the transgressive wit—that have inspired generations of readers not just to look differently at the world around them but to find the confidence to say something about it. Authors as wide-ranging as Norman Mailer, John Irving, Michael Crichton, Tim O’Brien, Margaret Atwood, Elizabeth Strout, David Sedaris, Jennifer Egan, and J. K. Rowling have all found inspiration in Vonnegut’s words. Jonathan Safran Foer has described Vonnegut as “the kind of writer who made people—young people especially—want to write.” George Saunders has declared Vonnegut to be “the great, urgent, passionate American writer of our century, who offers us . . . a model of the kind of compassionate thinking that might yet save us from ourselves.” More than fifty years after its initial publication at the height of the Vietnam War, Vonnegut’s portrayal of political disillusionment, PTSD, and postwar anxiety feels as relevant, darkly humorous, and profoundly affecting as ever, an enduring beacon through our own era’s uncertainties.

With the death of one of the Gang (as they call themselves), the war games escalate, directed now against the adults they hold responsible for the loss of one of their soldiers.

Continued from ARCANA ANNUAL BOOKS OF MAGIC (1994) #1. In the conclusion of the monumental Vertigo Annuals event, the plans of the strange children of Free Country come to fruition and the fate of that mystical land is decided. The children of the Vertigo titles will all be changed by their experiences...and one will not return.

Thirteen years ago, a curious star fell to the island of Somerset. That night Ike Ryder met Alina, the little girl who fell from the heavens. Now Ike Ryder is on the cusp of manhood and being called to join his father's decade-long war, a fight he vehemently opposes. Before Ike is forced to take up arms, a messenger from the island of Somerset's Great Spirit visits him. Ike is named the Great Spirit's new champion and called to make a perilous journey to the Spirit's sanctuary. While all of Somerset seems to doubt Ike's abilities as a warrior, he resolves to reach the Spirit and use her power to end the bloodshed plaguing the world of Dawn. Miles from Somerset, Alina fights alongside the Knights of Tenshi, the legendary peacekeepers of Dawn. After most of their regiment is killed in an ambush, Alina and the few survivors race to warn Somerset of a coming invasion. Although she and the other Knights fear their enemies of war, the real danger may come from someone much more sinister...a foe with supernatural powers and a growing collection of faces.