Rating the Famous Five titles

Posted on March 30, 2024 by Fiona

A recent comment on the blog has inadvertently inspired this post. A regular reader pointed out that I had written Five Have a Wonderful Time when I actually meant Five Fall Into Adventure. It wasn’t that I had confused the plots of the two books, but I had confused the titles. Wonderful Time, Fall Into Adventure along with Plenty of Fun are particularly vague titles which give no clue as to the plot of the stories and are the three I mix up the most.

And so, while walking to work one morning after the comment politely pointing out my error I started writing (in my head) a review of all the Famous Five book titles complete with star ratings. As is always the case my written review will never match the witty brilliance of what I can come up with when I have no pen and paper, but I’ll do my best here.

I’ll also try to come up with some alternative titles – though this is very hard and I don’t think I can actually come up with anything better!

Five on a Treasure Island

I think there are a few things that are important about a book title – besides being catchy. One is that it should give prospective readers an inkling of what the book will be about, and the other is that it should be sufficiently descriptive to differentiate it from other books in a series, or from the same author.

Five on a Treasure Island does both of these things. While the children visit Kirrin island several other times in the series it is only the first book where there is treasure to be found.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Five Go Adventuring Again

This is a rather vague title. Given that the Five have twenty adventures after Treasure Island, this could really apply to any of those!

I don’t have an issue remembering this one, for some reason. Perhaps as it’s only book two and I can confidently name the order of books 1-6, though the rest I wouldn’t remember in order.

Is there a better title? I’m not very good at coming up with titles but perhaps Five Have a Winter Adventure? Five Get Snowed In? Five Go Up Against a Thief? We are  a bit limited if we want to stick to the Five Go/Have/On/Get format. Otherwise how about Five and the Stolen Papers?

One thing we have to consider is that Blyton only intended the series to run for six books. Although this doesn’t help greatly with telling prospective readers what the book is about it would have helped with keeping the titles straight in our minds. Of course Blyton was such a phenomenon that by book two I’m sure children would have read Five Have a Mildly Interesting Time, Five Play Chess or Five Go to the Shops anyway.

With that in mind, Five Go Adventuring Again would score more highly had the series ended with book six. Thankfully for us it didn’t.

⭐⭐

Five Run Away Together

This is definitely less vague. Although the Five do go off all sorts of places together this is the only time they do it in secret, the only time they actually run away. (The Five all have loving parents and comfortable homes – what on earth could they be running away from? I imagine children crying on first seeing this title.)

This could have been called Five on Kirrin Island Again, really, as it is probably the book with the second-most amount of time spent on the island. However run away is more evocative of the plot.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Five Go to Smuggler’s Top

A perfect title. Enough said?

You know I can’t miss an opportunity to expound on my favourite book from the series. It’s a simple title, telling you they go somewhere called Smuggler’s Top. This title makes it perfectly clear which plot goes with it, and the mere mention of smugglers is sure to attract readers.

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Five Go Off in a Caravan

Our third Go title. It’s not terribly vague – although the Five stay in caravans in (let me think for a moment…) Wonderful Time they go to the caravans, not Go Off in them.

The only issue is that there are two caravans. Five Go Off in Caravans, admittedly, doesn’t have the same ring to it, but that’s probably because I’ve been reading the real title for over 30 years. Had the book come out as In Caravans I’m sure it would sound perfectly fine to me.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Five on Kirrin Island Again

While this doesn’t exactly describe the plot in detail, I’m struggling to think of anything else that would work. Five and the Underground Explosives? Five and the Undersea Tunnel? Five Save Kirrin Island?

As this was meant to be the final book of the series it probably worked quite well as it is – beginning with Treasure Island and ending on the island again. The Again also makes a pattern with Adventuring Again.

However, with ? more books featuring visits to Kirrin Island it isn’t the most unique title.

⭐⭐⭐⭐

Five Go Off to Camp

This one does half a good job at telling us what the book is about. The Five indeed go camping, or rather off to camp to fit in with the (varying) format of the other book titles.

However, they do camp in several books. If you’re only classifying camping as staying in tents then they do this in Get Into Trouble, Secret Trail, Billycock Hill and Together Again, though they sleep out in ruined rooms, caves, cellars, and quarries in at least four other books.

What are our other options then?

Five and the Spook Train? 

Five and the Black-Marketeers?

Five Go Off to Camp by a Haunted Railway?

I can’t think of anything that really fits the loose style for the titles (there are no Five and the Blank titles in the original run, but I’m sure there are some in the Claude Voiler continuations).

⭐⭐⭐

Five Get Into Trouble

Despite describing the plot of practically every single Famous Five book, I generally know which one this is. For some reason the cover of the Knight Paperback comes firmly into mind when I see the title and I know that the gates are at Owl’s Dene and therefore which story it is.

I suppose they didn’t want to call it Five Go to Owl’s Dene because that would give away too much as the Five work out where Dick has been taken.

Five Get Kidnapped? Short, snappy, and mostly accurate. Dick is certainly kidnapped. The others more or less do break into Owl’s Dene and are held against their will – but is that strictly kidnapping? (Research tells me that no, it is not as kidnapping involves carrying someone away – it would be false imprisonment however. But as we had Caravan and not Caravans earlier, then I’m sure the inaccuracy of kidnapping would be allowed.)

Five and the Black Bentley? KMF 102 is a fairly iconic and memorable part of the book after all. Or Five and the Escaped Prisoner? perhaps that gives too much away. I know – Five Go Off on Their Bikes! 

⭐

Five Fall Into Adventure

As I said at the top of this post, this is one of the titles I regularly mix up. The Five fall into adventure 21 times, this could be literally any book – it’s as if Blyton took the previous title and ran it through a thesaurus.

Five Tumble Into Peril
Five Plunge Into Intrigue
Five Get Into a Spot of Bother
Five Don’t Go Looking For Trouble.

You get the idea.

I try to remember that Timmy FALLS from the cliff into the sea near the end of the book, and picture the dust jacket image of that scene to help but I can’t always remember to do this.

This title neither tells you (specifically) what the book is about, nor does it really help you recall it afterwards.

So what could this one be called?

If we chose Five Get Kidnapped to replace Five Get Into Trouble, we could have Only Two of the Five Gets Kidnapped This Time?… Five Minus Two? Or perhaps Five On a Wild Goose Chase? If we didn’t have to have Five at the start we could call it Jo Saves the Day!

⭐

Five on a Hike Together

This one is just about descriptive enough. The Five do go on lots of explorations but this is their only walking holiday. It doesn’t tell you an awful lot about what to expect, but the alternatives like Five Go to Gloomy Water/Two Trees, Five on a Treasure Lake, Five Search for the Saucy Jane all give away a bit too much and would spoil some of the impact of the first reading of Two Trees. Gloomy Water. Saucy Jane. And Maggie knows. 

⭐⭐⭐

Do you agree, or disagree, with any of my ratings? Do you have any better ideas for possible titles? Let me know in the comments below!

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Monday #572

Posted on March 25, 2024 by Fiona

I nearly decided to have a week off from blogging this week, as I have come down with that feels like my hundredth lurgy of 2024. (It’s probably only the fourth or fifth, but it is only March!) However I will probably be taking next week off as it’s the school holidays and we will be away for a couple of nights. I just hope we finally get some better weather.

At risk of sounding like an intrepid explorer writing a diary that will be found years later alongside my body – Temperatures are regularly below freezing. Continual rain makes the outside world a miserable, inhospitable place. Snow is forecast tonight. I have forgotten what sunshine looks like.

OK so I’m not Scott and this is not the Antarctic, so I may be exaggerating a smidge. I just really need a bit of warmth and sunshine!

Rating the titles of the Famous Five books

and

Letters to Enid part 46

A comment on an recent post suggested the Sue Welford series Adventures with George and Timmy/Just George for Brodie after we finish the Famous Five. While looking for something to highlight here I happened across this interview with none other than Sue Welford!

An interview with Sue Welford – Author of the Just George Series

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Fan fic Friday: Bill and Allie’s great adventure chapter 5

Posted on March 22, 2024 by Fiona

Parts one, two, three and four for anyone who needs to catch up.

Jack nudged Philip sharply in the side, careful not to let Dinah see what he was doing, then made a show of scratching the side of his neck, trying to let the other boy know that there was a whiskered nose poking out the collar of his white shirt. 

Philip hastily dislodged the mouse from his collar, feeling its little paws scrabbling down his front as it looked for another comfortable spot, giving Dinah a winning smile as she looked at him suspiciously.

“Philip… you haven’t!” she hissed.

“Haven’t what?” he asked innocently.

“Mother told you that you weren’t to bring ANY pets with you today!”

“What makes you think,” began Philip. He was ready to remind her that sometimes Kiki just remembered old phrases and it absolutely didn’t mean that she had seen a mouse, when his new companion decided to betray him completely by darting out of his cuff to grab a large bread crumb off the table. As quickly as it had appeared it disappeared back in to eat its prize, but not before Dinah had seen it. “She didn’t say I couldn’t pick up any new ones today,” he called over his shoulder as he hurried from his seat, though he had spared a second to take his plate so he could refill it at the buffet.

Dinah glared at her brother and shuddered a little as she thought about the mouse that Philip must have picked up in the hall. What a beastly thing for him to do when he knew she didn’t like mice. 

“How tiresome,” she sighed, sitting back in her seat. “I suppose we shall have another mouse running about the house for the rest of the holiday.”

“At least it’s not a snake, or some sort of bug,” Lucy-Ann said in agreement. “But I don’t mind Philip’s mice friends. They are so sweet.”

“As long as Kiki doesn’t think that they are lunch,” Jack chuckled. He stroked Kiki where she rested on his shoulder.

“Keep that bird under control,” Bill said, appearing by the children and putting his hand on Jack’s shoulder. “Are you lot having a good time? Enough to eat?”

“Philip has just gone up for another plate of food,” Jack said jovially. “It really is a marvellous spread, Bill.”

“Everything is scrumptious,” Lucy-Ann agreed. “I can’t wait for the cake! Aunt Allie is very proud of it!”

“I vote that we give Philip a slice of the top tier,” said Dinah with a suspiciously bright smile.

“Be nice,” Bill warned her with a laugh, knowing that the top tier was actually made of cardboard decorated to look like cake, rationing not allowing for more than one tier even for a wedding.

Jack looked quizzically at them. “What’s wrong with the top layer? Did Aunt Allie mess up the recipe or something? You were just saying how pleased she was with it.”

Bill and Dinah both laughed, entirely unsurprised that Jack was oblivious. It wasn’t bird-related, after all. “It’s not cake,” Bill explained.

Jack leaned back in his chair, forcing it onto two legs as he strained for a better look. “It looks like cake,” he said at last.

Philip returned with his second plate laden with food. “You’ll split your head open, Mannering,” he barked, imitating their form-master, and even going as far as using his free hand to shove the back of Jack’s chair as the master regularly did.

The front legs of Jack’s chair slammed back down on the floor, making the cups and saucers of the table rattle. A few people looked around to discover the cause of the disturbance, and one or two at the same table began mopping up spilt tea and coffee.

Bill gave Philip a stern look, one that was mirrored by Mrs Cunningham. He then winked at his new wife, a wink that said he had it all in hand, and she returned to her conversation with Aunt Polly.

“Yes, Dinah,” he said carefully. “Make sure that Philip does get a slice from the top.”

“I was wondering when we’d get cake,” Philip said obliviously, thinking that his new mouse would probably enjoy some too.

“I’d be surprised if even you had room for cake after those enormous platefuls,” said Dinah, while Lucy-Ann sat quietly, her head turning back and forth like a spectator at a tennis match.

There was no real malice in their teasing, and she knew that Dinah was just trying to needle Philip for breaking the no pets rule. She wouldn’t cause a scene by tattling on him, but she would try to get even in other ways.

Still, Lucy-Ann didn’t like any tension between them, especially on such a happy day as this. She had been overjoyed, when, a few years earlier, Aunt Allie had taken her and Jack in, giving them a warm, loving home and a mother figure. Now she was to have a father figure too, and she couldn’t be happier. Just the thought of them all living together as a family in the next school holidays was enough to make her beam. 

Bill caught sight of her smiling face and grinned back at her. He was greatly fond of all the children, but Lucy-Ann in particular.

“The top tier is nice and light,” he said airily to Dinah before he moved on to speak to Anatoly, Johns and his other work colleagues, pausing only long enough to give Lucy-Ann a gentle squeeze on her shoulder.

“We’ll go and get the cake, once it’s cut,” Dinah said sweetly. “They should be ready to do that soon.”

