Elephant Kingdom - Karl Cullen

Imagine a world where everything is alive - the trees, the rocks, the wind that whispers stories in your ear. A world inhabited by manic squirrels, egotistical bushes, tyrannical dung beetles, bounty hunting vines, a carnivorous desert, an owl that carries the moon and an elephant who throws the sun into the sky each day. This is the world you are all invited to enter; to go on a journey with a young elephant named Hope, who stands on the verge of his tenth birthday - a birthday which will see him crowned King of the Jungle. Fearing he is about to lose the freedom he cherishes so much, and wanting to know everything about the kingdom he is about to inherit, Hope decides he will climb the highest mountain in his valley to discover where the sun comes from each morning. What Hope finds at the top of the mountain, however, changes everything. The world doesn't stop at the ends of his valley, but stretches forever in every direction, and what's more, the sun doesn't come from behind this mountain, but the one way over there! Or perhaps it's the one after that!! There's no turning back for Hope, and as he discovers how big his kingdom actually is, he also discovers how big he can be. Facing the unimagined dangers of a jungle in disarray, Hope finds help in the most unexpected of places and the strangest of characters, helping him to realise that bringing order within himself may help bring order back to his kingdom. It is a journey from the external world to the internal, and back again. For Hope, it is the beginning of everything - and everything begins with imagination.