The Naughtiest Girl in the School covers through the years

Posted on October 4, 2019 by Fiona

Previous covers through the years : The Famous Five, The Adventure Series, The Secret Series, Malory Towers, The Barney Mysteries, Mr Galliano’s Circus, St Clare’s

There are only three Naughtiest Girl books if you are counting the original novels; The Naughtiest Girl in the School, The Naughtiest Girl Again and The Naughtiest Girl is a Monitor, but with 12-14 reprints of each there are still plenty of covers to look at.

The first editions

Despite only having three books there are two different illustrators. W. Lindsay Cable (illustrator of the original St Clare’s books) did the covers and internal illustrations for the first two books, while Kenneth Lovell did the final one.

Lovell has done his cover in a very similar style to Cable, and used the same uniform colours etc so it is not a jarring or obvious change.

George Newnes 1940 / George Newnes 1942 / George Newnes 1945

Lovell’s characters perhaps don’t have quite the same air of movement but then they appear to be indoors and under the eye of grown-ups!

The ubiquitous Armadas

Unusually for an early, popular series, there are no new hardback editions. Not every series had those but both Malory Towers and St Clare’s have a second set with new dust jackets.

This series goes straight to paperback (though later impressions of the first edition had a few alterations to the spine design) and of course the 1960s paperback publisher of choice is Armada.

There are two Armada sets, in fact. The first in 1962/62 and the second in 1971/72.

The 1960s set come with the usual Armada look with the brightly coloured backgrounds and illustrations by Dorothy Brook.

Armada 1962 / Armada 1962 / Armada 1963

The 1970s set also have bright backgrounds but a different look; both to the previous covers and to each other! They are not the most disparate covers I have seen, but the sky background in particular between the two orange/yellow ones looks odd. They are by an uncredited artist.

Armada 1971 / Armada 1971 / Armada 1972

The bold and the dull

From 1967 to 1990 we saw a variety of publishers and styles. Merlin, Dean, Beaver and Red Fox all did their own covers, some more than once.

The first was Merlin in 1967/68 with some rather drab and dark covers. I’m never fond of Clyde Pearson’s work it has to be said. His covers are always quite serious and his internal illustrations are often strange. I mean why such dark cloudy skies? Why such dark green uniforms in a grey and green school yard? Why so many black uniforms and details?

Merlin 1967 / Merlin 1967 / Merlin 1968

Dean’s first set (in hardback) in 1972/73 is one of the brightest with the almost fluorescent yellow, bright red and shocking pink along with very stylised cartoon schoolgirls by an uncredited artist. Deans 70s hardbacks are not usually known for their realistic or toned-down covers. These are so stylised they probably get away with it – it helps that there is a ‘vintage’ air to them now as well. It’s just a pity they chose a reddish font for the last book as it’s a bit headache inducing to read!

Dean 1973 / Dean 1972 / Dean 1973

Their second set (also from an uncredited artist) is from 1989 and is very much darker both in colour and content. This set uses their ‘upside down Polaroid’ design which features on so many other series, with a sad selection of brown and beige backgrounds. As for the dark content I refer to ‘sad girl on swing at night’, ‘lonely girl at bus station with pile of belongings’ and ‘two almost drowning children’. The first must depict Elizabeth before she kicks out at Robert though it lacks a sense of anger or suggestion of movement. I can’t remember if Elizabeth gets the bus to school, if so it’s hardly an integral part of the plot. I mean, would these really stand out on a shelf and attract readers?

All Dean 1989

Beaver also have a bright set and a more neutral one, though neither has a cover for the second book.

The bright set is from 1979, and reminds me a bit of Grange Hill for some reason. I think it’s the yellow background and the almost comic strip image. These covers were by Martin Aitchison.

Both Beaver 1979

Beaver’s second set was in 1986, with a very different look. I have a nostalgic fondness for this as my first copy of the Naughtiest Girl was the Red Fox omnibus which reused the illustration from the first book here. Elizabeth reminds me of someone but I cannot think who. I like her cheeky grin anyway.

Beaver 1986 / Beaver 1986 / Red Fox 1995

Speaking of Red Fox they reused these covers for their 1990/92 set, with the cover for the second book done by, I presume, a different uncredited artist as Elizabeth looks quite different. Older and more stylish, perhaps. She also reminds me of someone, an actress perhaps.

Red Fox 1990 / Red Fox 1992 / Red Fox 1990

There is also a sneaky Armada cover in amongst all those – in 1987 they released a new paperback of The Naughtiest Girl Again. This comes under the ‘drab’ category for me!

The Hodder years

From 1997 Hodder took over and have published four full sets of the three books, plus an extra one of the first.

The 1997 set are quite nice in my opinion. They are a little like the modern Hoddern Famous Five covers, and look almost as if they’ve done the same in taking an original cover and giving it a new banner etc. These are by Max Schindler. These are reused in 2000 with a ‘full colour’ badge added, also like the Famous Five. The first cover is also reused for the 2010 70th anniversary edition, cropped, flipped, and with a big border.

Hodder 1997 / Hodder 1997 / Hodder 1997 / Hodder 2000 / Hodder 2000 / Hodder 2000 / Hodder 2010

Then in 1999 they went very modern with two school covers and one that looks like it belongs on a Nancy Drew book, drawn by Paul Davies.

All Hodder 1999

In 2007 they went even more modern (and awful) with covers by Teresa Murfin that make you suspect the children are not altogether human at this school. I have an irrational dislike of the devil horns and tail they’ve added to the font. She’s a school girl acting out, firstly because she doesn’t want to be sent away from home and later because she has a very strong sense of right and wrong but a poor control of her temper. She’s not a devil.

Hodder 2007, Me 2019, Hodder 2007

The middle one is how I see these sort of covers. That’s the School of Roars cast (a series on CBeebies with the voice of Kathy Burke for those of you without toddlers).

Here’s how it really looks, not that different!

And in 2014 the children are also very modern but also angular as drawn by Kate Hindley.

All Hodder 2014

Here’s the Naughtiest Girl

Published as a stand-alone book in 1997, Here’s the Naughtiest Girl was first published in Enid Blyton’s Omnibus. It’s a short story rather than a novel but it’s now printed as a fourth book in the series.

Its first edition is the attractive Max Schindler one,

Then it got new covers in line with the other three books: bright Paul Davies, demonic/monstrous Teresa Murfin and angular Kate Hindley.

Hodder 1999 / Hodder 2007 / Hodder 2014

I’m not going to include covers from the Anne Digby continuations, but they had two sets each. One by Paul Davies and the other by Teresa Murfin. It’s probably sufficient to say they are entirely in-keeping with the style of the ones shown.

As usual, the best covers have to be the originals. Followed perhaps by the modern ones masquerading as old ones. Everyone has a soft spot for their childhood covers, no matter how bad, though!

 

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September 2019 round up

Posted on October 2, 2019 by Fiona

It’s September now, and judging by the sudden plummet in temperatures, Summer is firmly over!

