Shower Land 1: Break the Curse, Felix finds that having a shower might just send you be somewhere you least expect to be!

Get ready for some fun in the hilarious book for ages 6+

Read on for Chapter 1!

Felix hates Mondays. Dad’s yelling at him to get up. His little brother, Olly, is being super annoying. So when Felix shuts the bathroom door, he wishes he could get away. He turns on the shower and . . .

REEEEKKKKKK!

Felix finds himself standing in the middle of a field . . . naked . . . with an army of soldiers charging at him.

Step 1- Avoid flying pitchforks!
Step 2- Find some PANTS.
Step 3- UM, IS THAT A DRAGON?!?

‘Felix Anthony McKillop, if you don’t get out of bed and get in the shower right this second, I’ll . . .’

Felix knew better than to wait for the end of that sentence.

‘Coming, Dad,’ he yelled as he dragged his body out from under the warm doona and sat on the edge of his bed.

Felix raised his fingers to his eyes and prised his lids open. Mondays were always so, so hard. He dug his fingertips into the corners of his eyes and wrenched out huge clusters of crusty sleep. Mr Claverotte, the old French guy who owned the bakery in town, had told him that in French they call it ‘caca des yeux’, which translates as ‘eye-poo’. As Felix wiped the yellow chunks on the underside of his bedspread, he decided that was a pretty good name for it.

‘FELIX!’

‘I’m up!’

Felix’s pyjamas were all twisted, and the bottoms had risen way past where it was okay to wear your pants. He yanked them down and straightened his t-shirt. His hair stuck up in different directions, but he couldn’t blame that on just waking up. Felix’s hair always looked like he had just woken up. It was very uncooperative.

As he tried to pat it flat, his bedroom door burst open and his little brother, Olly, ran in.

‘Dad says if he doesn’t hear the shower running in one minute, he’s gonna send you to school in the jumper Granny gave you for Christmas,’ Olly jeered, happy to be the one delivering this threat.

He then pulled out his favourite thing in the world – his copy of Biggest Book of Best Jokes, Insults & Comebacks. Super-catchy title.

Felix rolled his eyes at Olly. There were only two years between them, but he felt like his eight-year-old brother was from another planet.

‘You’re so hairy, you went to a dog show . . . and won!’ Olly cracked himself up.

‘That’s not funny, Olly. It’s also not true.’ Felix checked his top lip every morning, hoping for signs of a first moustache hair. So far, nothing!

Olly glared at him. ‘You wouldn’t know funny if it leapt out of the toilet and bit you on the butt.’

Felix tried to straighten the doona on his bed enough that it could pass for ‘made’.

‘Well, I know what isn’t funny. And it’s that book. It’s so juvenile.’

‘What’s juvenile?’

‘It means it’s immature stuff that only little kids find funny.’

‘Immature, huh?’ Olly flicked through his book. ‘Well . . .’ He landed on a page. ‘Immature is just a word boring people use to describe fun people.’ Olly threw his head back and snorted with laughter. ‘See? I’m calling you boring. Take that!’

Felix shook his head and stood up, pushing past Olly. ‘Move it, butt-face.’ He shoved his younger brother asideand headed down the hall towards the bathroom.

‘Butt-face, huh? Well . . .’ Olly flicked through his book again. ‘Why do ducks have tail feathers?’

Olly was like the ads you can’t skip on YouTube – there was no escaping him. Felix walked into the bathroom and shut the door in Olly’s face, but it didn’t stop him.

‘To cover their BUTT-QUACK!’

‘Go away, Olly, I’m having a shower!’ Felix yelled through the closed door.

‘Oh, you should have a shower . . . ’cos your armpits smell so bad your teacher gave you an A-plus for not raising your hand.’

It was useless trying to make him stop. Olly had been testing his jokes on Felix for weeks now, ever since he found that annoying book in the local second-hand bookshop. Olly thought they were hilarious, but what does an eight-year-old know about what is funny? Epic fail videos on YouTube are funny. #AnimalsActingLikeHumans is funny. POV memes are soooooo funny. Olly’s joke book is just NOT.

Maybe a nice shower would wash away the frustration of having to start every day with the world’s most unfunny stand-up comedy routine. But somehow, Felix doubted it. He stripped off his clothes, trying to block out the annoying voice behind the door.

‘Hey, Felix, you’re as much use as a chocolate teapot. Get it? ’Cos it would just melt?’

Felix stepped into the shower, keen for the sound of water to drown out his brother’s insults.

‘Ooooh, this one is perfect for you because you are such a bad dancer,’ Olly started.

‘I wish I could just get away from that little snotrag,’ Felix muttered as he turned on the tap, and water shot from the showerhead.

‘What do you call a dancing sheep?’

Felix never heard Olly’s punchline.

The water hit his head and . . .

REEEEKKKKKK!

There was a sound like rusty brakes on a metro train, a blinding flash of white light and the strong smell of singed hair.

Watch out for Book 2 – Shower Land 2: Feel the Freeze

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