It wasn’t long before there came the light sound of a fork hitting a glass to attract everyone’s attention and distract Philip from his thoughts of a third plate of food.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” Bill said in a carrying tone. “Allie and I are about to cut the cake.”

Several people got to their feet and moved for a better view. “Keeping the top later for the christening?” one of Bill’s work friends called out teasingly as Allie removed it and set it to one side. 

Bill sent his colleague a glare as Allie blushed, and then quickly smiled again as Jack had raised his camera to capture the cake-cutting.

Deciding it would be too difficult to cut the cardboard layer and have it look convincing, Dinah decided to bring the whole top tier to the table. She checked first that her mother didn’t intend to use it again, then grabbed the spare knife that had been laid out.

She took the false cake, which really did look rather convincing, even up close, and put it down on the table close to Philip. “Don’t even think about cutting yourself a slice,” she said. “You’d cut massive slabs and there would be none left!” She knew that a direct order like that would be far more effective than asking her brother to do something, and so began to gather up the used plates and cutlery from the table. “Does anyone want a cup of tea with the cake?” she asked as she headed off.

Lucy-Ann had already collected four slices of cake from Mrs Cunningham and was over by the tea urn. Dinah joined her and together they watched as Philip picked up the knife and attempted to cut the cake. They saw his confusion as the top bent in a little, but did not cut. 

Anatoly watched him try again and smothered a laugh. Johns reached out and, with one large hand, lifted the cake off the plate. “Hey,” Philip objected before Johns solemnly turned it upside down and put it back, showing off the hollow interior.

Everyone began to laugh. “Dinah! Where are you, you beast!” called Philip.

“I told you not to cut the cake,” Dinah reminded him, passing him a real piece of cake as a peace offering.  

“Well it’s not cake,” Philip said, his crossness tempered by the generous slice of real cake on his plate. 

“Look, Kiki’s even more confused than you were,” Lucy-Ann said, distracting from the disagreement. They all turned to watch the parrot who had fluttered off Jack’s shoulder to examine the hollow cardboard cake, eventually pushing it off the edge of the table in disgust.

“Naughty bird,” Jack said, tapping her on the beak before picking up the decorated piece of cardboard. Kiki rustled her wings. “Poor old Kiki, poor old Kiki.”

The rest of the reception went off without a hitch, and once all the guests had left Bill drove Allie home and Anatoly brought the children. Bill had already moved most of his belongings into Allie’s house, it was larger and they didn’t want to unnecessarily disrupt the children’s lives. All that was left was some larger pieces of furniture and the few things he had needed for the morning of the wedding. 

“Now children, I don’t want to hear any arguments this evening,” Aunt Allie warned as they tumbled indoors, Anatoly following more sedately behind. He was to stay over in order to drive the children to the train station in the morning to begin their journeys back to school. Luckily the boys’ and girls’ schools resumed on the same day this term. “Everything should already be packed and all that should be left out are your wash bags and uniforms for tomorrow.” 

They all nodded tiredly. Lucy-Ann stumbled a little as she moved towards the stairs but Anatoly caught her before she could fall over. She smiled and thanked him before heading upstairs with the others to bed.

“They are going to be hard to wake in the morning I bet,” Bill said with a shake of his head.

It wasn’t the traditional sort of wedding night, not with four children, one parrot, one mouse and one junior agent/surrogate nephew clattering around the house preparing for bed, but once the children, parrot and mouse safely off to school Bill and Allie would be off to France for their honeymoon.

Allie just hoped that Bill wouldn’t drag her into another adventure this time. Getting married had been adventure enough!

The end

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Reading the Famous Five to Brodie part 4

Posted on March 20, 2024 by Fiona

While in real-time we are on to Five on a Secret Trail, in blog-time it’s time for what Brodie said about books 6 & 7.

Five on Kirrin Island Again

We went straight onto this book the night after finishing Five Go Off in a Caravan. Gone are the days of reading anything else in between Famous Five books (which we only did once, actually, after the first one.)

My copy has the reprint dust jacket shown on the left, so unfortunately I couldn’t play ‘spot the error on the jacket’ with Brodie. Maybe someday I’ll show him a picture of it online and see what he says.

We were looking at the end papers before we started reading, and he said that the two other people must be “The Sticks, they must have escaped from prison!” The Sticks really must have made quite an impression on him!

When the Five can’t find Uncle Quentin on the island Brodie was certain that they would find him at the top of the tower. But he imagined the tower to be made of planks of wood painted green. It’s so cute how he keeps explaining to me that “I picture it when you’re reading it to me, so I see it in my head.”

The weeds around the dungeon stone took him a minute to understand, but he did get it in the end particularly that Uncle Quentin couldn’t get back out if it was shut.

His new theories became that that a) Uncle Quentin was wandering around the island the whole time and they just kept missing each other and b) that Uncle Quentin went down the well into the dungeon, and used a crane from a fishing boat to lower down his supplies.

For some reason this led us on to talking about escape rooms, which I had to explain to him. His response was “I’d get out easy. I’d just press on all the panels until I found a secret passage.” When telling this to Stef we had the brainwave that we should open an Enid Blyton themed escape room – in 2037, of course, when her copyrights expire.

Impressively he guessed that the man parachuted from a plane onto the island, and even more so he caught the mistake about the room being whole/fallen in/whole again. I feel SO vindicated in having listed my nitpicks in reviews, knowing that even a six year old (so well under the cut of of 12 that Blyton had for disregarding criticism) could spot some of them!

To balance things out he also believed that George would easily let Timmy stay with Quentin, and then that Quentin would let her stay with him. So he’s about 50/50 with his responses.

The next night he asked “When is the adventure going to begin?” Clearly this one’s more of a slow burner.

The night after that he was home late after a birthday party, and in bed late, so we skipped story time. But he woke up after half an hour having had a bad dream. So we talked about what nice dream he could have – and we settled on the Famous Five looking for treasure.

Either he just imagined a story before he fell asleep, or he really did have a Famous Five dream as he told me it all he next morning on the way to school. I did my best to accurately type it up when I got home half an hour later:

Anne and George were at the train station when Julian and Dick arrived “HI JULIAN, HI DICK!” they shouted, (and then my brain repeated that bit). They took the pony cart to Kirrin Cottage and one of them said “Maybe there’s treasure under our beds!” Aunt Fanny laughed and said “Maybe there is!”… (then there was something about going on a pirate ship to the island, but they came back), and Timmy sniffed around under the stairs and then the stairs lifted up and there was a deep, deep hole under there! Julian went down first, and there were iron staples for his feet, but then there were beams (that’s another word for staples, Mummy), and he kept going down, but then the beams ran out and he had to come up and get a rope. So we went down again but when he got near the bottom there wasn’t enough air. So they went to a scuba shop and bought… (I said “tanks of air”) Yes, tanks of air, but they sold all the swimming stuff, it was a trick you see. Then they went back to the cottage but I lost the dream and decided to dream about dragons…

The next time we read he was still annoyed by the mistake of the room with a roof. He got cross and wanted me to change what I read to a fallen-in room so it was right.

When George got into the undersea tunnel he got a bit scared and needed me to put my arm around him. And at the end of the chapter he really really begged for more because he needed to know what happened, but we’d already done four chapters so that was it.

He thought that Uncle Quentin should give the men the book to stop them from blowing up the island.

When “something” gets in through the window and comes upstairs to jump on Julian’s bed he shouted “It’s Timmy!” (Correct, one point). “He must have got in the boat and come back.” (Ummm no… no points there )

As Stef said: Timmy is good, but he’s not that good.

I later mentioned this to Ewan and his response was that maybe a dog could lean over the side and paddle with his paws – so what hope has Brodie got?

Anyway, sticking with Timmy, Brodie had to think about it for a minute but he figured Timmy was taking them to the quarry and quickly from that figured the undersea tunnel connected up to there.

He did think that two bad men were the same as from the first book though (they are pretty generic bad guys to be fair), and that the reason they didn’t come out at the quarry is that they were still trying to blow up the island.

This became his favourite book in the series (so far the most recent one has always been his favourite) and we talked about how this one was meant to be the last one but the fans begged for more. I explained that 21 was last as Blyton wasn’t so well and had trouble remembering things then.

“Like the room with a roof or no roof?”

He just couldn’t let that drop! That led to me explaining her whole “cinema screen” process for writing which he found pretty interesting.

He then said “We’ll start the next one tomorrow night… but what will we read after we’ve finished them all?” 

Around the time we were reading this we visited St Andrews and we spotted these iron staples in the wall. He pretended to be one of the Famous Five, having an adventure.

“If we lived in that house I’d pretend to be the Famous Five all the time and I’d go up and down those staples every day.”

He’d be Julian of course and he made me George (having already accused me yesterday of having a temper like George because I’d told him off for jumping on our bed) and Ewan gets to be Dick. He wasn’t bothered about not having an Anne, but he was bothered about Timmy who we decided would have to be played by a toy from home.

Five Go Off to Camp

Again we were straight on to the next book the next night. He was very excited when he realised they were going camping.

At the end of chapter two when they all fall asleep he said “I bet when they wake up in the morning they won’t remember they’re on holiday.” I love how he’s picked up on that little detail – one of them does it in practically every book!

And indeed Julian did not disappoint us:

He sat up and wondered where he was and who was calling. Of course! He was in his tent with Dick—they were camping on the moors.

While he said didn’t know what it was, he didn’t think that Anne was sitting on a volcano. After it turned out to be a train he admitted that he thought it might have been a geyser.

anne, five go off to camp

One evening he was absolutely begging and begging for more chapters because he wanted, had, to know if the boys went and if they saw a spook train. But, he added “someone must be driving it because ghosts. Aren’t. Real.”

I ran into a real Scottish problem here, as Jock had to have a Scottish accent. A) he’s called Jock and B) he has a Scottish accent on the cassette tape I had as a child. You may wonder what the problem was, as being Scottish, you’d think I could do a Scottish accent nae bathir.

That literally is the problem. I have a Scottish accent. So the Five, despite me trying to be a little less broad and a little more neutral of voice, still sound pretty Scottish. So how could I make Jock stand out as actually Scottish? By doing an extra-Scottish accent. A real och aye the noo one. Which then I had to replicate in softer tones for Mrs Andrews and harsher ones for Mr Andrews.

At one point Anne goes to check their tents are “untouched” when they get back. “I bet they’re been touched,” said Brodie. And also “I think the spook trains going to take them away and when they get off they’ll be in ghost land.” He was a bit scared when the shepherd was talking about the spook trains.

Funnily he (for a while at least) he was saying “jumping jiminies” when anything was surprising.

He suggested that the spook train had broken down the wall between the tunnels and gone in there – which is really not that far off the solution.

I had to explain how they could walk over the tunnel because he was picturing a curved tunnel above ground level – I blame the toy train sets with tunnels like that (especially because I have a hard time not picturing the same thing!)

Stef asked me if I had to explain why they could walk on the rails, to which the answer was no, he didn’t ask me about that. I did have to explain about the niches in the side for workers, though.

Other Famous Five things he said that evening:

“Mummy, do you love books or do you hate books?”

Obviously I said I love them.

“But you haven’t read all the ones on your shelves have you!?”

Before I could defend myself he started talking again.

“Do you know my favourite books?… CHAPTER BOOKS. Because I love the Famous Five… why are they called the Famous Five? Are they famous… why Five though?”

I asked how many of them were there and he ran off to get a book to count the characters. He brought through Caravan.

“Have we read this one before? Oh good, I didn’t want to spoil it for myself.” He did count the Five as being five but argued that Timmy shouldn’t count as he’s a dog…

His next story idea was that someone had “programmed the spook train with coordinates to run to the yard and back with no-one driving it.” 

He asked why Anne didn’t fall down the vent on her way back across the tunnel top – well, she stayed on the path when George had left it to investigate the lump, but it’s a good question, as George ripped up a load of heather so you’d think Anne might have at least noticed it on her way back.

Camp was then his favourite book, but very closely followed by “The one with the tower where he smashes the windows at the end.”

His favourite part was that the men were playing a trick making everyone think it was a spook train when it was just an ordinary train.

Again he asked “When we’ve finished the Famous Five what are we going to read next???” 

 

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Monday #571

Posted on March 18, 2024 by Fiona

I briefly looked for something non-weather related to say this week but it’s difficult to find something Blytonian-related that isn’t already going into one of my upcoming posts.

So I’ll tell you that it’s actually sunny right now. Not only that but it’s above 5 degrees. I’m sure this is just a brief respite before yet more heavy rain, but I’ll take it while it lasts.

Reading the Famous Five to Brodie part 4

and

Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure part 5

The Five experience the strange wailing noise along with blue, green and white lights floating in the sky outside the old cottage.

