Reading The Mountain of Adventure to Brodie

Posted on September 29, 2024 by Fiona

I actually got confused today (it really doesn’t take much!) as I was idly trying to work out what part of Mountain we had got to, but couldn’t remember. We’re actually reading Circus at the moment, but as I’ve spent this week skimming through Mountain to remind me of all the things Brodie said, it felt as if we had just read it.

We actually read it from the 7th of August to the 29th of August – so I’m catching up!

A book of many emotions

I know that some people dislike this one (or at least, like it less) as they are not fans of the weird sci-fi stuff, and they find the Welsh whateffers to be silly and over-the-top. Brodie had a lot of feelings, but none of them were of dislike.

Horror

The idea that there might be wolves prowling around

The notion of men being forced to jump to their deaths

Even more so that one of the children might have to try out the wings

Dismay/despair

That David and the donkeys had abandoned the children and left them lost

That the helicopter wouldn’t fly, that they lost in the mountain, and that  someone’s coming up the ladder just as they are so close to escape… I swear he was quite breathless!

Fear

When the wolves came back at night and get between Philip and the cave he was quite frightened and wanted to sit close to me, and again when the dogs are hunting them near the end

Worry

He was extremely concerned about Kiki when she’s separated from Jack, and kept asking if they’d find her again. He was afraid the men would hurt her, and then that she wouldn’t make it out of the mountain with the others.

Relief

When the wolves turn out to be dogs

When Kiki is heard (and obviously alive), and when she flies out to join them once they’ve escaped.

Confusion

He was baffled by the cave – though he thought the wheel might drain the pool and lead to an entrance under water.

He wasn’t sure whether or not to believe in these marvellous wings (the story does seem to suggest that there ARE anti-gravity rays in the mountain) and kept asking me if they were really real. I think he’d love to have had a go if they were.

Disappointment

He really had hoped that Philip could keep all the dogs, and snowy!

Joy

As always he loved all of Kiki’s antics, and was particularly pleased that she saved the day again. As he put it

Kiki always confuses the bad guys and scares them off!

He also loved them feeding Philip secretly.

Reading aloud

This one required probably the most amount of thinking on my feet to adapt as I read.

There’s some irritating ‘poor weak girls’ stuff in this one, and also a lot of problems with the way Sam is described.

First up everyone was still after their donkey rides, not just the girls and Mrs Mannering.

Philip said Let’s get the food out. Instead of Get out the food, Lucy-Ann and Dinah. Not even a please! The girls wash the dishes afterwards, which is fine as the boys are busy unpacking the donkeys.

“Poor Lucy-Ann!” said Philip. “We certainly do happen on strange things. I think it’s very exciting. I love adventures.”
“Yes, but you’re a boy,” said Lucy-Ann. “Girls don’t like that kind of thing.”
“I do,” said Dinah at once. “I’ve enjoyed every single one of our adventures

I left that part as Dinah gets to disagree with him! Brodie agreed that girls can like adventures, like George.

I can’t remember exactly what I said but I know I changed (or maybe just skipped) the second half of this:

All the same it was a pity [Philip] wasn’t with the others—especially as now there was only Jack to look after the girls.

I decided NOT to go with black, black, black, when David runs off but hadn’t thought that far ahead and very quickly chose eyes, eyes, eyes! (I could have, with hindsight, gone with a face).

You could perhaps explain David’s reaction as him never having seen a Black person before – he lives in a remote part of Wales where there was unlikely to be many Black people in 1949. (In the 40s there were probably around 10,000 Black people living in the UK, predominantly in port cities).

I actually haven’t checked this in any modern versions – I wonder what it has been updated to?

Lucy-Ann’s reaction isn’t much better – certainly, you’d be surprised to see a face in a tree when you thought you were alone in the valley. But it’s not just that it’s a face, but it’s a black face, as if this is somehow more horrifying. Perhaps, again, it was merely meant to be surprising, but I felt that bit off anyway.

The blackness is (like with Jo-Jo) remarked on rather too often, so I omitted some of it again.

I did not use negro which both Blyton and the children use repeatedly instead of just man, particularly frustratingly they do this long after it’s established that his name is Sam!

For the most part this all meant very tiny differences between the text and what I read aloud. Omitting a single word here and there, switching a single for for man – as I try to stick as close to the books as much as possible.

Sam’s dialogue needed a bit more as I chose to not use such broken English.

Lucy-Ann rushing off to tell the others had to change too as it wouldn’t have made sense for her to rush off and say eyes, or a man’s eyes or anything. So she said a man and Philip said It must have been his eyes David saw.

Not the best bit of dialogue ever but best I come up with on the spur of the moment.

For the Japanese servants I missed off the references to little men and their little feet. I also referred to them as the men rather than the Japanese at least some of the time as it was annoying that they were referred to as a nationality rather than as people.

I definitely did NOT do the You be caleful, much bitee, stuff!

Anyway, on to accents now – all terrible.

The Welsh accents start from p5 but thankfully are gone by chapter 7 with the exception of a few rare words from David, and a few lines from Mr Evans near the end.

As I said above a lot of people are annoyed by the look yous and whateffers but I found them very useful for getting me into my “Welsh” accent, which I will never do in front of a Welsh person for fear of offending them horrifically.

I found Evans/Effans rather annoying as it’s one thing for Mrs Evans to pronounce their name with the F sound, but Blyton calls him it too and I was forever getting it muddled.

Meier got a vaguely German sort of accent which slipped towards Russia/Eastern Europe sometimes. Basically I switch in V for W and see where it goes. No idea what nationality Meier is supposed to be!

Brodie helped with some of Kiki’s noises. He likes to do all her hiccups and added the farmyard sounds as well. (Except for turkeys as I had to get Alexa to play that for him.)

I (as always) did not attempt any of her special sound effects like a car changing gear or the express train in a tunnel (human voice boxes are just not that good, or at least mine isn’t!).

Donkey noises I cannot do, but at least a goat is easy enough.

I was excited for the don’t forget Bill Smugs part, and his reaction was pretty great. Though he didn’t didn’t at first think it WAS Bill. I think he suggested it was Mr Evans or Trefor or someone equally improbable.

Other derailments

I feel like we didn’t have as many conversations/explanations in this book.

He did assert (several times) that of course they were going to have an adventure.

He (predictably) gasped when they mentioned Scotland.

He sighed and said yes, you have to wash when Philip asked – he doesn’t like having to wash up before meals any more than Philip does.

He didn’t think that spring water could be as nice as lemonade.

He asked what panniers were.

He predicted that they would get lost in the mist and inside the mountain.

The shuddering was an earthquake, and the crack in the mountain was a secret passage. 

He sang little bit of bread and no cheese when the yellowhammer was mentioned (he loves to sing this, sometimes when we’re out and hear a yellowhammer,  but also sometimes at random).

He knew what gravity is of course. I explained how Blyton often used the youngest of the group to ask what might seem like silly questions so that she could explain it to the readers and he was quite impressed by that.

The slow worm babies were so cute.

I forgot to ask him at the end who his favourite characters/what his favourite bits were, and he’ll never remember now!

Posted in Book reviews | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Letters to Enid part 58: From volume 3 issue 20

Posted on September 25, 2024 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Letters page from Volume 3, issue 20.
September 28th – October 11th, 1955.

OUR

LETTER PAGE

A letter from Caroline Hayes, Waikato, New Zealand.
Dear Enid Blyton.
I am going to tell you a sad story with a happy ending. One night my cat, Tuss, got into a terrible fight, and a cat clawed his right eye, and he became blind in that eye. I took him to the Vet who said that he would give me ten minutes to decide if he should destroy Tuss, or take out his blind eye, with no pain. I decided to have his eye taken out. Tuss stayed two days at the vet, then came home and after a week he was quite all right. He is now 13 years old and looks as young as can be and is as playful as a kitten.
Love and best wishes from
Caroline Hayes.