What I have read

  • The Devil Wears Prada – Lauren Weisberger
  • The Well of Lost Plots (Thursday Next #3) – Jasper Fforde
  • When Did You Last See Your Father? (Chronicles of St Mary’s #10.5) – Jodi Taylor
  • The World I Fell Out Of – Melanie Reid
  • Revenge Wears Prada – Lauren Weisberger

And I’m still working on:

  • The Foyles Bookshop Girls at War (The Foyles Girls #2) – Elaine Roberts.
  • Bridget Jones’s Diary – Helen Fielding
  • Something Rotten (Thursday Next #4) – Jasper Fforde

I’ve taken a few new books out of the library this past week so I’d better get reading! I’ve slacked off this month so I’m only two books ahead of schedule now.

 

What I have watched

  • Hollyoaks
  • ER season 14 and some of 15
  • Only Connect
  • Series 6 and 7 of Call the Midwife which have recently come to Netflix.
  • Yet another series of Taskmaster
  • The Letdown, a Netflix original comedy about parenting. I cringed through the first episodes but it’s strangely relatable.
  • The Secret Garden (the 90s version with Maggie Smith)
  • Lots of episodes of the 90s Famous Five series on YouTube.
  • Smuggler’s Gold, the Famous Five Musical which I then reviewed.

What I have done

  • Stef came up to stay for the week, and after a bad start because we were all either ill or recovering from a stomach bug, we made two trips to St Andrews. We packed in the shops, (though we didn’t buy any books!!) the beach, the botanic gardens, cakes, and lots of walking.
  • We visited our local wildlife park and Brodie did his monkey noises when he spotted the gibbons and fed the goats some grass.
  • Went to a bookbug session in the big library as my local one was still closed for refurbishment.
  • Went for a walk/play in a country park and played at another centre with a huge maze/
  • Played at a few parks and fed the ducks.
  • Celebrated my 16 (!!) year anniversary with Ewan, (that is, quite literally, half my life!) by going for lunch and a walk along the Arbroath cliffs.
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Monday #339

Posted on September 30, 2019 by Fiona

 

September round up

and

The Naughtiest Girl in the School covers through the years

Far below the waterfall resolved itself into a winding river that curved round the foot of the mountain. The children could not see where it went to. The tumbling water shone and sparkled as it fell, and here and there rainbows shimmered. Lucy-Ann thought she had never seen a lovelier sight.

The Adventure Series children see the huge waterfall in the valley for the first time in The Valley of Adventure.

The Little Tree-House is the first of five books about Josie, Click and Bun. Josie is a doll, Click is a clockwork-mouse and Bun is a baby rabbit. They meet when Josie and Click run away from their unkind owner, and find Bun who has been left out by his family. They decide to start a home together and move into an empty home inside a hollow tree.

The books are all picture-strip style with four large illustrations per page with a short piece of text underneath.

 

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The Famous Five the Musical: Smuggler’s Gold

Posted on September 27, 2019 by Fiona

I had watched this musical once before, at Stef’s house, but I’d forgotten just about everything about it including the plot, songs and characters. We watched it at my house this time as I got it on DVD for my Christmas.

The stage play was on tour in 1997 for the hundredth anniversary of Enid Blyton’s birth.

 

The story

Like the 70s series’ first episode this is a slight amalgamation of two books. The 70s series combined the children meeting for the first time from Five on a Treasure Island with the main plot of the sixth book Five on Kirrin Island Again. The musical has combined the children’s meeting with the plot of Five Go Adventuring Again, the second book.

The musical then begins with Julian, Dick and Anne discussing having a cousin that they’ve never met. They then travel to Kirrin, meet their aunt and uncle, but not George right away. They are then introduced to Timmy who, as in the second book, is not a secret.

George tells (sings) them the tale of how Smuggler’s gold was reported to be hidden at Kirrin Farm, and tells them that two artists are renting it from that afternoon.

The end of the smugglers song

Mr Roland arrives to tutor them, and takes a dislike to Timmy. The Five explore Kirrin Farm and find a scrap of fabric with a map to a secret way on it. They hunt around Kirrin Farm, with no luck.

George has an argument with Mr Roland and Timmy is banned from the house and then some of Uncle Quentin’s work goes missing. She gets a talking-to in her father’s study and that’s when she finds the entrance to the secret way.

They all (oddly minus Timmy) explore the secret way, followed by Mr Roland, and find themselves at Kirrin Farm under attack from one of the artists. The tables are quickly turned though and it’s the artist in trouble. Everything is then tied up neatly, including one artist!

The Five prevail

How the story has been changed

Well, of course there are a lot of songs, but more about them later. Being a stage-play and having a set amount of time and budget, there are of course a lot of changes. What’s interesting is that there are various lines which are word-for-word from the books, a lot which are close enough to be recognisable, and then also there are many things which are completely different.

For example the children take the train alone to Kirrin, Kirrin Farm is an empty shell and there are no Mr and Mrs Sanders. The setting has been changed to the 1930s for no obvious reason, and George is the same age as Julian instead of Dick.

Mr Roland still comes to tutor them, all of them, as apparently they had poor exam results. It is George who sees him talking to the artists, before he later professes to not know them. Julian then follows him later and observes him talking to the artists at night and giving them a notebook.

The hidden gold is worked in quite neatly by changing George’s great-great-great Grandfather to her Great-great-grandmother who owned Kirrin Farm, and her smuggler brother who brought gold via a ship then a passage and cave before his ship went down.

Perhaps more understandably the snow has been changed to heavy rain and floods. Same effect of trapping them indoors without the requirement for fake snow and heavy coats under the theatre lights.

The end is very different. The children are under attack from Mr Roland and his gun and the two artists when Aunt Fanny opens the door to the secret way and knocks Mr Roland over. Julian ends up with the gun and Timmy sniffs out the hidden gold.

This never would have happened in the books!

The two artists, instead of being polite and well-mannered individuals who also happen to secretly be crooks are now a pair of very obvious spivs.

Also given the nature of what works on stage vs in a book, we meet the crooks Thomas and Wilton at the start and see them talking, arguing, and scheming a few times. I expect that gave the main cast a brief rest or opportunity to change clothing.

The songs

There are a lot of songs. More than I think I expected. Most of them are rather forgettable, unfortunately. The only one that sticks with me is One, two, three, four, five, we’re the Famous Five, and that’s because it’s used more than once. It’s not that the songs are bad, most just aren’t particularly catchy or memorable.

I’ve had to rewatch to have more to say about the songs. I remember there being one about Latin verbs as I made a note about that. At the time I said to Stef that they must have been desperate for song material to use that as a subject.

I did try to transcribe the songs while rewatching but I couldn’t catch all the words and there are no subtitles! Here is a rough list of the songs (names entirely made up by me), though and at least a few lines of each.

Song 1: Leaving London (Julian, Dick, Anne and two crooks)

Life in London can be tedious
What we need is a change of scene
Some may swear the air is cleaner
Grass is greener than grassy green
Anywhere but London
Anywhere but now
Just beyond the city lights there are starry nights to be seen
Higher heights to astound
Finer sights to be found

Our bags are packed
Our troubles are behind us
Adventures come and find us where the skies and seas are blue
Where dreams are made
As cream and lemonade
As castles built with sand command an oceanic view
Where pirates play
And have their wicked way
And damsels in distress confess their love for a handsome prince
When days are gone, when days are gone,
The night’s mysterious, mysterious,
Mysterious
Mysterious!

