Cannonball Read 18

Sticking It to Cancer One Book at a Time


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Running away to Nostalgia Island

Five on a Treasure Island by Enid Blyton

Five Run Away Together by Enid Blyton

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CBRBingo:  Free! (birthday gift); Shelfie I rescued these books from the garage sale my brother and I were holding after clearing out our childhood home following the death of our father and out mother’s move to aged care.  I was flying back home afterwards, so needed to be selective with the mementos I would take with me.  I almost let these go, but I got them from my parents for my tenth birthday and loved them so much as I child that I took them […]

Problematic nostalgia

The Mountain of Adventure by Enid Blyton

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This is the second Enid Blyton I’ve read this year and this one, like the Adventurous Four, is a nostalgic throwback but with some things that have not aged well. The 1949 novel features a different set of four children than in Adventurous Four, but still follows the same pattern: unsupervised children ‘having an adventure’.  These particular four children are two sets of siblings- Philip and his sister Dinah and Lucy-Ann and her brother Jack.  The four are on a summer vacation in rural Wales, […]

Unaccompanied Minors, side of Nazis

The Adventurous Four by Enid Blyton

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Set in an unnamed fishing village off the north east coast of Scotland, Blyton’s book follows three siblings, Tom and his younger twin sisters Jill and Mary, who are on late summer holidays with their parents.  Their older friend, Andy, is the son of a local fisherman, and the four of them are planning a day trip with Andy’s father’s boat, lent with permission.  On their day outing, a storm sweeps the boat off course, and the four children are shipwrecked on a small island […]

Never meet your heroes, and never reread your childhood favourites

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Darrell, Sally and Alicia stood together in their North tower dormy, gazing out over the lovely blue sea. Truly, their last day at Malory Towers had been a marvellous one. “The weather is truly wizard, isn’t it?”, Darrell remarked. “How wonderful to have this kind of weather on our last night here!” “My, I shall miss it so much”, Sally declared. “I know we’ll have loads of fun at university, but still. Our time here has been wonderful. I really feel this school has transformed […]



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