(What an interesting letter, Caroline. I have sent you my letter-prize.)

A letter from Anne Cooper, Meltham, Yorks.
Dear Enid Blyton,
If you remember, a few months ago you put in your magazine a coupon for anemones. I sent for them and put half of them in the garden. These last few weeks they have been in full bloom and are lovely flowers. We put the other half in last week and hope they will be as nice.
Yours truly,
Anne Cooper.

(I am very pleased you liked the anemones, Anne. Mine were lovely too.)

A letter from Briony Jordan, Hove 3.
Dear Miss Blyton,
Thank you very much for the lovely bicycle I won in your Diary Competition. I was so excited that I felt quite faint! My old bicycle is much too small now and nearly worn out, so this new one came just at the right time. Mummy and Daddy were very surprised and pleased too. Thank you again and lots of love, from
Briony Jordan.

(A very nice thank-you letter, Briony. I shall run the same competition in my Diary again this year, so look out for it!)

Unusual that of the three letters picked this week we have none that were about raising funds!

But we do have three letters of the type that Blyton also liked to pick.

One an interesting story about an animal (she often picks both pet stories and ones about garden wildlife).

Another about gardening, another popular topic.

And the last a thank-you letter – probably one of the less common ones as I’m sure she received thanks for all sorts of things constantly.

Posted in Magazines | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Monday #598

Posted on September 23, 2024 by Fiona

The brief resurgence of warm weather is well and truly over, and I am writing this from under a cosy blanket. If I was in an Enid Blyton book I would of course say under a cosy rug. Rug meaning blanket is a very old word, but to me it always conjures up images of the children lying under an antique Persian rug. Not at all comfortable, I expect.

Letters to Enid part 58

and

Reading The Mountain of Adventure to Brodie

Having read both The Treasure Hunters and The Ship of Adventure recently the similarities between the two books (regarding a villain who steals part of a map in order to find the treasure first) were particularly noticeable.

I mentioned them in my review of The Treasure Hunters back in 2017.

The Treasure Hunters

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Reading the Sea of Adventure to Brodie

Posted on September 20, 2024 by Fiona

I’m a bit behind on these reviews – we’re actually on Ship at the moment. But better late than never, we read Sea from 17 July to to 5 August.

Some things never change

People accuse Blyton of being repetitive but I think having key plots, characters and behaviours in books is a good thing! It makes a series feel comfortably familiar and cohesive.

Anyway, there are certain things Brodie always says when we read an Adventure book.

There is almost always a moment of dismay when it’s suggested that there will be no adventure (or that an adventure is over prematurely) – this time the children having a governess would surely put the kibosh on any adventure.

However he is quick to rally, and say that it’s an Adventure Series book so there HAS to be an adventure.

He knows by now that If Bill comes they WILL have an adventure. (While going off with Dr Johns would be boring and non-adventurous). If any of the children ask if it is an adventure they’re falling into he always says Of course an adventure is coming, in an its-so-obvious tone.

Something else predictable in this series is that Kiki will be funny, and he never fails to laugh at her. He finds her particularly funny when she muddles her lines up and this time made me repeat the wipe the door, shut your feet etc a few times. He also asks me (at random) to do Kiki’s muddled phrases and make more of my own… blow the door, shut your nose, close your feet… and likes to do his own versions too.

Also guaranteed is him gasping if anyone mentions Scotland. We live in Scotland!!

We’ve read enough that he now predicts when Lucy-Ann is going to make her food tastes better outdoors speech (though he doesn’t agree that it does!).

And as Blyton predictable manages to work the title of each book into the text somewhere Brodie predictably has to ask why do they always say the something of adventure??

Teaching moments

We always get derailed when reading as he asks what certain things mean, or I want to explain something.

First up in this book was measles, because thankfully that’s a lot less common these days. I spent a minute or two talking about how common it was, how serious it could be, but he should never get them as he is vaccinated.

His response?

Oh I’m glad! I don’t want to die at young age. You shouldn’t die at a young age, should you?

The questions he asked as we read were:

  • What’s peaky
  • Can you really smell freckles??
  • What’s a smoke screen
  • What’s a lagoon

Freckles and lagoons were answered in the text after I’d already answered him.

Reading aloud

Reading aloud is a bizarrely different experience to all the times I’ve read it in my head. Like I noticed that they say sea pinks an awful lot, most of which felt unnecessary. Disclaimer, I actually checked and it’s only 8 times but it still felt like far too many.

The use of waked and awoken has never bothered me before but I always read woke and woken, same with lit rather than lighted. Otherwise it makes me trip up because it sounds so wrong out loud.

I also changed a few bits regarding the girls, who are assumed to be useless and weak on several occasions. Like in previous books I have sometimes said children instead of just girls, such as them all taking turns (or at least planning to) pilot the boat and rowing. Instead of Bill ordering the boys to lie on top of the girls they just squashed up on the floor of the boat together.

It’s often just easier to do that than to derail the story with another discussion about historical attitudes to women and girls. Brodie gets enough nonsense at school about how boys and girls should cross their legs differently, and that boys can’t skip without absorbing it through stories too.

Sound effects wise we had seagulls (which I can’t do to save my life, even after asking Alexa to play some for inspiration) and puffins (which I struggled with at first but think I sort of got it eventually).

You’d think that my Scottish fisherman voice would be spot on, and maybe it was, but Brodie apparently didn’t understand any of it…

Predictions

It wouldn’t be a reading to Brodie post without me telling you his adamant predictions about what was coming next. As usual it was about 50/50!

His first concern was that they would struggle for money if Mrs Mannering cancelled her new job in order to take them away.

Then he was convinced that it was Bill hiding at the front gate (to be fair I think I thought that too, especially as Bill then does appear).

However he insisted that the man with Philip in the illustration was NOT Bill. Why? because Bill’s not BALD!(?)

So far he was 0 for 3, but then he declared that the aeroplane was Bill’s enemies. Not just people up to no good, but Bills enemies! A lucky guess, or is he a genius?

The orange peel must have come from the fisherman. Or maybe it fell from an aeroplane!

Less of a prediction but he was extremely worried about the children once they were trapped on the island. He did suggest a signal fire before they did, and was interested in my idea of spelling out SOS on the beach, which lead to me trying to explain the concept of souls…

As soon as the children said they hoped that the tents wouldn’t blow away in the storm he said but they will. He was really very certain about that! There was still a huge gasp when it happened, though. The tents! The tents have blown away! What are they going to DO??

He couldn’t decide if Horace Tripalong Tipperlong was an enemy or not, but decided he mostly was, but went back and forth to the end.

As he loves Kiki so much he was horrified that Kiki was hit and really worried she was hurt or killed.

Second favourite after talking parrots

He loved the puffins and particularly the idea of having pet puffins. This led to him being devastated that they couldn’t take Huffin and Puffin home with them, to the point of real tears. He had worried about whether they could be brought home earlier in the book, but been distracted by the story until it was confirmed at the end. We had to talk about how puffins wouldn’t be happy or well kept in an ordinary house or garden.

Coincidentally I came across a short video of a puffin with fish lined up in his beak while we read this, so I showed Brodie who was rather impressed. They were not as big as the fish in the illustration, though!