Can you feel the wind blow through your hair?
See the flowers dancing in the summer breeze
I can almost taste the salty air
And I’ve never seen so many trees
And what’s that beautiful building?
I don’t know but it’s very strange
Very spooky
The house they say is older than the hills
And every room inside can tell a different story
Of ghosts and ghouls!
Oh Dick, you’re such a fool!
It’s just as well I brought my toys as boys can be so funny and so boring

Far away from London
Far away from town
All aboard a fast approaching
[couldn’t catch this bit]
Ring the bell
Yell it to the world
Farewell London
Farewell London town

Continue reading →

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Letters to Enid 15: From volume 2 issue 3

Posted on September 25, 2019 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

This is the third magazine in a row that doesn’t have a letters page. Enid says in her newsletter I’m so sorry – but again there is no letters page for your letters this week. As you will see, there is a letter-page – but it is given up to the Best Letter we have ever had there. Aren’t you pleased?

She also writes in her opening letter  I am sorry we have no letter-page for you this time, but I am sure that all of us are gas to see it used for such a lovely letter – and to make up for missing it three times running I will award prizes to every letter I choose for the letter-page then, not just the top one. 

That doesn’t mean I want special letter-page letters. I don’t. I always choose the winning letters from your ordinary, every-day letters, which are written with no thought of being printed, and certainly no thought of a prize. The ordinary, every-day letters that we get from you are better than any made-up ones written merely in order to win  a prize!

Letters page from Volume 2, issue 3. February 3rd-16th 1954.

OUR

LETTER PAGE

Today this page is honoured by a message from Her Gracious Majesty, Queen Elizabeth the Second.

It is with much delight that I print it here, so that not only those thousands of my readers who went in such beautifully illustrated Christmas messages to Her Majesty may read it, but also so that each of us may rejoice in the honour paid to the prize-winners. Every reader shares in this, and we are so grateful to the children whose messages evoked such a gracious reply from our beloved queen.

I have received The Queen’s commands to express her Majesty’s sincere thanks to you for the beautifully bound volume containing twelve messages of Christmas greetings to The Queen from children throughout Great Britain. Her Majesty is delighted to have this collection of kind and loyal messages representative of so much affection on the part of great numbers of children. Please convey to those who contributed to it an expression of her sincere gratitude.

I know that The Queen almost never writes her own thank you letters, that would be a full-time job in its own right, but the way Enid goes on here you’d think Elizabeth had personally written a long a gushing letter!

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Monday #338

Posted on September 23, 2019 by Fiona

Letters to Enid part 15

and

The Famous Five the Musical: Smuggler’s Gold

“Mollie! Peter! Come quickly! The chair is growing its wings again!”

Chinky summons the children so that they can go on another adventure in Adventures of the Wishing Chair.

Mr Pink-Whistle is a righter of wrongs. It helps that he is half-brownie and half-human as it means he can use magic to help those who have been wronged, and punish those who have done the wronging.  He flits in and out of children’s lives, doing what he can to put things right. His only true friend is a cat called Sooty, as being only half-human adults tend to be quite wary of him, even if they’re not sure why.

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On my bookshelf part 6

Posted on September 20, 2019 by Fiona

I’ve covered all my Blytons now, and most of my childrens’ books, so I thought I would just give a quick overview of my other bookcase. This one is mostly books for grown-ups.

The detective/supernatural shelf

Not everything fits that category; the first ones are The Melancholy Death of Oyster Boy – Tim Burton, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time – Mark Haddon (which I’ve read four or five times at least), and The Masked City by Genevieve Cogman (need to read The Invisible Library on my Kindle before I can start this).

Then I have the ‘detective’ books. The Mirabelle Bevan mysteries by Sara Sheridan (Stef has recommended these as Blyton for Grown-Ups.) The Murdoch Mysteries (which the TV series is based on) by Maureen Jennings. And the Aurora Teagarden Mysteries by Charlaine Harris.

Then it’s more of Charlaine Harris, but moving into supernatural stuff now – the Harper Connelly series and some short story collections that she has contributed to.

There’s also a novelisation of a Captain America story in there (because it’s short and it sits on the too-tall Aurora Teagarden omnibus…)

And continuing with the supernatural theme last on this shelf are the Being Human books that tie in with the BBC programme of the same name.

More supernatural, amongst other things

More Charlaine Harris – the whole ‘Southern Vampires’ series upon which True Blood the TV series is based on.

Then a reasonable chunk of the ‘Undead’ series of vampire books by MaryJanice Davidson, which I really mean to re-read at some point. On top of those are a couple of her books in a series about mermaids. I’m missing the first one so I haven’t read them. In front is a valentine’s card I printed at home many years ago for Ewan.

After that it gets a bit random though mostly chick-lit; two of the Kate Shackleton mysteries by Frances Brody (others I’ve borrowed from the library or listed to from audible). How to Walk in High Heels by Camilla Morton, The Devil Wears Prada by Lauren Weisberg, The Goddess Experience and The Goddess Guide by Gisele Scanlon (the Guide being far better), and Wicked by Gregory Maguire. The last two are books I designed and had printed by Love Book for Ewan.

Nursing memoirs and fiction

Bar one this is all nursing-related.

The stack are memoirs by nurses and midwives; Linda Fairley, Evelyn Prentis and Jennifer Worth (whose books Call The Midwife based their long-running series on).

Next to the stack is another nursing memoir by Jennifer Craig, and a memoir about living in Dundee by Maureen Reynolds.

The rest of the books are historical fiction based on nurses, mostly around the first or second world wars.

There are some by Maggie Holt (who also wrote as Maggie Bennett when writing a loose series of nursing books), Maggie Hope, Jean Fullerton, and many by Donna Douglas.

A bit of a mixture

This is a mixture of grown-up and children’s.

A few more historical fiction and memoirs at the end;

Our Zoo by June Mottershead (ITV did a series based on this), War Girls short stories, Victory in My Hands by Russell and Rosen, The Story of my Life by Helen Keller. There’s also a biography of Florence Nightingale.

The next few may seem random but they are either books I’ve not read in a very long time, or have not managed to finish despite good intentions.

The Witch of Exmoor by Margaret Drabble (last read in high school), Lucky and The Almost Moon by Alice Sebold (read the first but didn’t get far with the second), The Time Traveller’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger (actually never been brave enough to start), Atonement by Ian McEwen (didn’t get past the first few chapters though I enjoyed the film). The entire Lord of the Rings by Tolkien (I’ve read Fellowship of the Ring and maybe the first chapter of The Two Towers), and The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde.

Starting the children’s books off is a novel by Stephen Gately – yes, of Boyzone – The Tree of Seasons. It’s the only book he wrote before he died suddenly, and I think it was actually finished by someone else but it was pretty good. A real shame there can’t be any more from him.

Then a whole load of Daniel Handler/Lemony Snickets. The All the Wrong Questions series and A Series of Unfortunate Events, plus a couple of additional titles which come into the same universe. On top of the last books is a little beanbag heart I made years ago.

The books shoved on top are Neil Gaiman’s Stardust, The Little Book of Hygge (apparently pronounced hoo-ga and not hie-g) and The Little Book of Going Green.

And on top of the bookcase

There’s not enough space on my shelves, I have more on top!

A special edition of Peter Pan by J.M Barrie with ten removable features and tons of colour illustrations, The Bookshop Book by Jen Campbell and Ripping Things to Do by Jane Brocket.

Some poems and plays; Selected Poems by Sylvia Plath, three plays by Noel Coward, A View from the Bridge/All My Sons by Arthur Miller (this must be Ewan’s actually as I don’t even recognise it…) and An Inspector Calls by J.B. Priestly.

And lastly my Famous Five stationery; the Smashing Notebook, Splendid Notes for Every Occasion and the postcard set which I’ve yet to do anything with.

Perhaps not as interesting to readers as my other shelves, but it shows the other sorts of things I read. And I like to be complete about things!

 

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Search terms 10

Posted on September 18, 2019 by Fiona

The latest Google searches, straight from the stats page.

Summaries

We get a whole load of searches looking for summaries every month. Quite often they are for a book, but equally often they want a poem or chapter summarised. Blyton’s poems generally fit on one page so it’s hard to shorten that into a summary! I wonder if people are using ‘summary’ in place of ‘review’ sometimes.

One of the best requests for a summary this month was:

Secret Seven Win Through by Enid Blyton summary in a dreadful blow.

I suspect there’s a chapter called a dreadful blow, but this search makes it sound like they want the summary delivered as a dreadful blow to them. Please, sit down, sir. This summary will come as a dreadful blow to you…

That’s not her name

Fat fingers and autocorrect have a lot to answer for, but I still laugh at the multitude of ways that people can spell Enid Blyton. Neither part seems particularly difficult to me, but both are equally misspelled.

Am I the only one who, on misspelling a search, clicks the correction on the ‘did you mean’ link? I do it even more now that I know that website owners are possibly laughing at their search term statistics.

Lately Enid’s name has been spelt:

  • Enind Blyton
  • Enid Bylton Bunny (to be fair they may have stuck bunny on the end referring to the content of the poems they were after)
  • Enid Blighten
  • Edid Blyton
  • Enid Biyon
  • Anid Blyton
  • Enid Bluton

She’s not the only one being misnamed, however.

I’ve also seen

  • Anunt fanny
  • Julan Kirrin
  • Pmela Cox
  • Eileen Rooper
  • Tasdie (from The Castle if Adventure, no less)

I just can’t help imagining the children bounding in fresh from the beach and asking What’s for lunch, Anunt Fanny? and her replying It’s your favourite meat-pie, today, Julan. I have an odd sense of humour perhaps.

Interesting questions

We usually get some interesting questions. Some are interesting as they throw up something I’ve never thought to ponder. Sometimes it’s because they’re just plain strange.

What can I learn when I read Malory Towers New Term story book? I’m not sure how to answer this. I’m not sure they want to hear that they’ll learn that Pamela Cox’s books aren’t as good as the originals.

Pamela Cox author of Malory Towers is she dead? No, she’s not. I had seen a rumour that she had died but it was confirmed in January that she was alive and well.

What is the mood of Famous Five Run Away Together? I don’t know that I could apply a mood to the whole of the book. There are periods of fear, anger, worry, but also joy and excitement.

Did Noddy have a willy? Probably not. If Blyton’s humans never needed to use a toilet I doubt she’d made a little wooden man anatomically correct.

Why did Enid Blyton w o n the award boys club of America? Why, because they thought that Mystery Island (the American name of The Island of Adventure) was the best book nominated.

Peter and Julian Enid Blyton fan fiction. I’m interested to know which Peter this refers to. Peter of the Secret Seven? Peter Longfield? Peter Frost? Peter Jackson? Or one of the other Peters from Blyton’s books. We have a Peter in our fan fiction but ours is Petronella Sterling from Malcolm Saville’s Lone Pine books.

The Castle of Adventure question their is something about the castle on hill why is everyone afraid of it what secret lurk its door describe the castle in 200-250 words. I’m not sure where to start on this. The local people are afraid because of old superstition about the old man who once lived there. The secret ‘lurking’ is that it is being used by spies. The very specific request for a description of the castle baffles me.

What colour ties do they wear at Mallory Towers? I don’t believe that it’s ever mentioned. The Malory (ONE L!) Towers uniform is described as Brown coat, brown hat, orange ribbon, and a brown tunic underneath with an orange belt. Based on that, I would guess that it’s either brown or orange! Perhaps both. There are covers showing orange ties, brown ties, orange and brown stripy ties, red and white stripy ties… but some of these show the girls in skirts and blazers that don’t match the brown/orange description given by Blyton and therefore probably aren’t to be trusted!

Why do schools no longer have Enid Blyton on the shelf? I hope that’s not true – but if it is, it is because misguided staff still believe that her books are too simple, or that they are too racist.

George Kirrin in love. This intrigued me as, despite pairing off the rest of the Famous Five, George remains a loner in our fan fiction. We just haven’t worked out who she might settle down with, apart from Timmy! I’ve briefly paired her with Jack Trent and Philip Mannering, but neither date went well.

Pronounce Alicia Malory Towers. Well, I know I had this wrong for a while. In my head it was Alice-ah, pronounced exactly as you would Alice, followed by an ah sound. My friend kindly corrected me that it was Aliss-ay-a, with the emphasis on the liss part. Nowadays Ah-leesh-ah is probably a preferred way of pronouncing it.

 

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Monday #337

Posted on September 16, 2019 by Fiona

Search terms #10

and

On my bookshelf 6

Fifth Formers of St Clare’s is not the fifth book in the series, even it it sounds like it should be. It is actually the sixth and final book, after three books in the first form, one in the second and one in the fourth.

There are three new girls this year; Anne-Marie Longden who considers herself a great poet, Felicity Ray who is actually a great musician who has moved up a form, and Alma Pudden who has been kept down from the sixth form. Further down the school there is also Antoinette, a sister of Claudine’s.

Each of the new girls creates some sort of drama or interest; but the star of the book has to be Mam’zelle who, upon thinking the school is full of burglars ends up locking several girls in cupboards.

Naomi Barlow lives at Ring O’ Bells Cottage in Ring O’ Bells Wood. When the Lyntons (and Barney) meet her they are immediately taken with how she resembles an elderly Red Riding Hood. They think she is perhaps a witch, as she has green eyes, and Ring O’ Bells is the sort of place where you could easily believe in witches. She is a descendent of Old Mother Barlow, who, as the legends say, was once threatened by a pack of wolves. She was saved when the bells of Ring O’ Bells hall rang out and alerted the villagers to the danger. So, perhaps there is some magic in her family!

ring o bells mystery

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Code reader from The Famous Five’s Survival Guide

Posted on September 15, 2019 by Fiona

Published in 2008, The Famous Five’s Survival Guide is now, as far as I know, sold out and out-of-print. There may be a few copies lurking in bookshops but on the whole if you want one; you’ll need to go for second-hand.

There’s just one problem with that. The book should come with a code reader – a thin bit of card with holes cut in it, attached to the book by a bit of red ribbon. Unfortunately the second-hand copies often miss this. Either the previous owner has untied it to use it (though it’s long enough to reach without doing so) or it has accidentally pulled free.

I know this because I have had three or four people contact me in the last year or two with the same story. They had bought a second-hand copy of the book, and it was missing the code reader. I’ve sent photos, and more recently scans of my code reader to these people, so that they can decode the letter on page 31. I’m not sure that it’s integral to solving the mystery, but it must be frustrating for readers for it to be missing none the less.

Anyway, I thought that I should just put the code reader on here so that anyone who needs it can save a copy and print it out, without having to wait for me to read my emails and send a reply. It’s taken me this long, though, as I kept forgetting to take it into work, but I now have my own scanner. So here it is! (And as you can see the hole on the left where the ribbon was tied is almost torn through).