Dick felt the roots of his hair pricking. He leapt off the heather-bed and ran to the window. ‘Quick! Come and look at this!’ he cried. ‘What is it?’

They all crowded to the window, Timmy barking now as loudly as he could. In silence the others gazed at a very strange sight.

Difficult to convey blue and green lights in black-and-white, though. I showed Brodie this before I read out the next line and he was puzzled.

“Huh?… Snow?”

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Fan fic Friday: Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure chapter 4

Posted on March 15, 2024 by Fiona

In case you missed them:

Chapter one
Chapter two
Chapter three

It was a short and simple ceremony, but Bill wasn’t sure he would remember all of it. His hand shook slightly as he guided the ring onto Allie’s finger, but she seemed to be in control as she pushed his ring over his knuckle. 

As the registrar wound up, saying that they were now man and wife and that Bill could now kiss the bride, Kiki joined in with “Kiss the bride. Kiss the bird. God save the King!” at the top of her lungs before Jack could stop her. 

Bill paused, raised an eyebrow and said dryly, “You know, Kiki, old girl, I will certainly agree to God Save the King, and I certainly am going to kiss the bride, but I cannot be persuaded to kiss the bird!” 

The children giggled, even Jack who was bright red at Kiki’s interruption. There were a few laughs from the congregation. Bill looked at Allie and with a smile, added, “May I now kiss the bride?”

“Only as long as you keep to kissing the bride and not the bird,” teased Allie gently as he pulled her close for a kiss. Bill chuckled and gently kissed Allie as everyone else laughed at the exchange and clapped. 

Anatoly took over the photography from this point as Philip and Jack slipped out of the room to go and decorate the car with the tin cans and the signs they had made. The guests then began to make their way out of the registry office and down to the steps to shake confetti over Bill and Allie as they made their way to the car.

“I’ll get you two for this later,” Bill called warningly to Philip and Jack who were doubled over laughing at the look on his face. 

“Anatoly was in on it as well!” Jack called back as Bill shook a menacing fist, obviously trying to spread the blame around.

“Traitor!” Anatoly said, taking the camera from around his neck and, in Jack’s opinion, swinging it far too recklessly on its strap in retaliation. 

“Oi! Be careful with that!” Jack shouted as Anatoly pretended to almost drop his precious camera. 

“You’re in enough trouble as it is without destroying our wedding photos,” Bill reminded him, eyebrows raised. 

Anatoly smoothly handed the camera to Jack and then cuffed him on the ear while the boy’s hands were busy examining it for damage. 

“Shall we go before anyone else gets into trouble?” Allie asked, smothering a laugh. 

“Girls?” Bill looked at Dinah and Lucy-Ann, who although smiling at the boys’ antics, were keeping themselves apart from any of their nonsense. “There’s nothing you’d like to tell me, is there? No surprises lurking in the car or at the reception?”

“Of course not, Bill,” they chorused, the picture of innocence. He looked at them suspiciously and then shrugged. Bill knew that whatever the girls may have planned, it would be less embarrassing than the boys’ decorating of the car. He held the passenger door open for Allie before he got in himself, turned the key in the ignition, and waved to everyone as he drove off. 

Anatoly used Allie’s car to transport the children, Kiki and Allie’s aunt and uncle to the reception in the village hall, as she had insisted she was fine to drive herself and the girls to the registry office. Bill had paid a local catering company to set up and do the food and the wedding cake. It was worth the money so that Allie hadn’t had to make it all herself with her daily help. 

As they pulled up, Bill spotted the sign that the girls must have put up on the front of the hall. It was a nice sign, if not slightly embarrassing to have their union declared to everyone in the village. The sign read “Congratulations, Bill and Allie on your wedding!”.

Allie sighed and laughed, “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised but at least it doesn’t make a noise!” 

Bill grunted and shook his head a little, and offered up the idea, “It’s the thought that counts?” 

Allie nodded and took his hand. “Indeed, and I think it just goes to show how fond they are of both of us that they want to show off that we have gotten married,” she said softly. “And they are just excited. Let them have their moment and don’t be so grumpy,” she teased. 

Bill lifted her hand to his lips and planted a kiss on the back of it. “You’re right of course,” he agreed. “I’m just not used to having things so out in the open. Come on then Allie, let’s go and make sure everything is how we want it before the hoards arrive!” 

The catering company had done a lovely job, and so there was little for them to do in the hall, but Allie went around checking everything nonetheless. They had only had a brief head start on the other guests, and soon everyone else was arriving. Most of the guests had walked the short distance over, but Anatoly took the car back to collect Bill’s older cousin and his wife.

“Is that everyone here?” Bill asked, doing a headcount after Anatoly’s passengers were inside, everyone having congratulated him and Allie again as they arrived.

“If there was anyone else they have missed their chance,” he said with a shrug.

Bill grinned. Including he and Allie there were 21 people and one bird in the hall. A small wedding by anyone’s standards but just the right number for them. Allie’s friends had come on their own – a girl’s night out they were calling it – and his colleagues had also come alone, so the numbers were fairly even for dancing later. 

In the meantime, the food was waiting. Bill cleared his throat noisily. “Thanks for coming, everyone. I know that at least some of you came mostly on the promise of food,” here he gave a raised eyebrow in the direction of his work colleagues, “so I declare the wedding breakfast open!”

“Hooray, I’m starved,” said Philip, heading straight for the plates at the end of the table before Aunt Polly caught his arm. 

“Let the bride and groom fill their plates first,” she scolded.

Despite the delay Philip still managed to be near the start of the queue. After piling his plate high with at least two of everything on offer he joined Jack, Dinah and Lucy-Ann at the end of one of the tables which formed three sides of an open square. Bill and Allie were in the middle of the top table but had said they weren’t going to fuss about seating arrangements, leaving it a free-for-all. 

After a minute Anatoly dropped into the chair beside him, but immediately turned towards Johns. Philip rolled his eyes. Once upon a time he and the others had been quite friendly with Anatoly but, especially if anyone else was around, they were apparently beneath him now. 

“Did Bill not eat this morning, or something?” he heard Anatoly ask his colleagues. “Only it is not breakfast-time, and this,” he indicated his plate of sandwiches and sausage rolls, “is not breakfast food.”

Johns and the other agents guffawed at the question.

“Not been to many weddings?” Johns asked, trying to keep a straight face.

“What?” Anatoly demanded. “What did I say?”

“It’s always a wedding breakfast,” Bentley explained. “Even if it’s at night. That’s just what they call it. Something to do with the bride and groom fasting before the wedding once upon a time, then breaking that fast with a meal after.”

Anatoly snorted. “People should just call things what they are.”

“But where’s the fun in that?” Thompson asked with a grin. This wasn’t the first time they’d had to educate Anatoly in the English language, despite him having grown up in London.

Dinah and Lucy-Ann were talking as they ate, but the boys were listening into the conversation next to them, wondering if they could glean any information on Anatoly’s high and mighty airs and graces now he was working less and less with Bill. Kiki was on the table, taking the odd grape or piece of fruit from the children’s plates and flexing her crown occasionally when someone ate something she wanted. 

“Three blind mice,” she said conversationally.

“I thought she’d forgotten that one,” said Dinah. “I don’t think she’s said it since you had that mouse a few summers ago.”

To be continued…

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Reading the Famous Five to Brodie part 3

Posted on March 13, 2024 by Fiona

Part one covered Five On a Treasure Island, and then part two was Five Go Adventuring Again and Five Run Away Together.

Five Go to Smuggler’s Top

This is, of course, my absolute favourite so I was really really hoping he would like it.

We began with this cracker:

“Uh oh. I don’t think Sooty should come to Kirrin cottage. He might find out their secrets, like the secret passage to Kirrin Farm!”

Then he was surprised by Soper’s illustration of Aunt Fanny (despite her being shown in at least one earlier book). He pictured her looking like Ms Frizzle from the Magic School Bus Rides Again (without the lizard, probably). It seems he’s like me, in that his brain gives him a picture of a person in a book and then he’s stuck with it. I usually get someone with the same name, he’s just got someone with the same initial.

He was tricked by George when she pretend to go off to Smuggler’s Top without Timmy, but did think George was up to something – planning to catch a smuggler not sneaking Timmy with them. He did guess he was who they were picking up when the car stopped, though. “They’ll have to hide him somewhere outside!” 

He had questions about the illustration and the strange-looking car. I had to remind him this book is very old, which somehow led to a long discussion about people getting TVs for the coronation.

Then I had to try to describe a marsh to him, because he said “I know what marsh is, it’s what you get when you burn wood…” He meant ash. I think in the end I had to look up images of marshes on my phone so he understood.

After a bit of prompting he identified the secret passage in the illustration (why did they have to put so many illustrations way ahead of the matching text? Brodie gets very annoyed by this and keeps pointing it out when he notices!)

New words were learned, namely precipice and summit.

When Sooty says “ready?” to the Five, Brodie answered with an emphatic “YES”. His solution would be keeping Timmy in the cupboard the whole time. When Sooty’s door buzzed he gasped and said “It’s the step father!!” He thought that Mr Lenoir sounded very much like Uncle Quentin.

We went over precipice, summit and catacombs again later as he had forgotten what they meant. “Why are there so many complicated words in this book?” he asked, obviously not knowing that Blyton was criticized for her simple language.

I asked him and he said he would trust Sooty and would follow him into the catacombs, the rope ladder would be fine because he can climb the ladder into the loft and that’s quite high. Thinking ahead, as soon as they climbed back into Marybelle’s room he said “What about the furniture? They’ll have to move it back!”

I regularly ask him questions to see what he’s thinking –

Who’s signalling from the tower? “It must be Block!” (He was right of course, but I’m not sure if he worked it out or it was a wild guess.)

Where did the man go in Block’s room? “Out the window! Or he’s a magician, and he disappeared in a flash. I know, maybe he’s under the bed!… Or maybe there IS a secret passage in Block’s room.” Honestly, I can’t keep up with him sometimes!

When smugglers were coming across the marsh he had this epiphany – “That’s why it’s called Smuggler’s Top! Because there are smugglers!”

One night we ended on the cliffhanger of Timmy barking while Mr Lenoir is in the school room, he was not happy. (He pretty much always begs for one more chapter but on cliffhangers it’s even more desperate.)

The next night he was full of concern that the Five would get into trouble for having Timmy there. We had a long conversation about how lying is wrong and that’s why the Five don’t say that Timmy is with Alf. He thought that Aunt Fanny and Uncle Quentin would be worrying about where Timmy was – this is a good point, I can only assume they think he is with Alf/James.

He later asked me if we could get up in the middle of the night some time and look out the window because that would be like the Famous Five. He thought we might see a robber sneaking into our garden… The only thing we’d see in our garden at night is the fox, or at least I hope so.

He found it very tense when George was in Mr Lenoir’s study, shouting “Get out! Get out! George!! Get out!!” And “I think I know what’s going on now… it’s getting to the exciting part because we’re near the end.”

Sometimes he’s astute and at other times completely incomprehensible – “I think there’s some sort of mechanism. He (Block) is a robot. There’s some sort of chain reaction going on.”

For a while he was convinced that Uncle Quentin and Sooty were inside the window box, and, touchingly, he was concerned that it was a bit small for two people. Eventually he twigged that there was a secret passage there too.

He did guess that Block was screwing the lid back down, though. He was all for them waking the whole house that evening and it took a bit of explaining about them not trusting Mr Lenoir (as always though I spend ages explaining and then two paragraphs later Julian more succinctly says the same things anyway). He then wanted them to tell Sarah and we had a discussion about Mr Lenoir being in charge of the house and his staff wouldn’t keep secrets from him.

“Maybe Mr Lenoir isn’t on the bottom of things.”

Then there was a bit of an argument because he agreed with Julian about not letting the girls go to Mr Barling’s because to have an adventure you had to be strong and stay awake all night (there were other things on that list that I’ve forgotten) and girls aren’t as strong as boys… honestly the rubbish he picks up from adverts and TV shows and kids at school it makes me furious. But he did agree that George was very brave and capable.

After we finished I asked the usual questions. It was his favourite book so far and all of it was his favourite part – except maybe the end because it wasn’t so exciting after the adventure ended.

Five Go Off in a Caravan

 

The night after we finished Smuggler’s Top he climbed up on the back of the sofa and took this one off the shelf himself, as a not so subtle hint that he wanted to start it. But then he thought he had picked the wrong one.

“No not this one, it doesn’t have a caravan on the front!”

I have the reprint dust jacket where they are underground – but it does have a bit of caravan on the spine.

He was sad that Sooty wasn’t in it because he liked Sooty. He said “Where’s Sooty?” in real surprise, and “I thought he’d be there. Who’s with them, then?”

About the elephant pulling a caravan he said “That’s not right!”

He didn’t know what a procession was – his guess was “a camping competition.”

Mrs Kirrin asking Anne if she’s been standing on her head because her hair is a mess prompted two whole minutes of hysterical laughter from him

He said he would choose the green caravan because green is his favourite colour. Which brings me to the realisation that I picture the caravans as white/cream, like today’s caravans, and not red or green.

He would also help with the chores, “I’d wash the dishes because I like getting my hands wet.” (He does actually like doing dishes, but they don’t usually get very clean, and more than just his hands get very wet.)

He thought Anne breaking the egg outside the cup was funny, that sitting outside the caravan was strange and that having to sit there guiding the horse would be boring. When George said she likes adventures he said “So do I. But I don’t know what adventurous thing they can find in the hills.”

One night  he had the book and pretended to read to me first but basically summarised what had happened earlier.

“And the caravans went away, pulled by the elephant. The boy who did cartwheels and his angry dad who said “Go and make me a coffee”.”

When Merran hills came into view he cried “Yessss! Now the adventure begins!” He thought Pongo was hilarious, wearing clothes, shaking paws, particularly with Timmy’s tail. This led to a long discussion over why you don’t see animals in circuses any more (though I just discovered that they have only just been banned in the UK in 2020).

Inspired by the Five Brodie had a camping session in the house during the school holidays. (We were under severe weather warnings so we couldn’t go anywhere!)

He packed a whole suitcase for this, and told me that I had to play “Mother” to help him.  Obviously I didn’t help enough as his case contained toothbrush, toothpaste, t-shirts, trousers, pyjamas, bottled water, marshmallows, sticks to toast them on, a toy camera and his tablet to play white noise at night. No underwear or torches though.  He then played as Anne making the food for camping.

That night he had a really quite intelligent idea –

“I know! They’re smugglers! There must be a trench under the ledge and there’s treasure they’ve smuggled there! That’s what the cart was all about!”

Then, after a pause.

“If I’m right then I’ve just spoiled the book for myself.”

I refused to tell him if he was right or not, though I did have to laugh at how serious he was about potentially spoiling the book for himself.

Further clever thinking led him to say that they shouldn’t stop and examine the treasure in the hill “because Tiger Dan and Lou the acrobat might come down behind them.” 

(Mind you, he also thought that the hollow for the caravans had stone walls and a roof so he’s not got a 100% success rate with the intelligent comments.)

He learned to say acrobat properly that night. Until then it came out as actorbat.

There was lots of laughter at Nobby saying “Yes, Ma,” to Anne, and at Pongo licking the honey from the jar. He asked “How much is he going to eat??” about the inspector with the bread and honey.

Then, after I read the last line of the book, he burst into tears because they were going home. Apparently it’s not a happy ending because they went home. But Caravan is now his favourite story, even more than Smuggler’s Top.

“How many more adventures can they have???” he asked in disbelief.

Well 16 actually…

 

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Monday #570

Posted on March 11, 2024 by Fiona

Halfway between meteorological spring and astronomical spring and… it’s still cold! (Mind you, if I didn’t have the weather to complain about I’m not sure what I’d find to say every Monday.)

Things I am looking forward to in spring:

Sunshine and warmth
Wearing trainers instead of boots
Flowers/leaves/general greenery instead of bare branches

Things I am not looking forward to:
Being too hot
Getting wet feet because it still rains in spring (and summer…)
Wasps

Reading the Famous Five to Brodie part 3

and

Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure part 4

As it was Mother’s Day in the UK yesterday (I got more Lego!) I thought we should revisit my post about Blyton’s mothers. (Image is unrelated apart from the fact it mentions mother’s day!)

Blyton’s Mothers

 

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Fan fic Friday: Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure chapter 3

Posted on March 8, 2024 by Fiona

In case you missed them:

Chapter one
Chapter two

Soon it was time for the groom and his best man to head over to the registry office. On Bill’s request, Anatoly had borrowed a slightly more posh service car to use as the wedding vehicle. It didn’t matter that they weren’t going very far for the reception. Bill wanted everything to be as near perfect as possible for Allie. 

Away from Bill’s prying eyes Anatoly knew that Jack and Philip had a “Just Married” sign for the back window, and tins cans on string to tie to the bumper for after the ceremony. Anatoly had caught them whispering about it during the brief wedding rehearsal the week before. “I heard nothing,” he had said as they spotted him. “What you two do to get into trouble is your own problem.” However he had been grinning as he spoke.

They arrived at the registry office and Bill had a cigarette pressed onto him by Anatoly before they went in, meaning they got to see some of the guests arriving. A few of Bill’s SIS colleagues appeared and shook his hand. Bill’s only relatives, a few distant cousins, turned up and so did some of Allie’s friends, escorted on foot from the nearby station by Jack and Philip. 

Aunt Polly then appeared and shook Bill’s hand warmly. “I always hoped things would work out for you both,” she said kindly before moving on to talk to Jack and Philip. Behind her, rather bemused by everything around him, was Uncle Jocelyn. His round-shouldered, wild-haired, bespectacled stare let everyone know that he wasn’t really with them, but rather miles away with whatever he was working on and his precious papers.

Polly waited for him to catch her up and then began steering him around people and into the right room by gentle pressure on his arm. 

“I’m surprised that Aunt Polly managed to pry Uncle Jocelyn out of his study for today,” Philip said to Jack after the couple had moved out of earshot.

“She wouldn’t have, I’m sure, if they had still been at Craggy Tops,” Jack replied.

“Long way to come, too,” Philip said thoughtfully. “I don’t think that they ever travelled so far back when they lived there. I can only imagine the look on Jo-Jo’s face if he’d had to drive them all that way in the rattly old car.”

They both paused for a moment, thinking about Jo-Jo, the servant, odd-job man, driver, and secret forger who had worked for Aunt Polly at Craggy Tops. It was all well and good to joke about Jo-Jo’s temper three years after his arrest, but they still remembered all too clearly the moment he had dropped his mask of foolishness and had revealed himself to be as cold and calculating as he was clever. Having broken up the forging gang during their first summer together, none of the four children liked to think of what Jo-Jo might do to them should they cross paths again. 

“They’re much better off now, aren’t they?” Jack said finally.

“Well, Uncle Jocelyn complains constantly about having had to leave Craggy Tops, but I think Aunt Polly has a much easier time of it now, especially with her poor health. She’s got hot and cold running water, and electricity for a start.”

Jack had only spent a few weeks at Craggy Tops before the undersea explosions set off by the desperate gang had ruptured the well on the mainland and ruined the house’s only water supply. But he remembered well having to fetch water in buckets, trimming the wicks on the paraffin lamps, collecting firewood and all the other jobs which were rather laborious given the primitive conditions found in such a desolate location. It hadn’t bothered the children much at the time, but he could imagine how draining it would have been for increasingly elderly Aunt Polly year after year. 

“And your uncle can still write his book from the new house,” he said.

Philip laughed. “He’s been writing that all his life, or so it seems. I don’t know if he’ll ever finish it.”

Jack coughed and Kiki imitated him, making people close to them laugh in bemusement and awe. Jack gave Kiki a little warning tap on the beak when she flapped her wings and puffed her throat. “Steady on, old thing. You need to behave today.”

“Steady on, old thing, behave! Behave! Steady, behave!” Kiki repeated, hopping from foot to foot on Jack’s shoulder.

“Exactly,” Jack said firmly. “Behave.”

Before long they were ushered inside as the registrar’s room, and the last guests found their seats as the clock moved closer to 10.30 and Allie’s scheduled arrival.

Bill and Anatoly went to the front of the room, nodding to the registrar, before Bill turned to Anatoly and asked, “You still have the rings don’t you?” 

Anatoly looked shocked. “You never gave them to me…” he started but at the look on Bill’s face, which had suddenly drained of all blood, he hastily laughed and pulled out the box from his pocket. “I did, however, remember to pick them up!” he finished off and grinned sheepishly. 

“Don’t you start,” Bill warned him as everyone in the room heard a car pull up outside. Bill slid one finger around his suddenly tight collar, glanced warningly at Anatoly to discourage him from any further tricks as the car doors slammed outside and footsteps could be heard heading towards the room they were in. 

There was a sudden, “God save the King!” squawk from Kiki in the hallway, which was hastily silenced by Jack who was waiting outside the doors to take pictures of Allie being walked down the aisle by Philip. 

The registrar cleared his throat and the pianist in the corner started the wedding march. Jack opened the door, and hurried up the aisle as Dinah and Lucy-Ann came through the doors ahead of Philip and Allie. 

The girls looked grand in their dresses with a simple bunch of flowers each, and their hair done nicely. Bill moved forward and kissed them each on the cheek as they got to the front of the room. He straightened up and looked back down the aisle as Jack hurried half way back and started snapping pictures. One of Allie’s friends from the village pulled him out of the way as Philip and Allie approached them so Bill could see Allie for the first time. 

Bill found that his breath caught in his chest as he laid eyes on Allie. She looked divine as she walked down the aisle in her light blue dress, Philip escorting her. She smiled shyly at Bill as she drew level with him. Bill smiled widely at them both and shook Philip’s hand before Allie and Bill both turned to the registrar. 

“All be seated,” he said. “We are gathered here today to witness the marriage of William Patrick Cunningham and Alison Elizabeth Mannering…”

To be continued.

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February 2024 round up

Posted on March 6, 2024 by Fiona

 

What I have read

I felt like I had a slow start to reading in February – and I definitely did a lot of listening to old favourites. But then I must have read a lot as I ended on 17 books!

What I have read:

  • Five Go Down to the Sea
  • The Secret Book Club – Shauna Robinson
  • A Second Chance (Chronicles of St Mary’s #3) – Jodi Taylor
  • Tilly and the Map of Stories (Pages & Co #3) – Anna James
  • A Trail Through Time (Chronicles of St Mary’s #4) – Jodi Taylor
  • The Library Girls of the East End – Patricia McBride
  • No Time Like the Past (Chronicles of St Mary’s #5) – Jodi Taylor
  • Five Go to Mystery Moor 
  • What Could Possibly Go Wrong? (Chronicles of St Mary’s #6) – Jodi Taylor
  • Happily Ever After for the Cornish Midwife (Cornish Midwife #8)
  • The Vintage Guide to Love and Romance – Kirsty Greenwood
  • A Demon’s Guide to Wooing a Witch (Glimmer Falls #2) – Sarah Hawley
  • James Herriot’s Animal Storybook – James Herriot
  • We Are the Baby-Sitters Club: Essays and Artwork from Grown Up Readers – Marisa Crawford
  • The Nesting – C J Cooke
  • Five Have Plenty of Fun
  • Lies, Damned Lies, and History (Chronicles of St Mary’s #7) – Jodi Taylor

And I’m still working on:

  • Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
  • How to Date Your Dragon (Mystic Bayou #1) – Molly Harper
  • The Island of Adventure
  • Boy of Chaotic Making (Whimbrel House #3) – Charlie N Holmberg

What I have watched

  • I’ve still been watching Call the Midwife Series 13, as well as ER season 5 and 6 and I finally finished Time Traveller’s Wife. Such a shame there won’t be a series two. I might actually have to read the book now (or maybe watch the movie, to see what happened next.)
  • Tuesday nights we have still been watching season two of And Just Like That (the Sex and the City sequel) even though it’s so bad. The terrible knitwear in every episode has us shouting at the screen.
  • Stef and I watched the new Famous Five episode (reviews here and here) and then with Brodie we watched a couple of episodes of the 90s series (review to follow.) We also watched Miss Congeniality.

What I have done

  • We went to see The Rock Orchestra by Candlelight and it was amazing. They played loads of songs that we loved and they were just so good.
  • Then Stef arrived for a visit! Aside from watching the Famous Five we took Brodie to the park to make patrins, we went to Fife Zoo, and the V&A. Then we took ourselves off to St Andrews for the weekend. We had tickets for a book event at Topping and Co to see Sara Sheridan, but we also made time to get our feet wet (accidentally) in the extremely high tide as it washed over the harbour path.
  • I built another Harry Potter Hogwarts set which Brodie immediately claimed to play with – as they are modular you can mix and match the ‘rooms’ so we made quite a good set-up combining the Room of Requirement and the Battle of Hogwarts courtyard. I then bought myself a smaller set – the Polyjuice Potion bathroom and we added that in too. And then I bought the Herbology Classroom which I’ve been after for ages.
  • We went back to St Andrews again to go to the aquarium and visit the castle.
  • I helped my parents with clearing out their loft and claimed a huge box of my Babysitters Club books.

What I bought

I treated myself to another copy of Splendid Notes for Every Occasion as I found it in a charity shop for £2. I say another as I already have it, and the rest of the set. They’re too  nice to actually use however, but now I have a second set maybe I will actually use it!

How was your February?

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Monday #569

Posted on March 4, 2024 by Fiona

First post of March already! So far March has remained fairly chilly, but there’s still time for it to get warmer – she says hopefully. We are in the period where it is spring but also is not spring, as it is past March 1st (meteorological spring) but we haven’t reached March 20th (astronomical spring). No wonder the weather doesn’t know what it’s doing.

February round up

and

Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure part 3

As I don’t have a product of the week (or a drink of the week) header I’m going to ask a question this week. Who has tried (or even heard of) Kirrin Island Ale?

Coming from a micro-brewery in Swanage it apparently tastes of Exotic tropical fruits, brought about by plenty of New Zealand hops, on a sweet soft golden malt. 

I won’t be trying it as no matter what flavours are promised all ales/beers taste just taste the same to me and I can’t stand them.

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Fan fic Friday: Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure chapter 2

Posted on March 1, 2024 by Fiona

Chapter one went up last week.

They had pulled together their wedding day in a few short weeks. Bill had a smart suit already and he had sent Allie into town to buy herself a new dress. Being a second wedding she had opted not to wear white but he hadn’t seen what she had picked yet.

The invites had been sent out, and the marriage licence had been obtained. The speed of things had been necessitated by the fact that the children were to return to school in September, and were absolutely refusing to miss the big day. Not that Bill or Allie would have dreamt of excluding them. Luckily the registry office had a morning slot the day before the children were due to leave for their boarding schools. 

The usually calm and cool Allie had become a little more flappable and was often heard saying things like before the wedding you must all make sure you are packed for school! and if you need anything new please tell me now so that I can go and order it!

Jack and Kiki had been severely reprimanded as the bird had been squawking Cold feet! Cold feet! Over and over and had also been caught pecking at the bag containing Allie’s new dress. 

Bill had some stern words of his own for Kiki when she had snuck into the room where he was trying to write his speech and muttering under his breath. She must have liked what she heard as she kept repeating What an ass! Such a poor Polly. What an ass!

Bill had jumped, banged his knee on the desktop, accidentally scored a line across his page, and shouted Bother you Kiki! Jack, come and get this bird RIGHT NOW!

Of course that had only led to Kiki cackling Bother you! Bless you! whenever she thought she would get away with it.

As this was Allie’s second wedding, and neither of them could be considered love’s young dream, they were keeping most things simple, much to everyone’s relief. One tradition they were sticking to was the groom not seeing the bride before the wedding.

“Is that just so you can avoid us in the morning?” Philip had asked cheekily when the plan was discussed.

“You, the chaos you will undoubtedly create, and particularly that wretched bird,” Bill had confirmed, giving Kiki a dark look. He hadn’t quite forgiven her for the What an ass debacle. Kiki had raised her crest slowly and said Cold feet in a mournful tone before adding a cough she had picked up from Uncle Geoffrey.

On the morning of the wedding Allie was being attended to by Dinah and Lucy-Ann who had both been rapturous in their delight over helping choose the dress, the flowers, the make-up and the hair. The boys meanwhile were only tasked with making themselves decent.

And Bill had Anatoly, his 20 year old surrogate nephew and best man, who didn’t particularly care for weddings (other than the free bar) even if he was pleased for him and Allie.

Anatoly was already dressed in a smart suit which complemented Bill’s when he arrived. Bill had insisted that Anatoly had his curly hair cut so that he would appear at least semi-presentable, so he was pleased to note that not only had Anatoly not managed to pick up a black eye or other obvious injuries right before the wedding, but he had also run a comb though his recently shorn curls.

“Not ready yet?” Anatoly asked, eyeing Bill’s attire, which consisted of his suit trousers and a vest.

“Top marks for observation,” Bill said with a laugh. “I’m just taking my time. No point in rushing when I don’t have to. I’ve shaved and -”

“Done your hair nicely?” Anatoly suggested, looking at Bill’s balding head from his slightly greater height; augmented by the fact he was the only one wearing shoes.

“Remind me why I didn’t choose Tim as my best man, out of gratitude for the Thamis rescue?” Bill shot back. He had invited Tim and a few of his other most trusted colleagues from his time in the SIS, but he was far closer to Anatoly whom he really saw as family despite there being no blood relationship at all. His relationship with Jack, Philip, Dinah and Lucy-Ann also went to prove that a family could be formed in many ways other than by blood.

When Anatoly just shrugged maddeningly and kept his face blank Bill gave up. “I’m going to finish getting dressed, you can pour the drinks in the meantime.”

Anatoly crossed to the drinks cabinet as Bill headed back upstairs. He was well acquainted with the contents of the cabinet so already knew exactly what he would find but he still spent a few moments lifting up the bottles to read the labels, occasionally pulling a face at some of Bill’s liquor choices. He settled on the vodka which Bill kept in for him. It wasn’t the finest stuff but it was an acceptable brand. He poured himself a generous measure (Bill was always complaining how quickly the bottle went down) and took it over to the window to sip as he looked outside.

He was just finishing it off when Bill came back downstairs, raising his eyebrows at the lack of a drink for him. Anatoly just shrugged again. “I did not know how long you would be. You like ice in your whisky and it might have melted.”

Bill fetched his own ice and poured his own drink. “As my best man you are supposed to do a little more than stand around drinking and insulting me.”

“I have to look after the rings,” Anatoly reminded him.

“You do, but only after I’ve given them to you,” Bill pointed out.

“Moral support.”

“Eh?”

Anatoly gave a long-suffering sigh that was a good imitation of the ones Bill so often gave him. “I am providing you with moral support.”

“Are you? I don’t feel particularly supported yet. Is your mere presence supposed to be helpful?”

“Are you anxious? Nervous? Panicking at all?” Anatoly asked him, grinning when Bill paused to consider. “Nyet. You are far too busy being annoyed with me to be getting your feet cold.”

Ignoring the incorrect phrasing – he suspected that Anatoly did it deliberately, at least most of the time, just because he thought it was funny – Bill had to acknowledge that Anatoly had a point. He wasn’t terribly anxious about getting married, but he did have his worries about making sure that the day went without a hitch and everyone had a good time. 

He didn’t anticipate too many threats to the smooth running of events. Jack and Kiki had been extremely well warned about Kiki’s behaviour and the bird was to be taken out at the first sign of trouble. If Jack had to miss parts of the festivities then so be it.

Micky wouldn’t be a problem as with Allie refusing to be responsible for a monkey during term time, he had recently been adopted by a local retired colonel from an Indian regiment who had long experience with exotic pets. The colonel had responded to an advert that Allie had placed in the newspaper, offering a monkey for sale, reasonable offers considered. The other people who had responded had all been circus and zoo owners, so when Micky had taken an obvious and immediate liking to the ruddy-faced colonel as he had regaled them all with the monkeys he had known in his lifetime, Philip and Allie had decided he was the best choice. When he agreed that Philip could visit Micky whenever he wanted during the holidays he had been told that he could have Micky for free, and they had shaken on the deal.

With the animal threats taken care of, there was not much else to worry about. But annoyingly Anatoly was right – his attitude was distracting Bill from repeatedly running over the day’s schedule, his vows and other details of the day.

To be continued.

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The Famous Five 2020s Style: The Curse of Kirrin Island, part 2

Posted on February 29, 2024 by Fiona

Last week I posted a transcript of the conversation Stef and I had as we watched this for the first time. It was pretty lengthy so I kept back Stef’s more in-depth thoughts and will post them here along with mine.

An interview with Stef

I asked Stef what she thought and had planned to just let her talk, but couldn’t help from interrupting!

Stef: are you sure that you want my honest opinion?

It had potential in the first – generously – ten minutes.

Then… it just… spiralled into this crazy utter mess that just… doesn’t match with any of the Famous Five energy. And… although it says based on, quite honestly I think Blyton would have been appalled. There were too many what-the-heck moments to really highlight what the daftest thing they did was. I’m kinda thankful we didn’t have to see them escaping through the crypt underground tunnel as that was a stretch and a half. It was all a stretch and a half.

Though, the end, on the beach, coming back to Kirrin Cottage, and agreeing to keep the secret and whatever, that ties into the rest of the Famous Five energy.

[Fiona: so basically the problem was just everything in the middle?]

Yes. [Clearly looking for something positive to say] Julian was the best cast.

[Fiona: but underutilised?]

Yes. Presumably to make way for George, as an ethnically diverse female lead to try to make it more relevant for today’s younger audience.

Dick and Anne did not live up to expectations at all. They were not in the slightest what they should have been. They tried to make Anne into Dick and Dick into a geek and a bit of Anne. I can understand why, you’ve got your fearless leader and you can also have chaps that are knowledgeable but scared and they balance each other out. But no. Just no.

They were both underutilised in the end. Had we had more of them…

[Fiona: and less of the crazy ramblings of the bad people?]

Yes. More screen time to come into their characters. Reminds me of the 7os Five who took a long time to tap into their character. In my humble opinion.

I then started talking again.

Fiona: I read criticism about Fanny being a writer, the money maker, making Quentin a useless potterer but I didn’t see that at all.

Stef: I think they got the power balance right.

Fiona: Well, they were barely in it.

Stef: She probably took up writing to get by while he tried to invent.

Fiona: Obviously she’s not making a fortune as they’re still poor.

Stef: Interesting the thing they through in about Jack being in the secret service.

Fiona: But it didn’t go anywhere

Stef: It had potential to tie in.

Potential?

I think potential is a key word here. There was a lot of potential in the ideas used but unfortunately there were perhaps too many ideas. The Five were never ones to need to travel into the big city to visit a crypt to find a clue to bring back to Kirrin – it was far too Dan Brown or Indiana Jones.

There were several plot lines that went nowhere – but perhaps these are going to be fleshed out in the next episode(s). With the baddie’s mother, for example, there seemed to be more story than what we were shown. Annie’s death – but no body being found. The body found on the beach but never mentioned again.

I agree with Stef that neither the characters or the storyline lived up to expectations. Julian was the best (isn’t he always?) while George was decent but we just didn’t see enough of what makes her George. The initial introduction to her cousins, and them making friends is very fast. Book George takes time to warm up to them, to fully trust them and to learn that sharing can be fun.

The same goes with Timmy – she finds him one minute and the next he is a fully formed member of the Five. The thing about book Timmy is that he is supremely loyal and George has trained him to follow her every command. The dog playing Timmy was obviously able to follow commands but most of the time I forgot he was there as he wasn’t spoken to, wasn’t involved in the action. In the underground scenes he stays outside of the circular room, begging the question how he joined them again later.

Actually, now I think about it, I now question how they got George’s boat back. They slide down the tunnel and are fired into the sea, then swim back. (Kirrin Island is supposed to be too far out/in too choppy water/too rocky to swim to, of course.)

I’m getting off the topic of potential now…

The cast

I think the only actor I didn’t like was Jack Gleeson, probably the biggest name in it. He was just far too pantomime and over-the-top to be taken seriously.

While I didn’t like the way Anne and Dick behaved in the episode Flora Jacoby Richardson and Kit Rakusen played their reimagined versions of the characters well.

George (Diaana Babnicova) had some nice stroppiness, and Elliott Rose was convincing as the oldest and in charge member of the Five, though he was underutilised.

Fanny (Ann Akinjirin) and Quentin (James Lance) were largely relegated to the background but we did get a sense of Quentin being impatient (if not hugely irritable) and Fanny trying to keep the peace.

Final thoughts

I will say something I often say about Blyton continuation books: If this had been an adventure film/episode about a newly invented group of children (in any era) it could have been quite enjoyable. As an entry into the Famous Five canon, it is not good.

It failed to capture much of what the Five were about as it spent too long focussing on things like Mr Wentworth and his evil machinations, the trip to London, and Anne being whiny. I mean it’s the Famous Five and the only thing they ate the entire time was some of the cake Mrs Wentworth gave them!

Besides that I wasn’t keen on the soft-focus that was used heavily throughout (not least because it made taking screen-caps so hard) or the 80s synth music which played most of the way through. However, the clothing (converse aside) and the locations were good. I particularly liked Julian’s shirt-and-braces look, while at least Dick got to rock a Paul Child worthy pullover.

 

Not sure why, but this one’s our favourite. Or at least it’s mine!
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Monday #568

Posted on February 26, 2024 by Fiona

February is almost over, though it seems to have dragged rather, despite being the shortest month. I’m always desperate for January and February to be over and spring to start, but inevitably March ends up being barely any warmer or drier anyway! Even April can be hit-or-miss, (but even if it’s a hit you wouldn’t find me bathing in the sea!).