 

 

 

 

 

Posted in Book reviews | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Letters to Enid part 57: From volume 3 issue 19

Posted on September 18, 2024 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Letters page from Volume 3, issue 19.
September 14th – 27th, 1955.

OUR

LETTER PAGE

This week’s letters are chosen because they all contain such good ideas. The first one wins my letter-prize.

A letter from Stuart Park, Shirley, Croydon.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I am sending the enclosed 4s. 8d. for your Children’s Home. I collected it by having a “Scooter Rally” with races and so on. I had been thinking for quite a long time how to raise money, and as most of my friends have scooters, I decided to have the rally.
Yours truly,
Stuart Park. (Aged 7)

(Thank you, Stuart. What a very original idea. I wish I had been at the Rally.)

A letter from John Mace, Newcastle-on-Tyne.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I am very good at finding four-leaved clovers. I have found 21 this year, and I sold them for a penny each. So here is one and ninepence for your little Blind Children.
Love from
John Mace.

(Well, your four-leaved clovers certainly brought us luck, John. Thank you!)

A letter from Mary George, Spalding, Lincs.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I am sending you £1 I got for the Busy Bees. I spent my pocket-money on seeds for my garden, and grew the flowers, and I have sold them for 2d. a bunch, and all my friends have bought some to help the Busy Bees.
With love from
Mary George.

(Thank you, Mary. Another splendid idea, which must have given you much pleasure.)

A letter from Rosemary Cole, Coventry. Sent to Matron, at our Children’s Home.
Dear Matron,
My twin brother and I have a large collection of Enid Blyton Books, which we let other children read at a penny a week. We hope the enclosed 5s. will help the little children at your Home.
Yours faithfully,
Rosemary Cole.

(You are very kind, Rosemary – thank you! I do feel pleased that my books helped you to raise money.)

An unusual themed set of letters this week, Blyton rarely did this.

Certainly some good fund-raising ideas there.

The scooter rally sounds as if it could have been held today, as scooters are really popular again now. Not that you’d catch me on one!

At risk of sounding like a broken record the four-leaf clover one wouldn’t work for me as I’ve never ever found even one…

I’d possibly fail at the flower one too, as our sunflowers turned out very poorly this year.

I could lend out my books at least! But only to people I would trust to look after them.

Posted in Magazines | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Monday #597

Posted on September 16, 2024 by Fiona

Letters to Enid part 57

and

Reading The Sea of Adventure to Brodie

When I added this banner it was because I wanted to answer a question that had been asked.

But why not use it to ask a question myself?

Has anyone else seen this Lego set and thought KIKI! Or is it just me?

I know she was described as scarlet and grey in the books, but Tresillian had her as a white and yellow cockatoo (cockatoos have crests, parrots don’t) and her description has been updated in some more recent texts, too. To be honest I picture her as white-and-yellow when I’m reading.

I’m tempted to get this set and build the cockatoo option to display near my Adventure Series books.

 

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Lifting the flap on two new “Enid Blyton” books

Posted on September 14, 2024 by Fiona

While in the children’s department of the library a few weeks ago a new delivery of books came in and amongst them were two books I’d never seen – or even heard of – before with the name Enid Blyton on the cover.

Sadly these are not previously undiscovered Enid Blyton books, they have been written by someone else, based on her books. But still – I found them really nice.

Lifting the flap

I chose the post title as a play on lifting the lid, because they are both lift-the-flap books. I loved lift-the-flap books as a child – I had several Spot books by Eric Hill, Dear Zoo by Rod Campbell amongst others, and even once I was a bit too old I’d still enjoy going through those, or ones I found at the library or in bookshops. Even as an adult I still enjoy them (having a child is a very good excuse to indulge in lift-the-flap books)! Particularly the detailed non-fiction ones like Usborne’s Inside Castles which allows you to see, well, inside parts of castles.

I had never seen an Enid Blyton one, though searching online shows there have been a couple of Noddy ones made, but not during her lifetime. There were some 1950s Noddy pop-up books, though.

It got me wondering about the history of lift-the-flap books, and I discovered that they have been around for hundreds of years – starting out as educational pieces such as guides to the human body where you could lift the flaps to see inside the body, and children’s ones were around in the 1930s. More information, and example of lift-the-flap and pop-up books from the past can be found here. (This explains why it always takes me so long to write what is supposed to be a simple review – I start wondering about things then fall down rabbit-holes on the internet.)

Anyway, the two books in question are Let’s Have a Picnic and Goodnight, Fairy.

Let’s Have a Picnic

This was the first one I picked up, which has a rather adorable baby Moon Face in a little onesie on the cover.

There isn’t a huge amount of story inside – which is pretty standard for a 10 page lift-the-flap book. Moon Face is hungry, so goes and fills his picnic basket with tasty treats (found, oddly enough, on “land” rather than up in the Faraway Tree where he starts off), before laying out a picnic blanket and waits for his friends to come and join him. From the pictures these look like Silky and the Saucepan Man (so young he has only collected one saucepan so far), plus another girl who I couldn’t identify.

Each double page has 2-4 flaps to lift, often revealing answers to the questions posed in the rhyming text alongside.

High up in the branches of the Faraway Tree, someone’s feeling hungry.

Who could it be?

I hope it’s not a spoiler to say that the doors open to reveal Moon-Face!

Other flaps lift to reveal woodland creatures and inhabitants of the tree.

My favourite is the slippery-slip which appears towards the end, opening this and folding it down changes the position of those sliding down it.

Goodnight, Fairy

Silky – who has wings like most previous incarnations in illustrations despite that not being in the text – has a similarly non-eventful story.

She finds her friends hiding in the tree then heads home to bed. Being a good little fairy she tidies up, takes a bath, has a bed-time story, and goes to sleep.

Only one of the flaps is lifted this time to answer a questions – who is hiding in the tree – but most are to show what happens next in each scene. Silky’s bedroom goes from (very slightly) untidy to tidy, we find a shooting star in the sky, Silky dons a very cute bathrobe after her bath and so on. I’m not sure what’s cuter, Silky’s bathrobe or Moon Face’s onesie.

There are also smaller flaps on the pages revealing fun glimpses of the forest animals. I like the story book she reads which is a teddy bear version of Cinderella.

My thoughts

I’m often reticent about continuation books as they never capture the characterisation of the originals for me.

Saying that, I don’t think it matters for babies! I really like these books (I hope there will be more, with other characters) as they are a great way to introduce very young children to Blyton. They are beautifully illustrated with a lot of fun details, and making the characters very young, and for the very young, avoids any need for continuity with the original novels (saying that, they haven’t done anything that clashes horribly.) We’ve had baby book versions of Winnie the Pooh and Peter Rabbit etc for a long time, so it’s good to see Blyton getting the same treatment.

I did wonder where Silky’s parents were, or if she lives alone as she’s clearly not more than a toddler – but I really doubt that the target audience is going to be worried about that.

It’s a shame that the true author isn’t credited, but I suspect that’s common with these very short books which are using someone else’s characters.

I’d definitely recommend these for any Blyton fan with a baby, or as a gift for anyone with a baby as you don’t have to be a Blyton fan to enjoy them.

Posted in Book reviews, Other Authors | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Letters to Enid part 56: From volume 3 issue 18

Posted on September 11, 2024 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Letters page from Volume 3, issue 18.
August 31st – September 13th, 1955.

OUR

LETTER PAGE

A letter from Elizabeth Marshall, Colpetty, Colombo 7, Ceylon.
Dear Miss Blyton,
This morning just after 8 o’clock there was a total eclipse of the sun, and I thought you might like to hear about it. My brother and I got up early and went into the garden. As the time drew near for the eclipse, it became slowly darker and darker. The crows flew off in flocks to their nests, the bats and flying foxes flew about. For four whole minutes it was night again. We heard the frogs and crickets set up their night-time chirping, and a few dogs barking, but all the birds were fast asleep. It really was a very weird feeling and I shall never forget the 20th June, 1955, in Colombo!
Love from
Elizabeth Marshall.