When printed the code reader should be roughly 15cm wide and 10.5cm tall, so you may have to fiddle with your printer settings to get it the right size.

I will also include the secret message you are trying to reveal:

Royal dragon of Siam stolen from king of Siam. It is in my possession. You must return the Dragon. If you fail there will be war.

I’ve made the text above white so I don’t spoil it for you, but you can click and drag to highlight and read it if you need the extra help.

Happy code cracking!

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If you like Blyton: The Cherrys by Will Scott

Posted on September 13, 2019 by Fiona

I’ll begin this with two points:

One – I feel bad about recommending this series because the books are quite hard to find and rather expensive when they are for sale. But not bad enough to not write this post.

Two – That’s not a grammatical error in the title. The family’s surname is Cherry. When talking about them they are The Cherrys. I know it looks really wrong, but it isn’t.

The Cherry series

There are fourteen books in Will Scott’s Cherry series, published from 1952 to 1965.

The Cherrys of River House (1952)
The Cherrys and Company (1953)
The Cherrys by the Sea (1954)
The Cherrys and the Pringles (1955)
The Cherrys and the Galleon (1956)
The Cherrys and the Double Arrow (1957)
The Cherrys on Indoor Island (1958)
The Cherrys on Zigzag Trail (1959)
The Cherrys’ Mystery Holiday (1960)
The Cherrys and Silent Sam (1961)
The Cherrys’ Famous Case (1962)
The Cherrys to the Rescue (1963)
The Cherrys in the Snow (1964)
The Cherrys and the Blue Balloon (1965)

I’ve got two Cherrys book. Book 12, The Cherrys to the Rescue was my mum’s, and book 11 The Cherrys’ Famous Case was given to me by a very generous stranger in return for some special edition stamps. It wasn’t as weird as that sounds. A lady posted on the Enid Blyton Society Forums that she had a copy of a Cherrys book and she’d like it to go to a good home. I was the first to respond and she offered to post it to me, her only request was that I send her some British stamps in return.

The first twelve books are illustrated by Lilian Buchanan (who did five of the Find-Outers books), though I can’t find any information on the last two books.

An illustration from The Cherrys to the Rescue on the left, and one from The Cherrys’ Famous Case on the right.

What are the books about?

The Cherrys are a family of four children, Jimmy, Jane, Roy and Pam, and their parents, Captain and Mrs Cherry, and also their monkey Mr Watson, and parrot Joseph.

Captain Cherry, a retired explorer, likes to create mysteries and adventures for his children. These they call ‘happenings’ and together they explore, solve, hunt, search, investigate, hide, escape… and generally have a very jolly time. The happenings occur in several fictional places, set around the Kent coast mainly. Market Cray, St Mary’s Cray, St Denis Bay, and so on are loosely based on real places.

In some of the books they are joined by others such as the Pringle family and the Wilks family.

The Cherrys’ Famous Case

This book begins with the children moping. Captain Cherry is away and as [he] was always the one to get things going when you had nothing to do. His ‘happenings’ as they were called – those wonderful adventure games that were better than any games you ever thought of – were famous with the Cherrys and the Pringles and Mr Wilks next door.

Roy is reading a detective book and says it would be fun to try to follow clues. It’s just his luck that the next day Captain Cherry takes them to visit a professor friend, and he just so happens to have lost a parcel. Perhaps it was stolen! The Cherrys form a police force and must put together a suspect list, find clues and investigate this crime.

Of course this is another ‘happening’ all set up by the Bigs (as the adults are known). The Littles (as the children are known) solve it in the end, having worked out that the real culprits are Captain Cherry, Mr Wilks and Mr Pringle.

The Cherrys to the Rescue

In The Cherrys to the Rescue, it’s Jimmy who gets the idea for the happening, when his father tells a story about rescuing a professor from the jungle.

Suddenly Jimmy gave a jump. “That would be a good idea!”

Everyone was interested, because ideas for ‘happenings’, their own wonderful adventure games, were always so very welcome at River House.

“If only we could have a missing professor we could organize a relief expedition and rescue him.”

“Absolutely smashing!” cried Joe Pringle. “It would take hours and hours!”

Captain Cherry offers to be the professor, but Roy decides it isn’t fair – poor father always does the organising of the happenings and thus can’t take part. Before they can argue too much about it, Mr Wilks’s brother from the Isle of Wight arrives. They invite him to join their picnic, but he never returns from taking his car to the garage.

I haven’t had time to reread this so I’m not sure how long it takes them to realise that Mr Wilks’s brother has taken the role of the missing professor. Either way, they throw themselves into trying to find him. Things are muddled by the involvement of two mysterious boys they nickname Thin and Fat, as the Cherrys follow the trail Mr Wilks’s brother has left.

Of course they reunite with Mr Wilks’s brother in the end, and the solutions to various puzzles are revealed.

Like Blyton but not like Blyton

Featuring nice, middle-class children of the 1950s having adventures, Enid Blyton and Will Scott’s books have a lot in common

However, there is one huge difference between Scott’s stories and Blyton’s. In Blyton’s books parents are generally packed off as soon as possible – through trips abroad, hospitalisation, caring for sick relatives, or the children themselves go off on camping/hiking/walking/cycling tours to get away from authority. Only then can they fall into hair-raising danger.

Will Scott, however, has not only the Cherry parents but also the Pringles and Wilks parents as well as other adults just as embroiled in the happenings as the children are. Of course the treasure hunt or kidnap trails are all entirely fictional, but everyone enters with such enthusiasm that they become very real. The clues and trails are just as satisfying as are any solutions made.

Much like Blyton’s stories, the Cherrys’ tales are supported by lovely covers and illustrations, by Lilian Buchanan as I mentioned above. What they also have are endpaper maps, illustrating the areas in which the book’s happenings take place.

On the left is the map from The Cherrys to the Rescue (unfortunately my book is an ex-library copy and the left of the map is missing from the front, and the right is missing in the back. I was able to scan each part separately and put them back together though!), and on the right is the one from The Cherrys’ Famous Case.

So if you ever stumble upon a Cherrys book I heartily recommend them, and I can only hope that one day I can find some more of them myself.

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Letters to Enid 14: From volume 2 issue 2

Posted on September 11, 2019 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Again there is no regular letters page as instead we have the remaining prize winners from the Christmas competition.

From the newsletter at the back of the magazine:

NO LETTER PAGE. I am giving this up again in order to complete the list of the Queen’s-Message prize-winning names. It is so very exciting to see your name in print, isn’t it, and fathers and mothers like to see it too. All parents are delighted when one of their children does well. You should just see some of the letters I get from your mothers when you succeed in anything!

Competition winners from Volume 2, issue 2. January 20th-February 2nd 1954

OUR CHRISTMAS COMPETITION

Here are the rest of the messages sent to the queen.

I am sending you and the Duke of Edinburgh, best wishes for a very Happy Christmas, from my two little sisters and myself. We hope you have an enjoyable time in New Zealand and that the rest of your tour will be just as pleasant.
Vivian Matthews, aged 9,
Grays, Essex.

On behalf of the children of Horton Bank Top Primary School, I send you our warmest wishes for a Merry Christmas. Although you are hundreds of miles away I know that every British boy and girl is thinking of you today, and we hope that when you think of  your own children you will also remember us.
June Lombers, aged 10,
Bradford, Yorks.