The Curse of Kirrin Island – a fuller review

and

Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure part 2

She was of her time. I think that she was a genius and The Magic Faraway Tree is the most fantastical stuff that she wrote

– Ben Gregor

In response to the question Enid Blyton’s work is still beloved by parents and children around the world, but the writer’s image has taken a knock in recent years due to accusations that she was racist, xenophobic and homophobic. Are you concerned that this could impact the reception of the film? the director of the new Magic Faraway Tree movie gives a pretty good answer.

 

 

 

 

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The Famous Five 2020s Style: The Curse of Kirrin Island

Posted on February 25, 2024 by Fiona

Stef was up visiting me so we thought we’d subject ourselves to the new Famous Five adaptation. Neither of us had seen it before. This would probably have made an interesting livestream but as neither of us have had any desire to record ourselves, ever, I just typed notes on what we said throughout.

In an attempt to avoid my usual thing of summarising the entire episode I am going to try to stick to what we said, with occasional context, based on the extremely hurried notes I typed while we talked.

I warn you now – we had a LOT of questions, and very few answers.

Here be spoilers!

[The opening credits, with synth music plays.]

Fiona: Why do I feel like I’m in the 80s?

Stef: Is the plan for this to be a slightly modernised mix? Looks lovely, though. Germany maybe?

Fiona: Yeah, very nice but not my idea of Kirrin Beach. It’s too narrow and rocky. You couldn’t dig holes in the sand to sit in there.

Fiona: George’s boat has a sail. Funny how it never had a sail in the books, until which one was it? Wonderful Time when they’re going to Red’s place and it has one.

Fiona: Oh, we have a mystery boat. Hang on, no Timmy yet? Is she going to rescue him somewhere? She doesn’t have him yet?

Fiona: She’s wearing converse? (I’ve done some research since and there were shoes like this in the 30s -I’ve found Keds from America with a similar look (for boys, of course) but I haven’t seen anything UK-based. I imagine these would also be quite expensive even if they aren’t totally anachronistic. Thing is, though, if you’re trying to portray a particular time period often it’s safer to not include perfectly accurate details if they’re going to be mistaken for too modern.)

Stef: Well, she’s wearing jeans on the promo picture.

Fiona: I was going to ask how she knows he’s Timmy but it’s on his collar.

Stef: Definitely more a Connal than a Toddy

Fiona: And not like the books. But more important he can act than matches.

[Timmy sounds like he almost talks]

Both: Laughing

[Uncle Quentin tells George to be nice, or, If you can’t be nice pretend to be nice.]

Both: Laughing

[Anne says Careful with my luggage, don’t drop it. DON’T put it on the ground! to Julian and Aunt Fanny.]

Stef: Bossy much? That’s not Anne. So far Julian is the only one who could be called like the books.

Fiona (Sarcastically): Oh no!! Tubing!!

Stef: A diving suit. Though it actually looks like a body.

[The cousins meet and George asks them if they want to see a dead body.]

Fiona (Sarcastically, again): Well this is going well. Not very Famous-Five-ish is it?

Stef: At least Julian’s being responsible… I bet Timmy has a secret in his collar.

Stef: He looks like a nazi.

Fiona: Very Adventure/Secret TV series, cutting away to bad guys with binoculars etc. The books never showed us the baddies on their own. (I realise now that the Famous Five 90s Series did this at least to a certain degree, though.)

[Mr Boswell has gone to report to his boss, Mr Wentworth.]

Fiona: OMG how pantomime.

Fiona: OMG it IS actually a dead body? (I had sort of thought it might just have been an empty diving suit, as you never find dead bodies in an Enid Blyton adventure!)

Fiona: So it is supposed to be set in Dorset.

Stef: Dick is not that timid.

Fiona: I think they’ve made him the geeky brain box

Stef: Not that he wasn’t always smart –  but he was the comic relief.

Stef: Why do they say the island is cursed? – Because it is?

Fiona: Are the ancient Knights Templar really a way to modernise and make it appeal?

Stef: So they’ve swapped… Anne is the sassy one, Dick is the scared one, and Julian is the only one like his character.

Stef: This might just be the boys’ heights but Julian –

Both: Looks a lot older. (We Googled but there’s a lack of info on the cast out there.)

Stef: Where the flip is the castle… oh, there…

Fiona: Not a sandy inlet, but I suppose the geography can’t always match.

Fiona: Why is he carrying her?

[Anne moans about being hungry, asking are we there yet?]

Fiona: Why is she turning into Dick? OMG she’s a pampered princess. Julian in the book would not have stood for that.

Stef: I really don’t like this adaptation of Anne. She has to do some major changing.

Fiona: I can see them wanting to give a personality other than just scared homemaker but they didn’t have to make her annoying.

Stef (correcting me): A brat

Stef: George and Julian look significantly older than Dick and Anne, but George not quite as old as Julian.

Stef: What? He’s carrying  great big chunk of rope.

Fiona: But, I mean, it’s not round his waist.

Stef: That might be later. Oh so the pampered princess decided she was going down.

Fiona: Julian would have sent Dick down first.

Stef: Who’s going to lower Julian down? Or Julian would have gone first.

Stef: The mushroom thing… There’s being clever and there’s being… obnoxious.

Fiona: Not just brainy but geeky.

Fiona: Has he gone in with his shoes on?

Stef: I think they all have!

Fiona: Wet and soggy socks and shoes. That’s not a brainy idea, tasting it. You don’t just drink water that could be stagnant…Why do I feel like there’s going to be a giant booby trap?

Stef: Indiana Jones style.

Fiona: You’re not going to need Mr Roland to translate the Latin.

Stef: To be fair in Adventuring Again Dick and Julian are learning Latin.

Fiona: GEORGE DROP IT!!!

Fiona: It’s the holy grail and here comes the booby trap.

Stef: What’s the dog going to do?

Both: UHOH.

Stef (laughing loudly): Not once did Anne ever say I think we’re going to die.

Fiona: Usually these things are not easily reset as they want to trap you and kill you.

Stef: Ah cool, four dead children then. Presumably this works as there’s four of them and adults would have gone alone?

Fiona: Mhmm… It’s a flipping slip and slide!

Stef: Laughing (possibly more at me than the episode)… He’s still got his rucksack on! Hope it’s a waterproof bag.

[Back at Kirrin Cottage they examine what’s on the chalice.]

Fiona: I don’t think that needed a magnifying glass.

Stef: Anne stop being not Anne!

[Mr Boswell comes to talk to Uncle Q about buying the island.]

Fiona: Julian’s so grown up he gets given a business card.

Stef: Well, he shook hands. What’s the tattoo on the wrist mean?

Fiona: It’s a shame – they don’t seen to be lighting Aunt Fanny well. She has darker skin and you couldn’t see her well sitting on the sofa – but maybe it was intentional to have her in the background?

Stef: It was the same in an earlier scene.

[We had to pause the episode to discuss this – however on rewatching on my laptop it seems better, so it may have been partly the colour balance/brightness settings on my TV]

[One of the baddies says don’t underestimate children.]

Fiona: Certainly not these children.

Stef: I’m not keen on this soft focus they’re using. (This turned out to be terrible for taking screenshots too!)

Fiona: There is a lot of it. I’m also not really interested in the baddie’s masochistic ramblings.

Stef: How come Timmy is somehow inside the house? (Uncle Q and Aunt F are against keeping Timmy and before now he has been kept in George’s den/shed.)

[The other three disagree with Julian strongly, and all end up travelling to a church in London.]

Stef: They’re all against him. Which is strange – especially in the first book they never gang up on Julian.

Fiona: How are they going to get into this guy’s tomb?

Stef: That’s not London it’s Gloucester. Those are the Gloucester cloisters.

Fiona: Is this where some of Harry Potter was filmed?

Stef: Yep.

Fiona: How did they get Timmy in the church?

Stef: Maybe the tomb is downstairs.

Fiona: Maybe the key is the key.

[Mr Wentworth approaches them dressed as a priest, and asks them where they found the goblet. George answers “What is it to do with you?”]

Fiona: They would never be that outright rude to an adult.

Stef: That is a Catholic priest and they are in a Protestant place.

Stef: Idiot children!

Fiona: Never follow the creepy priest underground!

Fiona: Those are not priest shoes!

[They find a hidden button in wall, press it and a secret passage appears.]

Stef: Now the whole of the Gloucester Cathedral is going to know that things are moving. Gordon Bennet!

Fiona: Totally Indiana Jones again. Just need all the insects. Is he going to shut them in?

Stef: Probably.

Stef: Julian would not do that. They’d all go or none of them. EURGH spider webs. He IS going to shut them in.

Fiona: It’s going to be the classic give me the thing! No, let us out, then we’ll give you the thing. No, give me the thing and then I’ll let you out. Then he won’t let them out.

Stef: I suppose, send the children in then take what they find is a normal trope.

Stef: Dick’s noticed the tattoo.

Stef: So, Julian is strong enough to move a marble slab on his own?

Fiona: I think taking the sword really does count as theft.

Stef: I reckon it’s the gem which isn’t dusty at all.

[Fake priest holds Dick hostage and demands the others hand over the sword.]

Stef: Kick ’em, Dick!!

Fiona: This is not our Dick though…

Stef: They’re going to lock them in now.

Stef (derisively to the Five): What did you think was going to happen?

Fiona: Of course there will be another way out. There’s always another way out.

Stef: Jack Gleeson was on Game of Thrones and from what I can tell his character there was the exact same as the moron he’s playing now.

Stef: I’m sorry but Transport for London would have blocked that off!

Fiona: Oh so we don’t actually get to see them risking their lives jumping onto the tracks. (On reflection this is probably to stop it looking like they are encouraging children to do the same.)

Stef: Interesting that they were close enough to go to Julian’s home.

Stef: Is this pre WW2? That thing on the telly would suggest so.

Fiona: But how many people had TVs pre WW2? (Apparently the answer is 20,000 and all in the South of England as the BBC didn’t transmit to the Midlands until 1948, Northern England in 1951 and Scotland in 1952. Shocking, if getting very off-topic.)

Fiona: Ooh they’re trying to explain it! (It being the two families not having contact, which turns out to be that Quentin and Jack had a sister who died.)

Stef: None of them have had a bath!

Fiona: Where are the grown ups?

Stef: Surely there’d have been even a maid.

[Mr Wentworth’s house again.]

Stef: What does he look like?

Fiona: I don’t even know!

[The butler brings out a silver tray of identical sunglasses]

Both: What??

[The Five ‘sneak’ across a wide open driveway by ducking.]

Fiona: You’re not INVISIBLE!!

Stef: My brain hurts.

Fiona: This is like breaking and entering at this point.

Stef: Fair’s fair – they do it in the books, when the go after Dick that’s fairly breaking and entering, Red Tower’s, its ok because they are bad guys.

Fiona: I think it’s different if you’re rescuing people.

Stef: They break into the artists’ bedrooms.

Fiona: They follow a secret passage and find themselves there, plus they knew they’d stolen stuff.

[The Five are on a mezzanine /balcony indoors while there are people on the floor below.]

Stef: It’s a bannister!

Fiona: It’s see through!

[The bad guy sets up the sword to shine a light through the gem, in front of an audience.]

Fiona: Now I see why the sunglasses were needed. This is indiana jones again with the sun shining on the map.

[Julian declares this is total madness.]

Stef: I’m with Julian on this one.

Fiona: It’s the outline of kirrin island?

[The Five are caught by Mr Wentworth.]

Stef: You’ve not even asked them how they got out of the crypt!

Fiona: Does you you actually know [where the treasure is]?

Stef: It’s the creepy little moustache.

Fiona: This seems like a lot of people to let into your secret.

[Julian says That guy’s completely insane.]

Fiona (sarcastically): I mean what gave you that clue?

[Mr Wentworth’s mother brings them a trolley of food.]

Fiona This is the first time we’ve seen them get fed. Look at those cakes – so bad and garish.

Fiona: Look at her [George’s] blouse, it was filthy earlier, across the shoulders now it’s clean.

[Mr Wentworth sits cross legged, eyes shut, oblivious to the Five creeping about.]

Fiona: He is much better at meditating than I am.

Fiona: Oh look, she [George] is dirty again now!

[Somehow we lose the ability to form coherent sentences around the time that George pulls the sword from its block of stone.]

Stef: Go and help her!

Fiona: I hope that’s not sharp.

Stef: Why is he not [responding, I probably meant]… is he pretending?

Fiona: Just stab him!

