Top ten self-contained worlds in fiction

Fletcher Moss won the (London) Times/Chicken House Children's Fiction Competition 2012, with his swashbuckling novel The Poison Boy.

He works as an assistant head teacher at a school in Greater Manchester, having previously worked as a classroom teacher, shelf-stacker and van driver in France and Spain.

For the Guardian, Moss named his ten favorite claustrophobic parallel worlds to get lost in, including:

My Swordhand is Singing by Marcus Sedgwick

When I first read this I couldn't help but think of M Night Shyamalan's movie The Village, mostly on account of Sedgewick's setting; the small settlement of Chust, sealed in a woodland clearing. This village, however, is the eastern European type plagued by vampires; proper vampires, rather than the moon-eyed Hollywood types more inclined to fall in love with you than drink you dry. The story is intense and brutal - entirely focused on a square acre of so of ravaged woodland. When, in the final chapter, the action moves to a distant city, the relief of escape is intense.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue