In The Wolf Who Cried Boy, MARK MUPOTSA-RUSSELL turns a familiar fable on its head, blending sharp wit with lyrical storytelling. This playful yet thought-provoking book explores fear, desire, and the slippery nature of truth, inviting readers to question the stories we inherit and the roles we are asked to play in them.

Read on for an extract …

ABOUT THE BOOK

Six-year-old Henry believes his life is a fairytale. He’s a Star Prince, his mum is a Star Queen and they’re hiding from Henry’s father, the mysterious ‘Wolf King’.

When news arrives that his Grandma is gravely ill, Henry and his mum must take a road trip across the country and back into the Wolf King’s orbit. Henry isn’t afraid: he knows his magic powers will save them. But as the King draws ever closer, Henry’s world starts to fall apart. Who is the real baddie in his life? Who can he trust? And why don’t his powers seem to work?

In this astoundingly original story of heroes, villains and the messy reality between them, a world of violence and fear can be wildly funny and streaked with magic. Through its unforgettable narrator, The Wolf Who Cried Boy explores how cycles of violence, misogyny and corruption must be broken if we ever want our children to grow up free.

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1.

On clear nights, when I’m good, Mum puts her finger in the sky and shows me our home. One, two, three, four up, and one, two, three sideways from the Southern Cross. Little and bright and a billion light-years away.

‘When can I go there?’

‘I’m sorry, darling. We’re never going back.’

Mum knows almost everything, but she doesn’t know that. I’ll go one day. I feel it pull me, from my eyeballs to my fingers and toes.

Or is that just the gravity?

∞

Last night was good for stars and the morning is blue and so cold you could bite it. Drips stayed on our tent and hitting the inside makes them jump off like a dog shaking. I hit three times and the broke pole falls. Mum closes our biology book.

‘Maybe I shouldn’t go today.’

‘No!’

‘I can’t trust you to sit still.’

‘I’ll be good but. Better than last time.’ I have to show I listened, so I open the page again to say all the ants we saw at the creek yesterday. Long skinny black ones. Yellow-middled ones with black heads and bums. And gold almost-see-through ones. ‘See?’

Her mouth scrunches. ‘What will you do while I’m gone?’

‘Sit in Fortress One and do maths.’

‘Sit how?’

‘Sit quiet.’

‘And if you finish your homework, and drawing, and Lego, and you have nothing else to do?’

‘Sit quiet and be bored.’

‘And if someone comes? Iiiiif Peter Pan swoops down and wants to fly you to Never-Never Land for chocolate donuts?’

‘Mum-mee.’

‘Need to hear you say it, kiddo.’

‘Crawl out the secret way and run superfast to Fortress Two.’

Her eyes crinkle, like, Don’t try tricking me, buddy.

I already tricked her but, because she thinks Peter Pan is still my favourite. I never told her it’s Captain America now. Mum hates him because The dude has the methods of a fascist, and the wardrobe of a middle-aged cyclist. You can tell that’s bad by how her voice goes.

Mum crawls around, getting our offerings for the Priestess. The green beanie she knitted. Crystals we grew in jars. Little straw baskets, like mice would use for laundry. Scones she cooked before the sun even woke up.

Our tent goes anywhere but today it’s behind big grey rocks (that came from a volcano but don’t have lava centres) and scratchy saltbush (that probly does taste salty but I shouldn’t try). The rocks and bushes are near cliffs above a beautiful rainforest. In the day all the trees make the hills a million different greens, forever. But at night it’s so black, the only way you can tell where the sky starts is the stars.

‘Pay attention please, Henry.’

‘Kaching!’ That’s our joke that attention costs money. I am paying it but, because Mum’s opening our Magic Backpack. She bestows on me Excalibur.

I don’t know if it’s the real Excalibur, from Camelot. Mum’s magic makes it look like a normal knife, made of wood and bumpy metal. If you stab someone with it they don’t just get cut normally, where their blood and guts fall out like spaghetti, and they slip in them, yelling, Noooooo, my guts are spaghetti! Excalibur makes it worse in ways I don’t even know. Turns them to slime, probly. Or maggots. Or static electricity. Even holding it is dangerous, and a big honour when you’re not even seven, but—

‘Henry.’

‘Kaching!’

‘What did I say?’

I remember really hard.

‘I said be very, very careful with that.’

I nod heaps.

I’m not lying, but Mum’s face scrunches again. ‘I just won’t go this week. We can stretch out the scones and—’

‘I hate scones!’

Her eyebrow goes up.

‘I hate having too many scones.’

‘Good save.’

‘But what if the Priestess has a really important prophecy?’

‘Why do you want me gone so badly? I think you just want a new DVD.’

‘No. But we don’t have Weet-Bix, or rice cakes, or anything. And your tummy was grumbling last night. It was like, Groooaaarrrk, give me some yummy food.’ I tickle her ribs, but it doesn’t do anything.