[Julian tosses a load of golf balls on the floor and Mr Boswell slips on them, groaning ‘balls’].

Fiona: Balls!?

Fiona: Timmy hasn’t covered himself in glory yet.

[Mr Wentworth calls out Professor Bernard, Mrs Bernard as they suddenly arrive – and the captions back this up. IMDB has them as Barnards, however. Also look how clean George is. The boys are grubby but not as filthy as earlier.]

Stef: Is that Aunt Fanny and Uncle Quentin he means?

Fiona: Bernards? Not even Barnards! How does Kirrin everything belong to Uncle Q if he’s a Barnard? They had ample opportunity to solve it and make it not confusing and they messed it up.

[We discuss this, at far too much length to have typed out. Upshot is, it doesn’t make much sense. They could have had Quentin Kirrin and his sister who marries Mr Barnard/Bernard. They could have had Quentin and Jack Kirrin… They could have left out Quentin’s family having owned Kirrin forever…]

Fiona: Julian’s shirt – the white patch is back, it wasn’t in last scene.

Stef: Her [Mrs Wentworth] dress is ripped under the arm – look.

Fiona: Why is he [Uncle Quentin] sporting bride of Frankenstein hair?

Stef: Nutty professor?

Fiona at 67 minutes in: Can I draw your attention back to what happened to the dead body on the beach?

Stef: No policeman involved in how or why he died? Even the incompetent Goon manages to get in the way of adventures. Not that the police did much more than arrive at the end to take the baddies away, the only other one I remember is the dismissive one from Hike.

Fiona: They do come in Fall Into Adventure to investigate the break in.

Fiona: Makes me think, it didn’t need to be a body just a helmet or something weird rather than a body forgotten about.

[Quentin tells George more about her late Aunt Annie and her explorations of Kirrin Island, which led to her death.]

Stef: You’ve just given George the answer!

Fiona: Yep.

Fiona: George has to be a bit inconsiderate to go and take the exact same risk.

Fiona: Their bodies were found? Whose?

Stef: The police searchers.

Fiona: But not Annie’s?

Stef: Is she the baddie’s mum?

Fiona: That’s what I was thinking but that’d be weird.

Fiona: You’d think he’d [Uncle Q] not have not allowed her to go [to the island, where her Aunt died] in the first place, not allowed her a boat.

Stef: What’s she going to do?

[The baddies are blasting with dynamite on the island.]

Fiona: Not very discreet is it?

[They find another passage in a cove.]

Fiona: Julian would never be the last one in.

Fiona: Do they not have clean clothes?? Even the 90s kids changed their clothes.

Stef: Yeah, Marco had like ten different pullovers.

Fiona: Sometimes they changed outfits just by walking behind a rock.

Stef: For a change Anne is not being a wimp.

Stef: Timmy knows, that’s where his diving person went, presumably.

Fiona: If it’s that dangerous to divers what chance do children have?

Stef: George knows the tides.

Fiona: But he had a diving suit on!

Fiona: Mushroom spores? Are they going to die of something toxic?

Stef: Unless it’s supposed to be uranium or something?

Stef: Ohh booby trap, lovely!

Fiona: The spikes are literally bending… I feel like they could easily squeeze out.

[They find a cave full of old treasures.]

Stef: Not quite as satisfying as ingots.

[Mr Wentworth uses the chalice to drink from a font.]

Stef: Please tell me it’s poisoned or something. But maybe as he’s already stark raving bonkers it won’t matter.

Fiona: Oh is he having visions of WW2? So it’s obviously set in the run up to WW2 but she’s wearing converse.

[Mr Wentworth runs off with a lit stick of dynamite.]

Stef: That fuse went off extremely quickly?

Stef: Why is there always another way out?

[The children climb on the font to escape.]

Fiona: Ohh sacrilegious!

Stef: Finally Julian’s taking charge! I’ve only been waiting an hour and a half!

[They climb out onto the island somewhere different.]

Fiona: Just another random hole in the ground.

Stef: What’s he got with him?

Fiona: A sack of treasure? Where did that come from?

[Dick tells the others that the water was contaminated with fungal spores.]

Fiona: I did call mushroom spores.

Stef: How are they going to get the island back? (Quentin sold it to Mr Wentworth earlier).

Fiona (on a wild tangent): Timmy might belong to someone, the diver might have had a wife…

[Quentin says the Five appear to be getting on famously.]

Both: Laughing.

Fiona: Where is this, a hospital?

Stef: His home?

Fiona: Why is he wearing a straight jacket at home?

Fiona: Peril on the Night Train, what the heck? What book is that supposed to be from?

I’ve a part two in the works with some (hopefully) more coherent reviewing.

 

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Fan fic Friday: Cunningham and Petrov: Bill and Allie’s Great Adventure, chapter 1

Posted on February 23, 2024 by Fiona

We have been writing Cunningham and Petrov fiction since 2020, filling in the gaps in the Adventure Series books to show what Bill was getting up to off-page. As he was around for a lot of The Island of Adventure, and didn’t know anything was up until he fell into, and was present for, the ending of The Castle of Adventure, we skipped those.

So we started with The Mystery of the Missing Aeroplane which is set during The Valley of Adventure and covers Bill’s search for the missing children after they disappear from the aerodrome, then adds some detail to the chapters where Bill and his men round up the enemy.

Then we wrote The Mystery of the Missing Agent, set during The Sea of Adventure, mostly chronicling what the Petrov half of the partnership was up to in the search for Bill, with some bits about Bill’s time in captivity.

Our most recent was was The Mystery of The Missing Children which, naturally, is set during The Mountain of Adventure and details Bill’s search for the children in the Welsh valleys.

The next book, of course, is The Ship of Adventure, but Bill is so fully embroiled in that one that it was hard to find any gaps to fill in order to write a story. So our minds turned to something that happened off-page, shortly after the events of Ship. We couldn’t make it fit the Mystery of the Missing… format, but never mind.

“I don’t see why you can’t marry each other?”

Lucy-Ann’s clear voice was still ringing in Bill’s ears as Allie walked him out to his car that evening. His “do you think it’s a good idea?” had not been the sort of proposal he had been planning at all, but Lucy-Ann had thrown the idea out there so neatly… and Allie hadn’t rebuffed it. 

In fact she had looked as if she had been positively encouraging it. It would have been impossible for him to have dismissed the notion at this point so there had been nothing for it but to propose. Casually of course, as he hadn’t wanted to give the game away that it was already on his mind and that he had been planning to ask Allie for a while now. However he wasn’t entirely sure that he had managed to sound casual about it. Despite Allie’s smile he hadn’t been all that sure that she would accept after the children’s latest adventure under his watch. 

Turning back to Allie after unlocking his car door Bill had the grace to look abashed as he cleared his throat and said, “That wasn’t how I had planned to ask you to marry me.” 

“But you were planning on asking me?” she asked softly, reaching for his hand and giving it a squeeze. 

Bill thought of the engagement ring that was sitting safely in his suitcase in the car boot, just in case he had gotten the chance to use it when he saw Allie again. “Yes. I didn’t have all the details worked out, but it was going to be just a touch more romantic,” he said wryly. 

“How long-” Allie began, but Bill put his hand up to stop her. 

“I’m not revealing my secrets.”

“But you don’t know what I was going to ask!” 

“You were going to ask me how long I had been planning to ask you to marry me,” he retorted smugly. 

Allie folded her arms, smiled equally smugly and with a teasing glint in her eyes, “No actually. I was going to ask you how long you were going to make me wait.”

Bill whistled through his teeth, “Oh, just until you had forgiven me for my latest misdemeanour. Whatever it might have been at the time.” 

“So, almost never then,” Allie laughed. “As you seem to go round and round in circles with trouble? The same as my children!” 

“Just as well that Lucy-Ann said something then, isn’t it?” Bill asked, his eyes glinting now. 

“Very much so.” 

Bill pressed  a quick kiss to her lips. “You’d better get back inside, it looks like rain. How about I take you out to dinner tomorrow and we can celebrate?”

“I’d like that very much,” Allie said, stepping back so he could open the driver’s door. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she added as Bill beamed at her. He saluted before sliding into his seat and then waved over his shoulder as he pulled away.

Allie returned indoors, glad that the children had already gone up to bed and mercifully had taken Kiki with them. The bird had been chanting all through dinner “God save the King!” and “Pop goes the weasel!” along with any other phrases she could remember, driving everyone mad to the extent that even Jack had told her to be quiet. 

The next evening Bill arrived to collect Allie for dinner. “A vision as always,” he said as she opened the door, dressed for an evening out in a deep blue evening dress. Looking past her he saw Philip coming down the stairs in a surprisingly smart getup, and in the middle of knotting his tie.

He looked quizzically at Philip and then at Allie. “Philip!” Allie said. “I told you, it’s just Bill and I going for dinner tonight. There’s a cold pie and some other bits in the larder for you all.”

“But Mother,” he protested as the other three came down the stairs, similarly smartly attired. “I do think we ought to be allowed along as well. After all, getting married was all Lucy-Ann’s idea in the first place!”

“That’s an argument for Lucy-Ann to come, not all four of you,” Bill replied, thinking of his bank balance. 

“You did agree to take on the four of them on, as well as me,” Allie reminded him. 

Bill held up his hands. “All right, but my reservation was only for two! I’m not sure they can accommodate six.”

“And a parrot,” Jack reminded him.

“And a m-”

“No!” both Bill and Allie said very firmly.

 “There is no restaurant in England that would accept a monkey as one of the party,” Bill said. “If you want to come it’ll have to be without Micky.”

With Micky safely shut in the boys’ bedroom the six headed out to dinner. When they returned Allie sent the children inside to get ready for bed, and instructed the boys to clear up any mess Micky had made. 

She went inside only long enough to pour them both a glass of sherry which they took outside into the garden. Bill had already lit his pipe and puffed contentedly on it as Allie put her free arm through his and guided him across the lawn to the bench overlooking a small pond. 

“I’m glad Kiki was better behaved tonight,” Allie murmured. There had only been one outburst of hip-hip-hoorays this time after another table had sung happy birthday. 

“Yes, I think the old dear was quite pleased at having a parrot join in on the well wishes,” Bill said with a laugh. “But really, I’m just glad she approves of us.”

He pulled the pipe from his mouth before letting out a billow of smoke. He looked down at Allie through the haze. “I hope that you do too,” he added, his voice thick with emotion. He knocked out his pipe and stowed it in one pocket before reaching into another and withdrawing a small velvet box.

“Shall we make this official?” he asked as he opened the box to show her the simple solitaire diamond ring with a plain gold band. 

“Oh Bill,” she breathed, taken aback that he already had a ring ready for her. “Of course we can make it official.”

Bill grinned like a fool and slipped the ring (which was thankfully the right size) onto her left ring finger. He had noticed that she had no longer been wearing her late husband’s rings recently but he suspected that she may have moved them to the chain round her neck. He cupped her face in his hands and then lent in to kiss her the way he had wanted to kiss her since he had casually asked her to marry him the night before. 

Allie let him kiss her, and kissed him back, her hands on his chest. When they stopped she pulled back a little and teasingly asked:

“You didn’t feel the need to go down on one knee, then?”

“Not with my knees,” Bill laughed. “You’d have to help me up again, Allie, love.”

She laughed and he kissed her again. Before they had finished this time a cackling floated over the night air and a large white bird settled on the fence next to them, cawing delightedly. “Silly Billy, hip-hip-hooray! God save the King!” 

“Oh Kiki,” Allie exclaimed. “How did you get out?”

“The boys must have opened their window,” Bill said darkly. “Away with you Kiki, old girl. Nothing to see here!” He waved a hand towards her as he spoke. Kiki lazily flapped her wings and took flight still chanting “Hip-hip-hooray!” Bill and Allie had no choice but to laugh. 

On his way home that evening Bill gave a sigh of relief. Allie had liked the ring he had chosen. He’d had a rough idea of what he had been looking for when he had visited the jeweller’s – something simple and understated, but elegant at the same time. And yet when he had been shown a selection of rings he had suddenly realised that he had come woefully unprepared. He had known that diamonds came in different carats and cuts, and that there were other stones to choose from. What he had not considered was that these factors could be combined in quite so many different ways. And then he found himself looking at trays and trays of rings, wondering how on earth he was supposed to choose. He hadn’t wanted to look like a fool so he had taken his time and considered the full array carefully. When the sales assistant had suggested that perhaps he could begin by ruling out any stones or styles he didn’t like, he had realised that perhaps he was making a fool of himself regardless.

With a little guidance from the assistant he had been able to narrow down the selection to just a few, choosing to rule out anything too similar to her first engagement ring, whilst also not picking anything outrageously different. 