(This is one of the most interesting letters I have had, Elizabeth, and you deserve the prize I have sent you. An excellent account of a rare event.)

A letter from one of our Magazine Club Group Leaders, Pamela Stopp, Hanworth, Middlesex.
Dear Enid Blyton,
Thank you very much for my lovely Leader’s badge. I wore it to school and, as everyone admired it, I felt very proud. I also had a pleasant surprise when I arrived home to lunch and found a lovely book awaiting me, it will be most useful to all members of my group. Daddy has promised to buy me a tent in which to hold my group meetings.
Yours with love,
Pamela Stopp.

A letter from Jeffrey Hodge, St. Helens, Lancs.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I have a big old tortoise called Crawler – and he has laid an egg! Mummy has put it into our airing-cupboard to hatch and every day I look to see if a baby tortoise has come out of it. I wonder if any of your other readers has ever had a tortoise egg that hatched?
Much love from
Jeffrey Hodge.

(Well, readers, have any of you had a tortoise egg that hatched? Do tell me!)


There was a letter from Ceylon a few issues back, too. I must have looked up what Ceylon had become, as I wrote Sri Lanka on that post, but I had to look it up again this week as I had forgotten!

This time I also looked up why the name had changed, and where the names had come from. This is probably common knowledge to many, but as it has been Sri Lanka my whole life it’s not something that I needed to know. Ceylon was an anglicised version of Ceilão (the Portuguese colonists’ name for it from 1505, as it had been called Sailan, Saylan, Silan, Seilan etc for hundreds of years previously) used from 1815 when the country became a crown colony. It became the Dominion of Ceylon when it achieved independence in 1948, then in 1972 it became the Republic of Sri Lanka, though that changed to Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka in 1978. Interestingly Sri Lanka had been in use from 1935, while Lanka dates back to the 10-12th centuries, and was used in the 16th century by locals opposing the Portuguese colonists.

History lesson over!

I assume that Elizabeth is 7, though her age is put in the wrong place, in the middle of her address. I thought at first that it was the online image-to-text converter I use, but no, that’s how it appears on the printed page.

Anyway, it was a nice letter about an unusual event!

It’s probably explained somewhere in the magazines what a Magazine Group Club is, as it must be something more formal than than the usual groups and clubs children write in about if it has an official badge! Strange Blyton didn’t respond to this letter, as she has responded to every other one I’m sure.

Having checked very carefully, Jeffrey does indeed say that he has laid an egg. This led me to my strangest Google search of recent weeks – do male tortoises lay eggs? The answer, as I expected is no, they do not. So this is quite possibly an error that has crept in when transcribing the letter or putting the plates together for printing. Saying that, my search has led me to many owners of male tortoises saying their pet has laid an egg – apparently vets are notoriously bad at identifying male and female tortoises correctly, so perhaps Jeffrey did believe Crawler was male! Would love to know if the airing cupboard egg ever hatched.

Posted in Magazines | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Monday #596

Posted on September 9, 2024 by Fiona

It’s Monday again – why do the weekends always go by so fast?

Letters to Enid part 56

and

Lifting the flap on two new “Enid Blyton” books

Oh I say!

Pretty much every Enid Blyton character must say this at some point (perhaps with the exception of the more working-class characters like PC Goon, Ern, Jo, etc) but somehow when Lucian says it, the Mannering-Trents find it funny. They laugh at him for it, even though they say it a lot too!

I expect it’s because he says it so often and probably says it with much greater enthusiasm, making it sound over-the-top.

I have to admit, it helps me, though! If Lucian says Oh I say! at the beginning of a speech I can easily get into (my version of) a sort of posh and weedy voice. If he doesn’t, I try to say it in my head instead to help.

I think I’d say something worse than “Oh I say,” if a parrot pecked me!

 

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Enid Blyton’s favourite words

Posted on September 7, 2024 by Fiona

If you asked the average person what Enid Blyton’s favourite word was they’d probably say lashings or gosh or ginger beer. If you ask me I think she probably wrote hungry and lunch more often than any of those!

I happened to be thinking about The Treasure Hunters recently (my mind wanders as I do boring things like brush my teeth), and I wondered how many times Blyton’s books featured treasure – and honestly, it’s quite a few. But I could only think of two times that treasure appeared in the title – The Treasure Hunters, obviously, and Five on a Treasure Island.

That got me wondering what word was the most used in all her book titles. (I’m not getting into short story titles, or collections published after her death, or anything like that. Just book titles.)

Initial guesses

Trying to think of words that appeared a lot and my first thought was Five – as it’s in all 21 Famous Five titles, but probably not too many others, except Five Minute Tales and Five O’Clock Tales.

Cover from “Five Go Adventuring Again” illustrated by Eileen Soper

Even though I knew it was less-used, my brain helpfully pointed out that Seven was used quite a lot, as all the Secret Sevens have Seven in the title.

Dustjacket from the first edition by Burgess Sharrocks
Shock for the Secret Seven, 1962 Illustrator Unknown
Cover of the “Secret Seven Win Through” published 1955 possibly drawn by Bruno Kay.

So could it be adventure(s), I wondered? It’s in all eight Adventure Series titles, and I know there are plenty of other books like Adventure of the Strange Ruby, Five Fall into Adventure, (can I have Adventuring Again, too?) Secret Seven Adventure… so I felt that was a strong contender.

Then I started thinking about mystery, Obviously there are 15 Five Find-Outer books which all begin with The Mystery of… then there are two Famous Fives (Mystery Moor and Mystery to Solve), Secret Seven Mystery, plus all six Barney/R Mysteries, so quite a lot there too.

And of course there’s also Secret, which of course is in all 15 Secret Seven titles, 5 Secret Series books, one Famous Five, one Find-Outers, The Secret of Cliff Castle, The Adventure of the Secret Necklace, and probably others.

I’m almost surprised there isn’t a book called The Mystery of the Secret Adventure at this point. I’ve also read adventure/mystery/secret so many times that my brain has stopped recognising them as real words.

What’s the word?

The most popular title word wasn’t too hard to work out, thanks to the search function in the Cave of Books.

A straightforward search for adventure gives us 1,145 results across books, short stories, poems, magazines and periodicals. Secret has 735 and Mystery 427.

However there is a LOT of repetition in those results as various books have been reprinted many times, and it also includes jigsaws and card games, audiobooks, series titles and publishers etc. The same short stories also appear in multiple collections but are counted each time they appear.

So with my (only slightly arbitrary) limits on what to include what do the numbers look like then?

I figure there are 34 original books with Adventure (or adventures, but not adventuring) in the title, 28 with Secret and 25 with Mystery. No Mystery of the Secret Adventure, but The Adventure of the Secret Necklace, Secret Seven Adventure and Secret Seven Mystery are the closest, as they contain two of the most popular words each.

So my guesses were pretty good!