‘I’ll be fine.’ Mum’s thumb tap-taps her leg. I’m this close to a whole week of no DVD and no practice time.

‘If you don’t have adult conversation soon, you’ll probly go crazy.’

Mum stops tapping and looks at me with her weird-joke smile.

∞

We get to Fortress One and Mum hugs me so hard my bones break in matchsticks and rattle around my body. ‘I love you so, so much. Do you realise that?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you’ll behave? You won’t leave, even for a second?’

‘Yes.’

I crawl through Fortress One’s entrance hole. Fortress One’s where I go when there’s danger, or emergencies, or Mum does secret meetings with the Priestess. It got made by a big tree growing down over even bigger rocks, like it’s bending to hear all the good rock secrets. Inside is a cave with a floor of old tree bits waiting to be new again.

I’m careful wiggling in so I won’t knock Mum’s twig people that dangle from the roof. Or tip her things of herbs. Or mess her salt squiggles on the ground. Together they make the most powerful charms you could think of. If wolfs attacked they’d bounce off pachingkongbong! and their furs would sizzle with acid.

I accidentally left Clifford and my school stuff in here from the false alarm yesterday, so I scratch his ears and say, ‘Sorry.’ I’m just joking but. He’s stuffed.

I find my maths page, where I’m up to the question 9 + 5. Maths is fun, because you turn it to nine soldiers plus five soldiers in your head, and other people think your answer is just a number when you actually made a army.

Before I even start, Mum pushes our DVD player inside. ‘As a special treat, if you keep the volume very low, you can have one rewatch.’

This is suspicious and I go on my belly to see back out. Mum’s chalking the Fortress tree with little sideways eights. That’s a special letter that means infinity, which means forever. She does three more in the dirt with her finger.

‘Now. I’ve added an extra hidden binding spell this time. For you.’

‘Why?’

‘You know why.’

‘Stop it!’

I find my maths page, where I’m up to the question 9 + 5. Maths is fun, because you turn it to nine soldiers plus five soldiers in your head, and other people think your answer is just a number when you actually made a army.

‘I have to, sorry. If you go exploring again – if you set even your tiniest pinky toe outside – pretty soon your bum will itch so badly you’ll go crazy. Worse than itching powder made from nits! And when I come back, and your finger’s smelly from scratching, I’ll know. And you’ll never be allowed to stay alone again.’

‘Don’t!’

‘My magic’s feeling super strong today, too. I bet I could do a simply astounding Firespire. Wanna see?’

I trace my maths question, but I’m not actually doing it. ‘Firespire’s boring.’

‘Okay, then. How about … Fae Folks’ Flame?’

I look up and Mum smiles like she knew I wanted that one all along. It’s my favourite but, so that’s not psychic.

Mum shakes her fingers and wobbles her head. Her eyes close and her hands make cups on each other. You can feel the magic come up off the dirt and whoosh around you, making the air go thicker. Goosebumps poke out my arms like, Let us see, too!

Mum’s cup hands twist back and forth, back and forth, with one cup pouring into the other. Her mouth whispers the oldest starwords. I can’t understand her, specially with how she says the words, altogether in a traffic jam. Her face lines come out. Lines from laughing at jokes, or scrunching with worries, or Being mum to a cheeky little monkey.

Without stopping whispering even to breathe, she gets her pink lighter out and shrick-shrick-shricks till it flames. Her eyes open huge. She puts the fire on her bottom hand and lifts. ‘Flagranto!’

The absolute millisecond the lighter touches her hand, the Fae Folks’ Flame is there. It’s only for a bit, and not big. But it’s phenomenal. A blue fireball with spiky yellow hairdo. Inside, a thousand million sparks do one twinkle each, then disappear. Like a galaxy going alive then dead, faster than you could blink.

When it’s gone, Mum smiles. She’s puffed, even from that. Before I was born she could do a Fae Folks’ Flame so giant it’d burn this whole rainforest and cook all the animals like furry sausages, woomf. But since her magic got stolen she can only do little ones. Even that’s dangerous, in case the Wolf King’s looking just this way. The magic would be a alarm yelling, HENRY AND MUM ARE HEEEERE! And wolfs would run from everywhere, jumping from trees and digging up from holes underground, with teeth and claws and guns and spells. They’d smash us to chunks and chomp our meat till we’re blood and organs and hairy broken skeletons in the mud.

‘Did you like it?’ Mum says.

‘It was a good one.’ I remember I’m mad at her and go back to 9 + 5.

‘I’m leaving now, kiddo.’

‘Yes.’

‘I love you. To the moon and back.’

‘And the stars!’

‘Absolutely. And to the stars.’

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Visit Mark Mupotsa-Russell’s website