At least he had known the size of the ring he needed. It had not been difficult to secretly measure Allie’s wedding ring when she had taken it off to wash the dishes one evening. 

He had then, in a moment of doubt, asked Anatoly for a second opinion. Why he had asked Anatoly of all people, he did not know. He hardly expected the boy to have any real input on the matter. Yet he found himself a trifle embarrassed to ask anyone else. Marrying at his age for the first time marked him out as different as it was, he didn’t need anyone thinking he couldn’t even choose a ring for his prospective bride. Besides, if Allie said no, he didn’t want it getting around that he was unmarriable. 

So he had held the ring out for inspection. “Da, that is a ring,” Anatoly had confirmed after staring at it with what had looked like serious concentration for several seconds. Bill had cuffed him on the shoulder for that. 

“I know it’s a ring. But is it the right ring?”

Anatoly had looked doubtful, leading Bill to worry. “I am not sure that I am the right person to ask. It is Allie’s opinion that will matter.”

“Yes I know that,” Bill had said as patiently as he could manage. “But asking her would rather give the game away now, wouldn’t it?”

Anatoly had given a non-committal noise in response. “I think you know her better than most people and if you have spent time choosing a ring for her, it is probably not too far from the perfect one.”

Bill had chosen to accept that mostly positive answer, and had sent Anatoly back to whatever it was he had been supposed to be doing when he had summoned him. Gone were the days where Anatoly was at Bill’s beck and call for work matters. He had his own special areas of expertise now, and usually went out alone. Bill missed their teamwork, and he worried sometimes that Anatoly had thrown himself too much into the job. It could be a lonely life. He himself had spent many lonely years already, never having found love before, though he did have colleagues that he considered friends, and some distant relatives that he saw semi-regularly. He had often wished that he had found someone earlier, when he was younger (and had more hair). But now he knew that it would not have been Allie, and therefore no longer wished such a thing. Allie had been more than worth waiting for.

To be continued.

 

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Monday #567

Posted on February 20, 2024 by Fiona

To prove I do get things written/posted eventually this week we’ll have some of the fanfic I’ve been talking about for the past nine months and a review of a TV episode from December.

Cunningham and Petrov: Bill and Allie’s great adventure

and

The Famous Five 2020s Style: The Curse of Kirrin Island

It was a smashing movie, Mummy.

The movie Brodie watched happened to be the recent Super Mario Bros Movie, but the language was pure Blyton.

 

 

 

 

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Reading the Famous Five to Brodie, part 2

Posted on February 16, 2024 by Fiona

I have written one post already with some of Brodie’s comments on Five on a Treasure Island (and his love of the series in general). We are all the way up to Mystery Moor now, and I find him making Famous Five related comments quite often which I absolutely love. So I thought it was time to make another post looking at the next couple of books – having sent Stef updates every evening after story time.

Five Go Adventuring Again

Although he loved the first book we didn’t immediately jump into the second. I had thought we might read one every so often, and so we read two Dick King-Smith books before, two weeks later, we decided on Five Go Adventuring Again.

The first thing I have recorded him saying is that Mr and Mrs Sanders must be evil smugglers because they have a hidey-hole behind the sliding panel in the hall. I couldn’t help but laugh at that. Maybe it was my attempt at an elderly all-purpose Cornishesque accent that misled him? I was trying for sweet and kindly.

He was more astute in his second prediction. He looked at the picture of the linen scrap and said “that’s a clue to the secret path! It must be in the farm house!” I thought it was interesting that he used the words secret path as those are one of the translations suggested by Mr Roland – a secret path, or a secret road.

I sometimes ask him questions to gauge what he’s thinking, especially when there’s something potentially misleading going on. So I asked him, quite casually, what he thought of Mr Roland. By this point George is well against him, while the others trust him and I wondered which side Brodie would fall on.

“I like Mr Roland, but I haven’t seen his lips.”

I loved that response! He remembered George talking about Mr Roland’s thin lips, but couldn’t make his own judgement as he hadn’t seen them.

(It was this point that I said to Stef that I should start a blog about his comments, and well, here we are.)

After Mr Roland has lied about knowing the artists he declared that “[Mr Roland] must be one of the smuggler family!” 

I’m not sure why he was so obsessed with smugglers and smuggling because there aren’t actually any references to it in the first two books.

I tried to get him to say Enid Blyton after one chunk of bedtime reading and the result was hysterical. The closest he could get was Elin Blightning. I apologise as there’s a bit of me speaking in my dulcet Dundonian in the clip below, too, but you can perhaps get an idea of why I struggle doing convincing accents!

Back to Brodie’s comments! As soon as George spotted the eight panels above the fire he said “that must be the entrance to the secret passage!” I’m thinking (with typical motherly pride) how smart he is and then he comes out with “It was on the tinfoil!”

So now, in Brodie’s mind, Mr Roland has been upgraded to a robber, though earlier he was sure it was George as she was the only one to have been in the study. He also twigged that Mr Roland had already attempted a theft the night he was caught by Timmy, and thinks he wants to do his own experiments using the stolen pages.

Another night he guessed that the secret way went to “Kirrin Farmhouse, where they found the tinfoil!” so again, he manages to sound both smart and silly in the same sentence. He thought the passage coming into the cupboard behind the secret door was “all very weird.” We ended on the cliff-hanger of the men coming up to find the doors locked.

“It’s a good thing they locked the doors. There’s only one key – only two keys – and it’s a good thing they’re on the inside!” but after a pause “but maybe the men can push the doors open. With an axe!”

At this point in the book he said his favourite character was “the boy, Julian” now ( he had said it was George before) because “he’s so clever and he is always the one saying things.” I suggested that Julian’s bossy and Brodie agreed “he’s a bossy boots.”

On finishing the book I asked him a few questions. His favourite part was when they were in the secret passage because that was the most exciting and George is his favourite now, because she’s the fiercest

He asked me how many more to go and I said 19.

“Yeah!! I’m going to read all 19!!”

Five Run Away Together

There was no gap between Five Go Adventuring Again and Five Run Away Together. We finished one on Wednesday night and he started the next on Thursday night. He asked me why it was called Five Run Away Together, and then, as he so often does, he answered his own question.

“I know, because they run away from a ghost!!”

I think we all know that this won’t be his last wild prediction for the series!

He really liked the Georgie Porgie song and laughed like anything at it – I suppose on its own it’s kind of a funny song. Perhaps aided by me singing it as mockingly as I could.

I asked Brodie where he thought Aunt Fanny and and Uncle Quentin were (just as George finds the house empty) and he said “They’re locked away somewhere! I know, Kirrin farmhouse with the artists!”

I reminded him that the artists had been arrested in the last book. “Oh yeah, then there must be another baddie around!” Then, after the note from Uncle Quentin, and Julian pulling Edgar’s nose he said “I bet that note wasn’t real. I think Edgar wrote it! He must have them locked up somewhere!” This is actually quite a clever guess, though unfortunately not right – he was so disappointed to be wrong.

(At this point Stef said “You need to blog these” and I told her that I was using the chat with her to log what he’d said so I didn’t forget.)

His next guess was better – he correctly guessed that George’s plan was to go to her island. I laughed like anything when George bought her supplies and Julian wonders what she’s up to, and Brodie said, in an isn’t-it-obvious sort of voice – “she’s doing her plan!!”

Upon discovering that the only whole room in the castle has fallen in and asking Where will they sleep? he immediately said “The pirate ship!” To be fair the Five do investigate the wreck as a possibility.

Someone has been on Kirrin Island. “I know! It was the man with the fire! But how did he get there, through the rocks? He must have parachuted from a plane!” One point to Brodie!

The Five guess that someone in the village has been collecting smuggled goods from the island. “Mrs Stick! She’s the smuggler!” Another point to Brodie.

I was amused at him being slightly disdainful that the Five hadn’t found the hole to the cave before. (And I kind of agree, especially seeing as George insists she knows every inch of her island!)

[Despairingly]”Oh Juuulian! He always comes up with the ideas.”

I asked him why this was a bad thing – “He doesn’t let anyone else have the ideas.” I said that he’s bossy. “Yes he is bossy. But he is the oldest, that means he has to be the leader.” At least he didn’t say it’s because he’s a boy.

Brodie’s list of things they would need to take to the island: Food, a stove, and chairs. Obviously not a fan of roughing it and sitting on the floor!

When Dick asks why they don’t always have meals like this he said “Yes it all goes so well together.” Tinned meat sandwiches, pineapple chunks, and then sardines dug out of the tin with biscuits… Ok then.

A rather intelligent comment I thought – when they put knots in the rope for getting in and out of the cave – “But that will make the rope shorter.”

When ?Dick says he hopes they hear/see something of the smugglers – “I don’t. I want to hear more about Anne playing houses in the cave.” I always like those bits too!

When they couldn’t find the tin opener he remembered from like four chapters and two nights before “It’s in their pocket!”

We had a lack of comments one night, I think he was too engrossed in the story. But he did find the animal noises in the dungeon hilarious and insisted on making the echo sound effects to my noises.

Before bed that night he said

“Mummy… I absolutely… LIKE the Famous Five.”

High praise indeed!

For all his astute remarks Brodie is six and has some pretty wild thought processes. He thought that cows could a) pick up mud in their mouths and throw it at people by shaking their heads and b) might steal cushions and blankets for a nice place to sleep.

Upon the reveal of the girls’ clothes in the trunk he came to the conclusion that Mrs Stick is having a baby girl and they want to have it without a doctor knowing. He couldn’t explain why, though.

He had me laughing again with a conversation about tongue. I had read a meal description that included tongue and he interrupted me. “TONGUE?” and showed me his tongue to make sure I understood. I explained it would be cow’s tongue. He considered this .“Does it have saliva on it?”

He couldn’t guess what the girl’s scream meant, unless it was a doll that could talk but he did know what the word kidnappers meant.

While reading this the schools went strike so we played schools at home (complete with school bell sound from YouTube) and finished the book as our literacy work. (Yes we are both in our pyjamas. Pretend school at home doesn’t require real clothes.)

The school had sent us some different activities including the one below.

Choose a story to enjoy with an adult. As the adult reads, listen for new or interesting words. Ask what they mean. Talk about the different characters and who you liked best. You could try retelling the story afterwards. Try drawing pictures of the beginning, middle and end of the story. Now try writing a sentence under each picture to explain what is happening.

Picture 1: George finds a letter – She is reaching up to the mirror which has the letter tucked into it, and Edgar is on the sofa.

Picture 2: Julian climbs down the rope – The rope has a lot of knots in it, then there are the four blankets for sleeping and their tins and food on the rocky shelf.

Picture 3: Jennifer is rescued – She is saying thank you.

He didn’t think it was very fair on Edgar to get locked up, as he didn’t do any of the kidnapping. But “it was the only thing they could do”.

At the end of this book Julian is back to being his favourite.

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2023 birthday and Christmas present round up

Posted on February 15, 2024 by Fiona

I’m rather late writing this up this year but better late than never.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that my family and friends would have run out of Enid Blyton themed gifts for me, but they haven’t quite – yet. I think it does get harder for them every year, though!

First up, there was this Adventure Series jigsaw. It’s one of those ones where the box doesn’t show the picture and it comes with a little booklet which sets you a mystery to solve in the finished jigsaw. I haven’t done it yet, but I’ll be sure to show you when I have.

Then, from the appropriately-named Georgina the Librarian‘s site, this magnetic notebook with a Famous Five quote on it. This’ll go on the fridge for shopping lists as soon as the current one is finished.

Actually from last Christmas but I got them a bit late so I’m including them now, were these Swanage/Corfe postcards. I have quite the collection of these now so I need to find space on the walls for these new ones.

Moving to the more Blyton adjacent than strictly Blyton I also got this collection of Malcolm Saville short stories, published by Girls Gone By.

Plus this nice book about lighthouses (my interest in those mainly stemming from Demon’s Rocks, of course).

Did you get anything Blyton-y over Christmas?

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Monday #566

Posted on February 12, 2024 by Fiona

Turns out that I was right to guess that I wouldn’t write anything last week! Who’d have guessed?

Stef has returned to the far end of the UK (blow!) so I can’t use her as an excuse this week. I have developed my second lurgy of the year, though, (yes, already). But I will try not to let that get in the way too much. I did get some fresh sea air over the weekend but I don’t think it works so well while you are actually unwell, as opposed to when you are getting better.

Christmas and birthday present round up 2023

and

Reading the Famous Five to Brodie part 2

 

I found this very Kiki-like brooch in a quirky little shop selling magickal items, vintage finds and gifts.

I resisted buying it, but I couldn’t resist taking a picture to share.

 

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