Here are those book titles below:

Adventure Bound At Seaside Cottage Five Go to Mystery Moor
Adventure of the Secret Necklace Adventure of the Secret Necklace Five Have a Mystery to Solve
Adventure of the Strange Ruby Five on a Secret Trail Mystery of Banshee Towers
Adventures of Bobs Fun for the Secret Seven Mystery of Holly Lane
Adventures of Mr. Pink-Whistle Go Ahead Secret Seven Mystery of Tally-Ho Cottage
Adventures of Odysseus Good Work Secret Seven Mystery of the Burnt Cottage
Adventures of Pip Look Out Secret Seven Mystery of the Disappearing Cat
Adventures of Scamp Mystery of the Secret Room Mystery of the Hidden House
Adventures of the Wishing-Chair Puzzle for the Secret Seven Mystery of the Invisible Thief
Billy-Bob Has an Adventure! Secret Island Mystery of the Missing Man
Bobtail’s Adventures Secret Mountain Mystery of the Missing Necklace
Castle of Adventure Secret of Cliff Castle Mystery of the Pantomime Cat
Circus of Adventure Secret of Killimooin Mystery of the Secret Room
Five Fall Into Adventure Secret of Moon Castle Mystery of the Spiteful Letters
Further Adventures of Brer Rabbit Secret of Spiggy Holes Mystery of the Strange Bundle
Further Adventures of Josie, Click and Bun Secret of the Old Mill Mystery of the Strange Messages
Gulliver’s Adventures Secret Seven Mystery of the Vanished Prince
Island of Adventure Secret Seven Adventure Mystery That Never Was
More Adventures of Mary Mouse Secret Seven Card Game Ragamuffin Mystery
More Adventures of Pip Secret Seven Fireworks Rat-a-Tat Mystery
More Adventures on Willow Farm Secret Seven Mystery Rilloby Fair Mystery
Mountain of Adventure Secret Seven on the Trail Ring o’ Bells Mystery
Noddy Has an Adventure Secret Seven Win Through Rockingdown Mystery
Noddy Has More Adventures Shock for the Secret Seven Rubadub Mystery
Noddy’s Grand Adventures Story of a Secret Secret Seven Mystery
Queer Adventure (The Yellow Fairy Book) Three Cheers Secret Seven
River of Adventure Very Big Secret
Sea of Adventure Well Done Secret Seven
Secret Seven Adventure
Ship of Adventure
Tales of Brave Adventure
The Wonderful Adventure
Valley of Adventure
What an Adventure
Posted in General bookishness | Tagged | 3 Comments

August 2024 round up

Posted on September 5, 2024 by Fiona

That’s us halfway through 2024 already!

What I read

Having upped my reading goal to 150 last month, I then found that I didn’t read as much in August, isn’t that just typical? I watched a bit more TV in August, and I also found myself reading a few books that turned out to be a bit of a slog to finish.

What I have read:

  • The Chase (The Forbidden Game #2) – L J Smith
  • The Sea of Adventure (Brodie’s review to come)
  • A Novel Love Story – Ashley Poston
  • The Kill (The Forbidden Game #3) – L J Smith
  • Six in a Caravan – Bridget Mackenzie (reviewed here)
  • The Accident – Diane Hoh
  • Funhouse – Diane Hoh
  • The Back of Beyond Book Club – Angela Britnell
  • My Roommate is a Vampire – Jenna Levine
  • Goodnight, Fairy – “Enid Blyton”
  • Let’s Have a Picnic – “Enid Blyton”
  • The Tower at the End of Time (House at the Edge of Magic#2) – Amy Sparkes
  • The Bookstore Wedding (Once Upon a Time Bookshop #2) – Alice Hoffman
  • The Mountain of Adventure (Brodie’s review also to come)

I ended the month still working through:

  • The Wisdom of War (Buffyverse #63) – Christopher Golden
  • Poyums – Len Pennie
  • Girl Sleuth – Melanie Rehak
  • The Last Bookshop in London -Madeline Martin
  • The Ship of Adventure

What I watched

  • We are up to ER season 14 (only one to go!), and we watched a few episodes of Richard Osman’s House of Games when we needed something shorter. Then Only Connect started back up, and the new seasons of Only Murders in the Building and Rings of Power started so we’ve been watching those as well.
  • With Brodie we watched the new Ghostbusters film – Frozen Empire, and 80s classic Willow.
  • We also fitted in more 80s classics after Brodie went to bed – Romancing the Stone and Jewel in the Nile.
  • I’m on to season four of Charmed, having watched all the Shannon Doherty episodes it’s now Rose McGowan as the third sister. I’ve also been watching The Last Leg and the Paralympic Highlights each night.
  • On Tuesdays my sister and I watched Wicked Little Letters, the original Mean Girls, then for something different we tried the TV show Rich House Poor House.

What I did

  • We kicked off August by having a big toy clear out and Brodie did really well at recognising what he no longer played with as much and was ready to let go to a charity shop
  • That meant we had a bit more space for his birthday as he turned 7. We had a Lego-themed party for him at the house as Lego is his #1 obsession at the moment. After his birthday we had a lot of Lego to build as well.
  • We took the week off around his birthday so we could do some daytrips – though the weather turned out to not be that great. We made us of the rainier days to visit the rest of the libraries we needed to complete the summer reading challenge. On better days we visited Brechin Castle centre where we all enjoyed footgolf and crazy golf, and Cairnie Fruit Farm where we just about beat the maze.
  • Brodie went back to school – into p3!
  • I did a couple of 500 piece jigsaws, the Harry Potter was one surprisingly difficult, though!
  • We finally harvested our potatoes and were pleased to find that there were actual potatoes in there, not just a huge leafy plant.

 

How was your August?

Posted in Personal Experiences | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Monday #595

Posted on September 2, 2024 by Fiona

And just like that, it’s September already. Summer isn’t over (if it ever began!) but the evenings are growing darker already.

August round-up

and

Enid Blyton’s favourite words

We have books of the week this week, these two which crossed my path at work last week. I didn’t know anything about them so they were a nice surprise, reviews will be coming soon!

Both are lift-the-flap books based on the Faraway Tree series, with Moon-Face and Silky.

 

 

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Letters to Enid part 55: From volume 3 issue 17

Posted on August 28, 2024 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Letters page from Volume 3, issue 17.
August 17th – 30th, 1955.

OUR

LETTER PAGE

 A letter from from Margaret Edwards, Prospect, Okehampton.
Dear Miss Blyton,
When I read the story of the Dolls’ House Exhibition in your magazine I wanted to do the same. So I made a Dolls’ House Show and have collected 18 pennies for the Blind Children. Mummy has bought stamps, so I am sending them to you. I do like reading your magazine and the Noddy books, and I have your Book of the Year, too.
Love from
Margaret Edwards.

(Thank you Margaret! I didn’t think that my story about the Dolls’ House Exhibition would result in someone else having one too! As you are not very old, I am really proud of you.)

A letter from Menevia Scone, Pembroke Dock.
Dear Miss Blyton,
I live in a flat and have not got a proper garden, so Mummy has made me one on a big marble wash-stand, and I think it is more fun than a real garden! I collected stones from the seashore to make the rockery and it was great fun mixing cement and filling match-
boxes for steps and paths. It really is a lovely little garden.
Love from
Menevia Scone.

(What a very good idea, Menevia! I wonder if anyone else has a garden like yours.)

A letter from Helen Campbell (Captain), Markinch, Fife.
Dear Enid Blyton,
My Club and myself held a sale in my shed at the back of the house. We also acted a play called “Meet the Johnsons” which I made up myself. During the winter I made kettle-holders and mats and other things, and sold some of them to my aunts and friends who could not come to the sale. The sale was great fun, and when it was over we counted the money and found that we had made £6. Please accept this money and send it to your little Children’s Home.
With lots of love from
Helen Campbell
(Captain, F.F. Member and Busy Bee)
and all our members.

(My warm congratulations, Helen! You must have a fine Club of nine members, and be very proud of it.)