Christmas Greetings and New Years Wishes from the children of Wivenhoe County Primary School. We hope you and the Duke of Edinburgh will enjoy yourselves on your tour of the Commonwealth.
Shane Parker, aged 10, 
Wivenhoe, Essex

My dear and much loved Queen,
Most gracious lady ever seen,
First sovereign round the world to fly,
Emblem of peace none can deny.
May your Christmas happy be
With all your Empire family.
A day with all your peoples dead,
So memorable in future years.
When you return our cry will be,
“God bless our Queen and long live she.”
Denise Yarker, aged 11,
Burley-in-Wharfe, Yorks.

As Christmas draws near and you are so far away from those who are nearest and dearest to you, may I, in my small way, wish you the happiest Christmas ever.
As you are taking your message of Goodwill and friendship to all your subjects overseas, we shall be thinking of you here at home, and when we hear your voice speaking to us on Christmas Day you will not seem so very far away from us.
Please accept my greeting as coming from all your children here in England.
Margaret Peat, aged 13,
Sheffield, Yorks.

The Children of Cholmondeley School would like to wish you and the Duke of Edinburgh a Happy Christmas and Prosperous New Year. We will all be thinking of you in England and looking forward to hearing your voice. We offer our sincere good wishes for a long, happy and peaceful reign.
Marjorie Griffiths, aged 14,
Malpas, Cheshire

 

I wonder if Marjorie ever thought that the Queen’s reign would still be going 65 years later?

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Monday #336

Posted on September 9, 2019 by Fiona

Letters to Enid part 14

and

If you like Blyton: The Cherrys by Will Scott

The Twins at St Clare’s is the first book in the St Clare’s series. The titular twins, Pat and Isabel don’t want to go to St Clare’s, they want to go somewhere much posher, so when they get to St Clare’s they rebel and refuse to follow the rules. They only make things miserable for themselves, however, and soon realise that St Clare’s is a good school, and perhaps their classmates could be good friends too.

Jimmy Brown starts out the Galliano’s Circus books as a pretty average child. Actually, that doesn’t really change, he stays down-to-earth and kind, but instead of average village child be becomes average circus child. He and his family join Galliano’s Circus, and Jimmy quickly makes friends with more of less everyone in the circus, always helping out and enjoying all the wonderful experiences that go along with living in a working circus.

He even becomes a performer himself after teaching his beloved dog Lucky to do tricks.

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On my bookshelf part 5

Posted on September 6, 2019 by Fiona

I have written about most of my Blyton books already, but there are more children’s books in my collection. I have another shelf of mostly vintage books and one of mostly newer ones, which also has my collection of Blyton biographies.

Some vintage children’s books

From the left;

Tom’s Midnight Garden by Phillipa Pearce in a 1970s edition formerly a library book.

An huge hardback omnibus of the first four Borrowers books by Mary Norton and a paperback of the last book The Borrower’s Avenged.

The Princess Bride by William Goldman (this is actually a recent paperback).

Jean Becomes a Nurse by Yvonne Trewin.

The Swiss Family Robinson by Johann David Wyss. I absolutely love the film but have never finished the book as I found it quite slow.

The Story of The Treasure Seekers by E. Nesbit, which I liked but it’s not what I expected from the title. It’s more akin to The Family at Red Roofs than The Treasure Hunters.

Two ‘Cherries’ titles by Will Scott (these are so hard to find!) The Cherrys to the Rescue and The Cherrys’ Famous Case.

The Treasure of Trevellyans by Doris Pocock (bought just because I liked the cover).

Torridon’s Surprise by Mary Muir, this is set in Scotland and I’m looking for the first in the series so I can start reading.

The Secret of the Loch and The Secret of Grange Farm by Frances Cowen.

Then I have some Collin’s Seagull Library books, I love the spines on these and can’t resist if I see them going cheaply in charity shops. They are The Harveys See it Through by Phyllis Gegan, The Children of Primrose Lane by Noel Streatfeild (I have more of hers further along the shelf), The Red Flower Mystery by Juliet Marais Louw, and A Mystery for Ninepence by Phyllis Gegan.

I should put Torridon’s Surprise by the other Seagull Library books, and put the two Phyllis Gegans together – I’m seriously looking at my shelves anew doing these posts.

After that is Sue Barton Student Nurse by Helen Dore Boylston.

Then some school books – Queen of the Daffodils by Leslie Laing, Three Terms at Uplands, The Leader of the Lower School and The School at the Chalet all by Angela Brazil. I’m now questioning why I’ve split my Angela Brazils onto two shelves and how to fix it. Lastly, Kits at Clynton Court School by May Wynne.

Finally, the rest of the Noel Streatfeilds. Party Frock, Ballet Shoes, Apple Bough, The Painted Garden, By Special Request and The Fearless Treasure.

I have to admit I haven’t read quite a lot of these books! I just couldn’t help buying them because they look nice!  At a rough count I have read 14 out of the 29, so not quite half.

Some newer children’s books amongst other things

First, which you can barely see, is The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, a special edition with the characters names changed to that of my family. It was a present. I’ve read the story but not in that edition, as I find it really weird!

Then are my Roald Dahls (not the most modern of children’s books, but newer than a lot of what I have on my other shelves);

Storyteller, the Life of Roald Dahl by Donald Sturrock, which I’ve only ever read the first chapter or so of.

The Magic Finger, Esio Trot, Fantastic Mr Fox, James and the Giant Peach, The BFG, The Roald Dahl Diary 1997, Boy and Going Solo, Danny Champion of the World, George’s Marvellous Medicine, The Wonderful Story of Henry Sugar and Other Stories, The Witches, The Twits, and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and The Great Glass Elevator.

I should also have a copy of Matilda, but I think I might have lent it to my sister. As you can see lots of the Dahls are very well read. My favourites are mostly the longer one; The BFG, The Witches, Matilda and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.

Then some much newer stuff: Diamonds and Daggers by Elen Caldecott, Mr Lemoncello’s Library Olympics (I have read two more in this series, and they are great literary and inventive fun) by Chris Grabenstein, Pea’s Book of Holidays and Pea’s Book of Big Dreams by Susie Day. I have reviewed Pea’s Book of Holidays as it has a Blyton connection.

I have the whole Anastasia Krupnik series by Lois Lowry, they have been read so many times that they are falling apart. The omnibus of the first three books actually has a chunk missing and I really need to get a new copy so I can re-read. In a similar vein, two of the Little Sister books by Allan Frewin Jones. There are a dozen or more of these and I’d love to find some more.

Some classics from the Parragon library. My aunt used to buy me boxed sets of these for my birthdays, so I had dozens but I only kept my favourites (I don’t think I even read them all). I have; A Little Princess by Frances Hodgeson Burnett, Treasure Island by R. L. Stevenson, What Katy Did by Susan M Coolidge (not sure why I didn’t keep the rest of the Katy books!), and Heidi by Johanna Spyri. I’m also wondering why I didn’t keep ones like The Secret Garden! I would like to replace some of these with older editions, if it weren’t for considerations of money and space!

Anyway. Another Noel Streatfeild, Ballet Shoes for Anna, Love From Greg by Maureen Stewart (I’d love to find Dear Emily by the same author, to find out more about Emily, who Greg is writing to in his book).

