Tag Archives: Eileen Soper

The Five as you have never seen them before part 3

Posted on December 14, 2022 by Fiona

I’ve done a couple of posts already, each showing a few illustrations by Eileen Soper which although look like they could be depicting the Five are in fact from other books entirely. So here’s another one! (Soper was quite prolific … Continue reading →

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Posted in Illustrations and artwork | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

My favourite Blyton covers part one

Posted on May 12, 2022 by Fiona

Having done some posts on the worst and most misleading covers lately I thought it was time to balance that out with a celebration of some of the covers that I love. I’m not going to rank them in order, … Continue reading →

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Posted in Illustrations and artwork | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Monday #455

Posted on December 20, 2021 by Fiona

For those of you who love Five Get Into a Fix and were eagerly awaiting my review (I like to at least pretend there are people out there that feel that way about my blog, OK?) I’m sorry it failed … Continue reading →

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Monday #440

Posted on September 6, 2021 by Fiona

It is September and yet the sun is still shining (for now, at least!). Kirrin Holidays brochure from Travel Blyton and Cunningham and Petrov: The Mystery of the Missing Children chapter 20.5* (I don’t have The Mountain of Adventure to … Continue reading →

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Monday #429

Posted on June 21, 2021 by Fiona

I’m sure none of you have missed the furore over what English Heritage said about Blyton this week, but I thought I would express my thoughts on it this week anyway, which means it’s going to be a bumper week … Continue reading →

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Five Go to Mystery Moor part 3

Posted on February 26, 2021 by Fiona

Here we are for part three of what should have been a two part post. Part one was a general review of the plot, and part two was entirely taken over by George and Henry. So, part three is all … Continue reading →

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The Five as you have never seen them before, part 2

Posted on March 11, 2020 by Fiona

Recently I posted some illustrations by Eileen Soper that look like members of the Famous Five but are actually from short stories. Here are some more, this time from the Hodder Story Books (Happy, Merry and so on). Anne and … Continue reading →

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The Five as you have never seen them before

Posted on February 21, 2020 by Fiona

Eileen Soper’s Five are the real Five to me. I grew up seeing her illustrations in lots of my Famous Five books and although I also had some Betty Maxey books too, I always picture Julian, Dick, Anne, George and … Continue reading →

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Eileen Soper at Christmas

Posted on December 18, 2019 by Fiona

It’s no secret that Eileen Soper is my favourite Blyton illustrator. She is best known for her work on the 21 Famous Five books, both the covers and internal illustrations, but she also illustrated lots of short story collections, a … Continue reading →

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The Secret Series covers through the years

Posted on February 16, 2019 by Fiona

I recently looked at the different covers used for the Famous Five books and The Adventure Series. One series. Five books. Four cover artists. The Secret Series is perhaps unusual due to how many different cover artists the series had. While … Continue reading →

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The Famous Five covers through the years, part 1: 1940s-1990s

Posted on December 8, 2018 by Fiona

The Famous Five books have been in print for nearly 80 years now, and along the way they have appeared with a lot of different looks from the original Eileen Soper covers to TV tie-ins and famous illustrators. We will … Continue reading →

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Five Go to Smuggler’s Top

Posted on November 23, 2018 by Fiona

Here we are at book #4 in the series and, as I’ve probably said a hundred times or more, this is my absolute favourite Famous Five book. It won first place in my list of favourite Blyton books, and unsurprisingly … Continue reading →

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When people search for Enid Blyton what are they looking for? (#2)

Posted on September 6, 2017 by Fiona

A long time ago I did a post about the search terms which brought people to our site, (I also had some in a Monday post, with made-up illustrations) and while looking for things to write about for my maternity … Continue reading →

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The Famous Five Party Game as played by Fiona

Posted on November 16, 2016 by Fiona

First up: I didn’t throw a party to play this game. It’s really not that sort of game in fact! I bought it mostly because I just love Eileen Soper’s work, and because it wasn’t too expensive. I don’t know … Continue reading →

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Posted in Toys and Games | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Looking at The Famous Five Annual 2016, part 1

Posted on February 5, 2016 by Fiona

In what has become an ‘annual’ tradition I will look at the current year’s annual in two parts. (Apologies for the bad pun.) You can see my review of the first annual from 2014 here and here, and then the … Continue reading →

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What Blyton products we would like to see in 2016

Posted on January 22, 2016 by pippastef

After the joys of Christmas and the new year have left us and that January gloom has set in, let us get back to the consumerism that we’ve all been trying to avoid in the longest pay month in the … Continue reading →

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The Famous Five Stationery

Posted on January 15, 2016 by Fiona

I was treated to all three items of stationery in December. (I have a huge desire to mis-spell it as stationary every time I type that, despite knowing how wrong it is.) They came out in September last year and … Continue reading →

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The Famous Five Card Game played by Fiona

Posted on June 14, 2015 by Fiona

I didn’t get around to listening to an audio drama for the blog this week (I think that was what I was meant to have done, at least!) so as Stef has arrived in Dundee tonight we decided to play … Continue reading →

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Looking at The Famous Five Annual 2015, part 2

Posted on March 15, 2015 by Fiona

A few weeks ago I read and reviewed the first half of the annual so here I am looking at the rest of it. I originally posted about getting this for my Christmas here, and I also reviewed the 2014 annual here … Continue reading →

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Looking at The Famous Five Annual 2015, part 1

Posted on February 13, 2015 by Fiona

So this week I’m going to read and review the 2015 annual, I posted about getting it for my Christmas here. I also reviewed the 2014 annual here and here. ON THE OUTSIDE As with last time I’ll start with … Continue reading →

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