I wonder how old Margaret was, and just what a Doll’s house exhibition entails? I’ll have to look at the magazine – it was in issue 3 volume 14 – to find out.

I wonder how much greenery there was in Menevia’s garden? As a child I liked making miniature gardens in plastic trays but of course nothing lived very long in one!

Markinch isn’t very far from where I live – I wonder if Helen still lives in Fife and if she’s still as busy now as she was then!

Posted in Magazines | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Monday #594

Posted on August 26, 2024 by Fiona

You know you’ve been reading too much Enid Blyton* at bedtime when your child turns to you and says You’re a beast! 

*Obviously there’s not really such thing as too much Enid Blyton.

Letters to Enid part 55

and

Enid Blyton’s favourite words

I really should have used You’re a beast as the quote of the week, but never mind.

Instead, here’s one I’ve used before, but it was six and a half years ago and nobody’s going to remember, or at least they wouldn’t if I hadn’t just admitted it.

This one’s so good anyway, that it’s worth repeating.

Don’t forget Bill Smugs

We reached this on Saturday night and the gasp and the shriek of excitement from Brodie were something else.

Who could forget this guy?

Bill Smugs/Cunningham, of the Adventure Series, drawn by Stuart Tresilian

 

 

 

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

If you like Blyton: Six in a Caravan by Bridget Mackenzie

Posted on August 24, 2024 by Fiona

I bought this as it appealed on two counts: a Blytonian title, and illustrations by Eileen Soper.

The Six and the Caravan

The title is more accurate than Five Go Off in a Caravan (in which they, of course, use two caravans) as there is indeed one caravan, and six people. However three of the company sleep in a tent as Slow Coach the caravan (newly built but in the traditional gypsy style) isn’t big enough to actually accommodate six. I’m sure all six are inside at some point or another, though, so close enough.

The six in question are siblings Norry (13), Fred (10) and Cynthia (age not given, but younger than Norry), their older half-sister Grace, her husband Rodney, and her son Toddles (3).

A rollercoaster of a caravan holiday

I went into this not entirely sure what to expect. Was it going to be an adventure, à la Five Go Off in a Caravan?  – that seemed unlikely after the first pages revealed there would be two adults and a toddler in the party.

The other option was something more akin to the Caravan family where the adventure is simply living in a caravan and travelling about.

As it turned out, it wasn’t that either! It looked, for a brief time that it might be, but things quickly plunged into the unexpected…

It began tamely enough. A letter inviting the children on the holiday, taking the train to meet their sister and her husband. Going for tea in the town then walking up to the field to find that The caravan had vanished!

This turns out to be because Rodney had parked it in a farmer’s field without permission, and the farmer had thrown him out (fair enough, really!). The caravan had only been moved to some common ground a little further on, so was found by the others quickly.

I thought that this sort of thing would be the only real drama they faced, but I was wrong, very wrong.

The book is under 100 pages, and yet manages to pack in two children nearly drowning, two children being swept out to sea in a rowing boat (unconnected to the drowning!), one child sneaking off to perform at a circus resulting in one badly sprained ankle, one night time prowler, one planned theft and one reunited grandmother and grandchild. Phew.

Each new chapter had a sense of what next?? Though sadly the mention of smugglers’ caves was just a brief mention and played no part in the story.

The only real disappointment in it all is that the big drama of the planned theft of Rodney’s money is over before it even begins. They hear of the plan and the boys go off to fetch the police

And that was the end of the gypsies’ plot to steal Rodney Dean’s money.

The police arrive before anything has happened and go to watch the gypsy camp through the night. In the morning the police interview Rodney and the gypsies. There’s no mention of them trying to sneak over to Slow Coach in the night let alone any detail of arrests.

Personal development

Somehow the book manages to also fit in some personal development for the three children amongst all the drama.

Fred has the most – he is described as (more so than shown to be) a bit on the lazy side. He is never shown to shirk duties when caravanning/camping but several times it seems to be expected that he would try to avoid work. Fred himself seems to be aware of this habit of his and as he flushes, or doesn’t meet Rodney’s eye on occasion.

He is told off once for grousing because they’ve been walking in the rain then have to fetch wood and water.

No grousing! You must take the rough with the smooth.
– Rodney

But there’s no dramatic occasion where Fred’s laziness leads to disaster actually – that’s left to his older brother Norry.

It is Norry who is left to supervise young Toddles (referred to as a baby multiple times despite being a sturdy three year old!) and a local friend the boy has made, and it is Norry who engrosses himself in a book and doesn’t notice them trying to sail a bathtub on the village pond until it’s almost too late.

You’ll never make a man if you aren’t trustworthy. No matter how clever, or loveable a person may be he’ll always be a failure if he can’t be relied upon. Make a beginning in small things, my boy, then in great ones you won’t be wanting.

– Rodney

This sort of speech wouldn’t be out of place in a Blyton book.

Only then does Norry reflect that he often forgets to post letters, or do jobs he had promised and treats this as a wake up call.

It is Cynthia who somehow ends up filling in at the circus – having meant to just buy some chocolate then return to the caravan.

She learns her lesson the hard way, by spraining her ankle and not being able to continue the holiday for a time.

We’re not going to punish you for you disobedience, my dear, because you have your own punishment in a good deal of pain and having to lie still when you would like to be running about. But, please remember that you are delaying everyone’s trip for a week or more, and that you have caused us a great deal of anxiety and expense. Rodney and I are very displeased, and if there is any more trouble through the behaviour of you children, you will all three be back off home without a moment’s delay.

– Grace

The first part of that speech is certainly something you’d find in a Blyton book – the worst or only punishment being the natural consequences of a person’s actions. I’m not sure that Blyton’s adult would then labour the point so much afterwards, though. I feel like Blyton’s child would perhaps reflect, guiltily on the impact their actions were having on others rather than having it said to them.

Coincidences and contrivances

Blyton’s books are in no way exempt from strange coincidences and obviously contrived situations but this book leans quite heavily on them.

The boy (Jerry) who sneaks into their camp looking to steal just so happens to be the grandson of an old lady they meet later, who just happens to lament that she’s all alone as her daughter is gone, having run off with a wandering man and then died. Obviously Jerry is the daughter’s son, who they just so happen to bump into later, and who just so happens to have lost his dad so that he can be passed into the care of his grandmother with very little fuss.

The planned theft of Rodney’s money also required a deliberate set of circumstances. He was expecting money from someone who sent actual money instead of a cheque, and this just happened to be overheard by some gypsies – from the same camp as Jerry – and Rodney just manages to take too long in thinking it over to go back to the post office before it shuts.

When Cynthia hurts her ankle there just so happens to be a doctor in the audience who has a spare room, as the local hospital is full. And he just so happens to have a daughter Cynthia’s age to make friends with her…

These things probably wouldn’t be so obvious in a longer book where they could be disguises or distracted from with other events and details.

I doubt children would notice or care but I did find some of it a bit unlikely and silly.

Some other thoughts

We don’t get to know the characters particularly well as this is a short book – for example Grace being the children’s half-sister is never explained (making me wonder why it was even mentioned, other than it sort of explaining why she’s so much older) and there isn’t time for the sort of jokes and teasing you get from the Famous Five or Adventure Series children. It’s more like The Treasure Hunters actually where the children are not overly detailed and are just there to have an adventure.

Jerry was similarly sketchy – and had a cringey way of calling Grace pretty lady or lovely lady every time he spoke to her. Likewise his Oh I am so hungry, so hungry! Do not beat me! came across as awkward.

His grandmother gets to talk in a strong Cornish dialect using words like foine, zee volks, zpot, darter (daughter) and so on but this tails off when she has several sentences to say at once!