Then we are back to Blyton stuff! There are four of the Famous Five Adventure Game Books, some with the dice and cards still there. The Whispering Island, The Shuddering Mountain, The Wailing Lighthouse and The Secret Airfield. I’ve never played any of them, and there are eight in total.

The rest are biographies/autobiographies. Enid Blyton by George Greenfield (her literary agent) Enid Blyton and her Enchantment with Dorset by Andrew Norman, So You Think You Know Enid Blyton’s Famous Five? by Clive Gifford (actually a quiz book), Looking For Enid by Duncan MacLaren (gets slated by many fans but I enjoyed it), A Childhood at Green Hedges by Imogen Smallwood (Blyton’s younger daughter), Tell Me About Enid Blyton by Gillian Baverstock (Blyton’s older daughter), Enid Blyton at Old Thatch by Tess Livingstone, Enid Blyton by Barbara Stoney (the seminal biography), The Story of My Life by Enid herself, The Famous Five; Everything You Wanted to Know by Norman Price, and The Enid Blyton Story by Bob Mullan. I’ve also recently purchased The Blyton Phenomenon by Sheila Ray and slotted that in beside the Stoney biography.

On top are;

The Clue of the Velvet Mask by Carolyn Keene. I have hundreds of Nancy Drews but this is my only vintage hardback. The rest are 80s and 90s paperbacks are are stacked in my wardrobe.

The Parent Trap by Erich Kastner, which is really quite different from either of the movies.

The Railway Children by E Nesbit. I’ve not read this edition but I have read the book at least twice before.

The Mysterious Boy by Julie Robinson.

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August 2019 round up

Posted on September 4, 2019 by Fiona

It’s September now, and judging by the sudden plummet in temperatures, Summer is firmly over!

What I have read

I did quite well even though I didn’t read much the week I was on holiday. I spent several evenings in the hot tub then, though, and I thought it inadvisable to take a book in with me! I’m still six books ahead of schedule so I’m doing fine.

What I finished in August:

  • Baby. Boom! – Helen Wallen
  • The Mummy Lessons – Helen Wallen
  • Outlander (Outlander #1) – Diana Gabaldon
  • Discovering Scotland’s Lost Local Lines – Julian Holland*
  • Lost in a Good Book (Thursday Next #2) – Jasper Fforde
  • Lies We Tell Mothers – Suzy K. Quinn
  • The Clippie Girls – Margaret Dickinson
  • The Foyles Bookshop Girls (The Foyles Girls #1) – Elaine Roberts

And I’m still working on:

  • The Foyles Bookshop Girls at War (The Foyles Girls #2) – Elaine Roberts.
  • The Well of Lost Plots (Thursday Next #3) – Jasper Fforde
  • The Devil Wears Prada – Lauren Weisberger
*Probably not the Julian Holland from The Naughtiest Girl books.

I made the same mistake this month and started on the second Foyles Girls book, not realising it was the second in the series. I then read the first, and as I’ve started the second feel I should finish it even though the first wasn’t that great.

Talking of ‘not great’ I (and this is rare) do not recommend The Clippie Girls unless you want to be 30% bored, 30% irritated by almost all the main characters, 10% incredulous at the ridiculous birth details, and 20% in a rage at the hundreds of times the lead female characters bite their lips. The remaining 10% was probably OK. So far in the Foyles Girls books there has only been half a dozen lip-bitings, though most have ended in the metallic taste of blood. Who are these lip chewing women and how have they not disfigured themselves to the point of no return??

Ahem. Anyway, does anyone else find it hard to give up on a rubbish book?

What I have watched

  • Hollyoaks
  • ER season 13
  • The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. I’m inclined to try the book now.
  • Murder She Wrote season 5

What I have done

  • Found a few more Oor Wullies
  • Brodie turned two (how??) and had a party
  • Visited the St Andrews Sea Life Centre
  • Organised a LOT of crisp packets for charity
  • Launched my board game library
  • Went on holiday! We stayed on a farm near Banchory in Aberdeenshire, and visited somewhere new every day. We went to Crathes Castle (lovely gardens and an adventure playground), The Deeside Vintage Steam Rally (lots of vintage tractors and other vehicles), The Den and The Glen (lots of life-sized fairy-tale and nursery rhyme characters, castles, vehicles and play parks in a huge garden), Stonehaven beach and park, the Grampian Transport Museum, and the Brechin Castle Centre (no castle, but a large play park with sledges and pedal carts etc).
  • Went to our favourite beach for a paddle and sandcastles, and found a crab and some shrimp-like things

 

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Monday #335

Posted on September 2, 2019 by Fiona

August round up

and

On my bookshelf part 5

The Mystery of the Vanished Prince is the ninth mystery for the Five-Find Outers. As the title suggests the mystery is that a young prince has gone missing. Having already dressed up as the prince’s family, the Five-Find Outers realise that they have significantly muddied the waters of Mr Goon’s investigation, and so it’s up to them to find him. Their clues take them to a baby show, looking for twins, and with a little help from Ern and his brothers, they of course solve the mystery.

Lucian is the unfortunate nephew of Mr and Mrs Eppy,  who are taking a cruise along with the Mannering/Trent children and Mrs Mannering. He latches onto the children straight away as they are the only ones of his age aboard. Although he irritates them at times by being a bit weedy and repeating oh I say a million times, he comes in very useful as a translator and haggler when Lucy-Ann wants to buy a present for Philip’s birthday. It is of course that present which starts the whole adventure. He also screws up his courage near the end of the book to help the children after they have fallen into his uncle’s clutches. I always hope that he is happier once his uncle is out of his life.

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Letters to Enid 13: From volume 2 issue 1

Posted on August 30, 2019 by Fiona

I have done all the letters page from the issues of volume 1, and now we have reached the start of volume 2. Previous letters pages can be found here.

There is actually not a letters page in this volume. There are, however, pieces written and sent in by children so I will include them, as part of the idea of this series is to create a digital record of the children’s names and letters so that they might find them again as adults.

Blyton says in her newsletter at the back:

OUR LETTER-PAGE. None this week, because I am giving it up to something MUCH MORE IMPORTANT.

Competition winners from Volume 2, issue 1. January 6th-19th 1954

OUR CHRISTMAS COMPETITION

I know you will all want to read the twelve messages which were chosen to be sent to the Queen, so here are some of them. I am afraid that I haven’t got room for them all this time, but I will give you the rest in our next number. I am starting with the youngest prize-winner!

Your Gracious Majesty,
Best wishes for a Happy Christmas and Speedy return to your Family and to us all in the New Year.

Jill Rawlinson, aged 6.
Barrow-in-Furness.

A very happy christmas to our most gracious and beloved Queen Elizabeth II, in your realms across the seas.
May their blue skies and sunshine bring you health and happiness, and may your visit to distant lands help to bring peace on earth and good will among men at all times.
May God protect you on your journey and bring you safely home again.

Suzanne Maiden, aged 7.
Heaton Moor, Stockport.

Our Very Dear Queen,
I am very happy to be able to write to you this Christmas and hope the visit to your people in other countries will be interesting and enjoyable.
I would like to say to you this Christmas Day, God bless and keep you safe always.

Patricia Salmon, aged 7.
Ipswich.

