Lockdown seems to be going on forever – but it looks like libraries might be able to open from July 15 here in Scotland. I haven’t heard anything from my work yet but I could be back in less than three weeks!

Here are the displays I did in weeks 10 and 11 (about 2-3 weeks ago).

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Day #64

Royalty

Princes, princesses, kings, queens and emperors (is that stretching it a bit?)

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Day #65

Things you can wear

Turns out I have a lot more shoe related books than I thought!

• The Clue of the Velvet Mask – Carolyn Keene
• Party Frock and Ballet Shoes – Noel Streatfeild
• Lord of the Rings – J. R. R. Tolkien
• How to Walk in High Heels – Camilla Morton
• The Devil Wears Prada – Lauren Weisberger
• A Boot, a Hat Now Who Is That? – Nick Sharratt
• The Clue of the Tapping Heels and The Scarlet Slipper Mystery – Carolyn Keene
• Ballet Shoes for Anna – Noel Streatfeild
• The Clue in the Ancient Disguise and The Secret in the Old Lace – Carolyn Keene
• Fox’s Socks – Julia Donaldson

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Day #66

Graphic novels

Buffy, Angel and Charmed are mine, the rest are from Ewan’s collection.

I have to admit I’ve never read any of my graphic novels, the only one I’ve read is an Outlander one I borrowed from the library. I just can’t understand them! I puzzle over what’s happening, what box to read next and who all the faces are supposed to represent. It makes me feel entirely illiterate. (Yet I love comic strips like The Broons and Oor Willie and can follow them fine!)

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Day #67

War

I have some other books with war-time settings but they don’t have anything that suggests war in the titles.

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Day #68

It’s a mystery

Absolutely loads of Blytons here!

I’m not going to name each title as we’ll be here all week. I think I’ve got the whole Five Find-Outers series there and all the Barney Mysteries, plus Five Have a Mystery to Solve and Five Go to Mystery Moor, Secret Seven Mystery and The Mystery That Never Was.

There are several of Helen Moss’ Adventure Island series, and a couple of Malcolm Saville’s Lone Pines – Mystery at Witchend and Mystery Mine.

Plus The Hidden Valley Mystery by Helen Wells, The Red Flower Mystery by Juliet Marais Louw, A Mystery for Ninepence by Phyllis Gegan and Mystery and Mayhem by various authors.

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Day #69

Adventure

An un-inventive follow up, perhaps!

Lots more Blytons:

• Noddy Has an Adventure
• Five Fall Into Adventure
• The Adventure of the Secret Necklace
• Adventure of the Strange Ruby
• The Queer Adventure
• The Secret Seven Adventure
• The Valley of Adventure and all the others in the series
• Both of the Adventurous Four books
• Five Go Adventuring Again
• The Adventures of Mr Pink Whistle
• Adventures of the Wishing Chair

And the non Blytons are

The Gay Dolphin Adventure by Malcolm Saville and a few of the Adventure Islands by Helen Moss.

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Day #70

Puzzles

Mostly Where’s Wally books, but also one of the I SPY books by Walter Wick and Jean Marzollo (I absolutely love these and the rest are still at my parents’ house), and a big maze book.

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Day #71

What’s the time?

These are all loosely related to time, something that seems to be difficult to track in lockdown.

 

The Blytons:

• Bedtime Annual 1978
• Ten, Fifteen and Twenty Minute Tales
• Tales After Supper
• Tales at Bedtime

The non-Blytons

• Children of Time – Adrian Tchaikovsky
•  The Curious Case of the Clockwork Man – Mark Hodder
• Portal Through Time – Alice Henderson
• The Clockwork Sparrow – Katherine Woodfine
• A Nurse In Time – Evelyn Prentis

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Day #72

Gardens

Some of these are more tenuously linked to gardens than others:

• Apple Bough – Noel Streatfeild (Apple Bough is actually the name of the house, but it sounds garden-y and it probably has a garden possibly the one on the cover…)
• The Painted Garden – Noel Streatfeild
• Queen of the Daffodils – Leslie Laing (daffodils grow in gardens)
• The Tree of Seasons – Stephen Gately (so do trees, and yes that’s Stephen from Boyzone if you were wondering)
• Garden of Evil – Emma Harrison
• Tom’s Midnight Garden – Philippa Pearce
• The Door in the Tree – William Corlett

Plus of course my two house plants which have lasted the longest of any plants I’ve ever had. I even managed to re-pot them recently and they’ve grown massively since!

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Day #73

Holidays

We haven’t been able to go on holidays for a while now, so maybe reading about them would be fun – or it maybe just a cruel reminder of what we are missing?

The Famous Five go on holiday in a lot of their books but I stuck to ones whose titles give a suggestion of going somewhere (and which I had with dustjackets).

• Death’s Excellent Vacation – Charlaine Harris and Toni L. P. Kelner
• Five Go to Mystery Moor and Five Go Off to Camp – Enid Blyton
• Pea’s Book of Holidays – Susie Day
• Five Go Off in a Caravan – Enid Blyton
• How I Survived My Summer Vacation – Various authors
• Five Go Down to the Sea, Noddy At the Seaside and Five Go to Billycock Hill – Enid Blyton

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Day #74

Books about books, bookshops, libraries and book clubs

• The Bookshop Book – Jen Campbell
• A Book of Book Lists – Alex Johnson
• Censorship in Public Libraries in the United Kingdom during the Twentieth Century – Anthony Hugh Thompson (hardly a snappy title, but it has a chapter on Enid Blyton)
• Literary Listography – Lisa Nola
• The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society – Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
• Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops and More Weird Things – Jen Campbell

I also have a copy of Mr Lemoncello’s Library Olympics by Chris Grabenstein but despite searching everywhere I couldn’t find it until days after I did the display (just like working in a real library, then!).

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Day #75

Things you might (or might not) eat

Cheese, chips, pancakes, chocolate moose (maybe even the goose), yes, disgusting sandwiches and peas? No thanks.

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Day #76

An approximation of the weather since we’ve been allowed to meet outside

OK so we haven’t actually had snow but there has been a lot of rain and more than once there have been blankets required for sitting outside in the middle of the day (yes, in JUNE!)

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Day #77

Shirley Hughes

Mostly her Alfie series but also Dogger and some of her nursery collection about learning shapes and colours etc.