There is a suggestion a few times that Grace and Rodney are too soft with Toddles.

It does seem crazy for a baby of three [to go on a caravanning holiday], but you know Rodney and Grace take him everywhere they go, and he never seems any the worse.

It would be odd not to take your three-year old on a caravan holiday these days, especially if you were going for six weeks! He also eats a great many more cakes than were good for such a little boy, but Grace only laughed and said no goodies could spoil his digestion.

There’s the usual boys vs girls attitudes, to be expected in a 1940s book. The boys camp out, Cynthia sleeps in the caravan. The boys fetch water and firewood, Cynthia helps make supper and put Toddles to bed. Worst of all when Cynthia is missing Norry is left at the caravan to take care of Grace and Toddles while Fred and Rodney go looking for her. Why on earth does a fully grown woman need a 13 year old boy to look after her!?

I was confused to begin with as the children are in the school room, and home lessons are mentioned but their mother writes to the heads of the children’s schools to make excuses for them taking a long trip away – despite it being as described as all the holidays. So they go to school, but have a school room at home, and home lessons, and have to be excused from the home lessons during the holidays?

I sort of like Cynthia’s idea of hanging fourteen inches of a tape measure up and snipping off an inch every day to count down to the trip, but it does seem a bit wasteful too! She could probably get several uses from a tape measure at least.

I liked that Fred didn’t enjoy his first night camping, as the ground was hard and uncomfortable – and the narration mentions how bad a night most people have when they’re not used to it. I know I’d never manage a good nights sleep on the ground, and find it vaguely annoying how well book characters always seem to sleep in the most uncomfortable places.

Unlike Blyton’s characters Rodney does not approve of going to the circus, presuming it to be vulgar entertainment – though that perhaps applied specifically to that circus and not all circuses.

Overall I enjoyed this – it was fast-paced and I never knew what was going to happen best. It lacks Blyton’s excellent descriptions of places and food, as well as banter and amusing incidents, but that aside, it was a good read. The Soper illustrations also helped!

I’ve included all the rest of the illustrations below as I’m not sure if any of them are online anywhere.

Posted in Book reviews, Other Authors | Tagged , | Leave a comment

Reading the The Treasure Hunters to Brodie

Posted on August 21, 2024 by Fiona

Having read 20 of the 21 Famous Fives and 3 of the 8 Adventure Series books Brodie asked what else there was. I had already suggested The Treasure Hunters some time before and it was rejected, but this time he rejected the Galliano’s Circus books and whatever else I suggested and chose The Treasure Hunters, perhaps thanks to the illustrated Collins spine.

What Brodie knew

I often write about what he didn’t know, or understand but today we’ll have what he “knew”.  I say “knew” because despite his confidence he isn’t always right…

That Jeffrey was the oldest as he was putting stamps into his album and collecting them. He didn’t say as much but I think he was inferring that stamp collecting was a boring activity for people older than he is.

All about secret passages – I know about secret passages into cupboards, it’s just like the one in the Famous Five.

That you should not feed squirrels chocolate. He was very judgmental over them giving the squirrel chocolate in case his teeth fell out – telling me about the highland cow who had eaten popcorn and sweets until his teeth fell out. He meant Callum the Stag who had been fed junk food until his teeth fell out and he had to be put down as he couldn’t eat.

Why Granny was crying – because she has to leave.

That finding the “treasure cup” meant they could drink out of it and have good luck and not leave their house. He announced this as soon as the lucky cup was mentioned and repeated it often through the book. I love how he didn’t focus on them finding valuable treasure which would change their financial situation, but instead was determined that the magic cup would fix everything.

That the treasure cup would be in the box they found in the chimney.

That the treasure cup had been in the box but someone else had already found it. (He rethinks his solutions pretty quickly).

That the box must have had a false top which is why it looks smaller on the inside than it should. (I suggested perhaps it was more likely to have a false bottom, which he quickly agreed with.)

That the map was a treasure map. Well, ok his first response was Huh – just a piece of paper? But I flipped back and showed him the picture at the start of the chapter. It’s a map!… A treasure map!

That JREAFURE spells TREASURE. I spelled out J – R – etc and he was baffled but we went back to look at the illustration again and straight away he said that it was a T (which is impressive as he often gets T, I and J muddled) and from there he quickly realised that it said treasure.

IT SAYS TREASURE he kept telling the children, and was quite annoyed at their inability to figure it out.

That the map must be wrong as it showed four bends and the road only had three.

That the hill had been knocked down, like farmers do – he meant the bits of old railway embankments we’ve seen ploughed through for access.

That it was a river, not a road – mere moments before the children figured it out

That Mr Potts knocked Jeffrey into the water and took his clothes TO GET THE MAP!

That promising to stay in all DAY meant they could sneak out at night – but I did have to say all DAAAYYY a few times before he got it.

That dropping a handkerchief up the wrong passage would send the men the wrong way.

What Brodie did not know

When he wasn’t interrupting with his wild mixture of assertions he was asking questions.

Such as;

What’s a maid?
Is this book too old for torches to exist? His grasp of history is sketchy at best. The other night he asked me if I was alive during WWII…
What’s seccotine? I knew it was glue from The Naughtiest Girl, and so he made the really good point that it would be difficult for them to remove the map from the doll’s house again. I looked it up incase it was a weak or easily dissolved glue but all I could find out was that it was made from fish…
Why would you wake up mad at someone from a dream? Hard to explain, but it’s definitely happened to me!
What’s a lawyer?

Brodie’s opinions

This is a kid who barely ever stops talking so he managed to squeeze in more comments.

He was a little upset that their mother and father weren’t staying with them but that was quickly forgotten.

He was surprised by the three sets of stairs in the house. The house which he called fusty-musty-dusty, by the way.

He was concerned that the man (Mr Potts) wouldn’t bring back the map and at that point didn’t know if he wanted to keep reading as things might go bad.

He was very excited by the lucky cup. As above he kept talking about finding it. When they do find the box he shouted THE LUCKY CUP, they can drink out of it and get rich. He was worried that Mr Potts would catch them and get it from them, but if they could drink from it first maybe money would fall from the sky and they could keep the house. He was very invested in them keeping the house.

He loved them drinking their ginger beer from the lucky cup.

Afterwards he said he did not like Mr Potts at all, he was not a good person, But he liked everyone else. His favourite part was the end part with the secret passages but it was almost too exciting and scary with Mr Potts chasing them.

As for me I never realised how often they say LOVELY until reading it out loud. It seemed like every other sentence, but turns out it was only 34 times in the book but 25 of those are in the first 6 chapters!

 

 

Posted in Book reviews | Tagged | 5 Comments

Monday #593

Posted on August 19, 2024 by Fiona

I know that I’ve put The Treasure Hunters on the list two weeks running now, but things just keep coming up! It’s probably about half-finished at this point so maybe this week will be the week!

Reading The Treasure Hunters to Brodie

and

If you like Blyton: Six in a Caravan by Bridget Mackenzie

Apparently there is to be yet another Blyton continuation title, coming out next year. Five and the Forgotten Treasure focuses on some new children solving a mystery that somehow has something to do with George and the original Five.

Have you heard about the unsolved mystery of the Famous Five? An incredible new story by bestselling author Chris Smith, inspired by Enid Blyton’s The Famous Five series and featuring original and new characters.

