Kiki Kallira Breaks a Kingdom
Contents (35)
VIKING
An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, New York
First published in the United States of America by Viking,
an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC, 2021.
Copyright © 2021 by Sangu Mandanna
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
Hardcover edition ISBN 9780593206973
International edition ISBN 9780593403075
Ebook edition ISBN 9780593206997
Cover illustration © 2021 by Nabi H. Ali
Cover design Kelley Brady
This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.
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to Mum, Dad, and Gramps,
for all the stories
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Acknowledgments
About the Author
1
I had absolutely, definitely killed my mother.
Okay, maybe not definitely, but I was pretty sure of it. Like 90 percent sure. Maybe 85.
It all depended on whether I had locked the front door when I left our house earlier today, and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t remember if I had. And if I hadn’t, well, then there was a very good chance that Mum, who had been repainting the kitchen cabinets when I left, had since been murdered by a burglar.
Or had been eaten by an opportunistic goose, which only sounds ridiculous if you haven’t met the geese that live in London.
The day hadn’t started on such a tragic note. It was a hot July, and school had just finished for the summer, so I left home right after lunch to meet my best friend Emily, her little sister Tam, and two of Tam’s friends. We took the bus halfway across the city to one of those pop-up amusement parks that always appear in the summer. We’d planned it for weeks and it was awesome at first. We had eaten ice creams in the sunshine, taken turns go-karting, and tried to win those giant cuddly teddy bears.