May this tour bring great pleasure and happiness to your Majesty and to H.R.H. the Duke of Edinburgh. May it also bring great joy to the people whose lands you are visiting. May the Infant Jesus bless your children this Christmas – and all children throughout the world.

Madeleine Exworthy, aged 8.
Southport.

Your Gracious Majesty,
Loving Christmas Greetings to you and the Duke of Edinburgh.
Best wishes for a happy and successful tour and a safe return to your dear children.

Jim McMaster, aged 9, Co. Down, N. Ireland.

 

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On my bookshelf part 4

Posted on August 28, 2019 by Fiona

I’ve already shown you most of my Blyton collection, as well as my Harry Potter books and some other stuff. So here are the last of my Blytons and then some other vintage children’s book.

The last of the Blytons

These fall into two main categories: school series, and stand-alone titles. Most of the stand-alones are family titles though some are young family and others are for older children. Then at the end are some random non-Blytons.

From the left;

Shadow the Sheep Dog (because it is tall…) then three Naughtiest Girl books, the six Malory Towers titles and the six St Clare’s books, plus Mischief at St Rollos which although a Mary Pollock title is also set in a school.

Younger family type stand alones are Snowball the Pony, Four in a Family, Run About’s Holiday (which should probably be shelved with the fantasy books), Four in a Family, The Very Big Secret and The Boy Who Wanted a Dog.

Then stand alone family books for older children, Holiday House (arguably a bit more of an adventure title than a family one), The Put-Em-Rights, The Six Bad Boys, The Family at Red Roofs, House-at-the-Corner, Hollow Tree House, Those Dreadful Children, The Happy House Children (probably for younger children.)

I have a spreadsheet to track my Blytons, organised by general genre (adventure, family, farm, school etc). There are lots of series, so those books are easy to categorise but with the stand-alones I use the categories in the Cave of Books. I’ve noticed, though, that my shelves don’t match the spreadsheet, as book shelving has more factors than just categories. Book depth and height are important as they affect the way the shelves look, too tall or too deep and a book can hide its neighbour. Thickness is less important but I think books look better when they’re roughly the same size.

Space on a shelf is also a factor, as you don’t want a series split across two shelves. Then there’s colour, spine style, dustjackets… it’s a bookish minefield!

Anyway, the non-Blytons on this shelf are;

The Prince and the Goblin by George MacDonald (one of Blyton’s favourite childhood books), The Nursery Peter Pan by J.M. Barrie, Winnie the Pooh and The House at Pooh Corner by A.A. Milne, Kristie at College and Dangerous Deadline by Mildred Benson (one of the first writers of the Nancy Drew books).

On the front of the shelf are;

A cassette tape of The Sound of Music soundtrack. I’ve never listened to this, actually, as I don’t have a tape player! I got this when my great uncle died and I helped to clear out his house. I just thought it was a nice cover, I love the film, and when I see it on my shelf I remember him.

A copy of Hello Mary Mouse, my first picture strip book which my mum bought in a local antiques shop for me.

A canvas of a stag’s head made by my mother in law. It rather obscures the books behind it, but it’s one of those items that gets moved around regularly as Brodie is forever knocking it down.

On top of the books ar four slim volumes;

Santa Claus Gets Busy (A Wheaton musical play for juniors), The Enchanted Village (about Bekonscot), and two Adventures in Reading by the Oxford University Press. These are on top as they are such slim paperbacks they would get lost otherwise.

A mostly Malcolm Saville shelf

At least two thirds of this shelf are Malcolm Saville books, followed by some random titles by various authors from a similar time period.

Here is the full Lone Pine series by Malcolm Saville. Most of them are original harbacks, but two of the later ones are Girls Gone By reprints, and the last one is an Armada paperback as that was the first edition. Then there are the radio play scripts of the first three books (in the wrong order, I now notice.) Next to those is a stand alone title The Master of Maryknoll.

Then there are two of the Cherry Ames nursing series by Helen Wells, and The Hidden Valley Mystery by the same author.

Next is Coral Island by R.M. Ballantyne (another of Blyton’s favourite childhood books).

Lastly a few school books by two famous authors in the genre – The School on the Moor and An Exciting Term by Angela Brazil, and Song of the Abbey by Elsie J. Oxenham.

In front of the books are;

A postcard showing Ingles Farm, and a lone pine cone picked up by Brodie somewhere.

Next time I will show you the rest of my children’s books.

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Monday #334

Posted on August 26, 2019 by Fiona

On my bookshelf part 4

and

Letters to Enid part 13

Fancy – you never would clean Daddy’s bicycle for him when he asked you to. I suppose it’s because you’ll get a shilling from Mr. Fraser – and Mummy said you ought to do it for Daddy’s love.

Linda is rather cutting to her older brother Roddy in Four in a Family.

Five on a Secret Trail is the Famous Five’s fifteenth adventure. Because Timmy has hurt himself and people keep laughing at his special protective collar, George takes him camping on Kirrin Common where Anne joins her later. Forced to take shelter in a half-ruined cottage because of terrible weather, they experience a frightening night of lights, noises and a face at the window. Thankfully the boys arrive soon after and together they start to look into what’s going on, aided, or perhaps hindered by twins Guy and Harry who aren’t talking or even acknowledging each other at the time.

 

 

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Letters to Enid 12: From volume 1 issue 21

Posted on August 23, 2019 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Letters page from Volume 1, issue 21. December 23 1963 – January 5 1954

OUR

LETTER PAGE

 1. A letter from Ann Coutts, St. Bride’s Nr. Onick, by Fort William, Scotland.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I have a cat called Ginger. We both earn sixpence every week. Ginger earns his sixpence by catching mice, and I earn mine doing odd jobs about the house. I enclose a shilling for the Sunbeam Society from us both. Isn’t it nice to think that animals as well a human beings can help Blind Children?
Love from
Ann Coutts

(It’s nice to think that the two of you are so generous, Ann!)

2. A letter from Barbara Anthony, R.A.S.C., H.Q. M.E.L.F.6, Benghazi.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I have a tortoise called Timmy. The other day he was invited to a party at my friend Norma’s house. She has three tortoises and their names are Jigs, Spot and Joey. It was Joey’s birthday, so it was his party. Norma made a cake out of a cucumber, and they had lots of other things they like. I must close now.
Yours sincerely,
Barbara Anthony.

(I would have loved to see the tortoise party, Barbara!)

3. A letter from Wendy Pickett, 3 Canon Square, Melksham, Wilts.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I am a member of the Sunbeams, and as it is near Christmas I want to make a blind girl happy by giving her my doll which I was lucky enough to win a little while ago. I would like a little girls with either the name of Wendy of Elizabeth to have it as those are my names. Wishing you a happy Christmas from
Wendy Pickett.

(A very kind thought, Wendy. Thank you very much!)

 

More letters from girls this issue, but it’s good to see a letter from Scotland, possibly the first one? Though I wonder what Ginger normally spends his sixpence on!

Barbara’s address almost looks as if it’s written in code but I have deduced that it stands for Royal Army Service Corps Head Quarters, Middle East Land Forces. Can’t say I would like a cucumber for a cake, but it sounds perfect for tortoises. I must admit I had a laugh at the abrupt “I must close now.”

I wonder who got Wendy’s doll in the end, if there was a Wendy or Elizabeth there to receive it.

(Unfortunately my copy of this magazine is missing its front cover, and that is the only image I could find online).

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