When Fran, Tom, Maddy and Gilbert the dog stay with Professor George Kirrin for the holidays, they soon find themselves caught up in a robbery. Professor George will have to tell them about her past and the unfinished mystery of the Famous Five, if they’re ever going to catch the thief…

The Famous Five by Enid Blyton was one of Chris Smith’s favourite series as a child. Now, this bestselling author weaves the action, adventure and danger of this thrilling and exciting world into a brand-new story, perfect for every generation of readers. Join the adventure!

Well, you know I’ll end up reading it… but will I like it? That’s less likely.

There’s no cover as yet, but hopefully we’ll get something decent! Hopefully someone like Ruth Palmer, who can actually draw human beings.

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Letters to Enid part 54: From volume 3 issue 16

Posted on August 15, 2024 by Fiona

Previous letters pages can be found here.

Letters page from Volume 3, issue 16.
August 3rd – 16th, 1955.

OUR

LETTER PAGE

A letter from Wendy Spencer, Chippenham, Wilts.

Dear Enid Blyton,
As you are interested in wild birds, I thought perhaps you would like to hear about some I know of. Every year the lovely swallows come and rear a family in our cowshed. They use the same nests as the previous year, but sometimes they have to be patched up a bit. When the baby swallows are old enough to leave the nest, the mother lines them up on a beam. Then she flies off to find a tasty fly or some other morsel. This she delivers into the gaping mouth of the first baby. Then off she goes again to find food for Baby No. 2, and this goes on until every baby has been fed.
Yours sincerely,
Wendy Spencer.
PS. – thought you would like this four-leaved clover!

(Thank you for your very interesting letter, Wendy, which everyone will like to read – and for your lucky four-leaf clover!)

A letter from Yolande Bristow, B.A.O.R. 15.
Dear Enid Blyton,
I am sending another ten shillings for the Blind Babies. I earned it by keeping Daddy’s lawn free from dandelions, and doing some shopping for Mummy. I have to ask for everything in German.
Lots of love to the Babies and yourself.
Yolande.

(Thank you, Yolande, you are very generous once more. I must say that I think you are clever to go shopping and ask for things in German. Well done.)

A letter from Mary Johnson, Newcastle-on-Tyne, 4.

Dear Enid Blyton,
Yesterday I saw a most peculiar creature crawling up the stem of one of the weeds in our pond. I watched it, and it stood still – and then split open! I was very surprised. Please do ask your readers if they can guess what came out of it. I’ll tell you in a PS.
Love from,
Mary.

(Can you guess what was in Mary’s PS.? Here it is. What came out was a big dragonfly with wings! Thank you, Mary, for telling us – you were lucky to see such a sight.)

Another letter from a child documenting the birds of their garden – and ANOTHER four leaf clover! After my lament last time that I’d never found one I’m starting to feel slightly victimised here!

I assumed that B.O.A.R. was military related but  had to look up exactly what – British Army of the Rhine. Interesting that Yolande wrote in aged 15, a few years older than Blyton intended her writing for. (Obviously not a criticism as I am considerably older than 15!)

I didn’t guess what was in Mary’s PS, I’ve never seen a dragonfly hatch.

Posted in Magazines | Tagged , , | Leave a comment

Monday #592

Posted on August 12, 2024 by Fiona

The last six weeks have flown by and schools go back tomorrow! Brodie is now 7 and is going into primary 3, I can hardly believe it. We are currently reading The Mountain of Adventure (oh, those Welsh accents, look you!) so perhaps we will see some Adventure series drawings from him this term.

Letters to Blyton 54

and

Reading the Treasure Hunters to Brodie

Part of the Summer Reading Challenge this year was a book bingo. One of the squares was Draw your favourite book character, and Brodie chose the Famous Five. One of them (either Julian or Dick, I can’t remember) has a handy rope around his waist, of course.

Posted in Blog talk | Tagged , | Leave a comment

July 2024 round up

Posted on August 7, 2024 by Fiona

That’s us halfway through 2024 already!

What I read

I hit my 100 books target in July, so I had to up my goal. I went for 150 which seems very doable at this point.

What I have read:

  • Me vs Brain – Hayley Morris
  • The Librarian – Salley Vickers
  • A Dead and Stormy Night (Nevermore Bookshop Mysteries #1) – Steffanie Holmes
  • The Perfect Cornish Murder (Nosey Parker Mysteries #3) – Fiona Leitch
  • Old Kingussie and Badenoch -Ann Glen
  • Midsummer Mysteries – Agatha Christie
  • Love and Other Wild Things (Mystic Bayou #2) – Molly Harper
  • The Treasure Hunters (Brodie’s review to come)
  • Around the World in 80 Days – Michael Palin
  • The Bookish Life of Nina Hill – Abbi Waxman
  • The House at the Edge of Magic (The House at the Edge of Magic #1) – Amy Sparkes
  • The Enchanted Castle – E Nesbit
  • The Lighthouse Library  – Rachael Lucas
  • The Hunter (The Forbidden Game #1) – L J Smith

I ended the month still working through:

  • The Sea of Adventure (Brodie’s review also to come)
  • The Back of Beyond Book Club – Angela Britnell
  • The Chase (The Forbidden Game #1) – L J Smith
  • A Novel Love Story – Ashley Poston

What I watched

  • We are up to ER season 13 (only two to go!), and we watched a few episodes of Richard Osman’s House of Games when we needed something shorter.
  • I’ve returned to Green Wing to finish it off, though I’ve also started re-watching Charmed as Shannen Doherty (Prue) sadly died in July.
  • On Tuesdays my sister and I watched the recent remake of Mean Girls (which is a musical), and The Duff.

What I did

  • We’ve eaten lots of strawberries from our plants, but not picked our potatoes yet. We planted our sunflowers outside but they are still weedy little things and show no sign of flowering.
  • Brodie started the Summer Reading Challenge and so we have been visiting libraries to collect flags and puzzle letters.
  • Headed off for our family summer holiday to Newtonmore. There we took part in the Wildcat Trail, finding 83 of the 130 cats which are in gardens and windows all round the village. We also visited the Highland Wildlife Park where the wild horses tried to eat our car and we saw several red squirrels and Landmark where Brodie bravely tried out everything he was able to. On the one really rainy day we took the train to Inverness to do a bit of shopping and visit the museum. We also squeezed in a visit to the shops in Kingussie, Ruthven Barracks, The Highland Folk museum, the ospreys at Loch Insh and the Speyside ‘beach’ and finding some geocaches. On the way home we stopped at Pitlochry to look at the dam.
  • When the weather has been good enough we’ve played in the garden and put the paddling pool up.
  • We made our first visit in a long while to the transport museum for emergency vehicles day.
  • My parents took us on a trip to Perth to do the Highland Coo trail and do some geocaching, and to Forfar to look at a hidden castle and find more geocaches.
  • We had a proper beach weather so we headed to Monifieth for a dip and a lot of burying each other in the sand.

What I bought

Sadly I bought nothing in Leakey’s (though Brodie got a Thomas the Tank Engine book), but I did get a few things in more unexpected places.

There’s a good second hand bookshop in Kingussie which I’ve visited before so of course I had to go again. There I found a load of the Adventure Island books by Helen Moss and was able to get the last of the ones I haven’t read – for £1 each!

We had a look in the gift shop in Landmark and to my surprise I saw these little jigsaws of the Famous Five for Grown-Ups covers. I didn’t know such a thing even existed! While I don’t particularly like the books themselves, the artwork by Ruth Palmer is lovely (the best part of the series!) so I had to get them.

I mentioned this a few Mondays ago, but I also treated myself to a book with Eileen Soper illustrations, and a Blyton-ish title – Six in a Caravan by Bridget Mackenzie.

 

How was your July?

Posted in Personal Experiences | Tagged , , , , , | 7 Comments