The Barney Mysteries

 

It's a warm post ban holiday day here as I type this weeks blogs so having been at EBS he old adage "You can't but a good book down would seem to apply around these parts of late  as some more new to me books by Enid Blyton arrived recently that cannot be bought now.

These copies are actually editions from the very early nineteen-seventies where while still in hardback form they have been cheapened by printing the frontspiece and spine direct to the jacket and missing off the rear of what would of been the back of the paper dust jacket the original hardbacks had.

 There are six novels in this series of mystery adventures that feature Rodger and Diana Lynton and their cousin Peter, ophaned, who goes under the name "Subby" in the series and his dog Laddie who are also joined by Barney an motherless circus boy who has been on a quest to find his absent father and who has a money called Miranda.

The "Barney Mysteries" is the title these usually are grouped under although some use "R Mysteries" with the "R" coming from the R in the names of all the titles.

The children visit sleepy villages and seaside towns that it transpires are riddled with intregue and it's that they look into.

One of the strengths of this series is the stories are full of atmosphere and good humour, the strong characterization making for much more depth  than most of her work and more sophisticated language that made it the only series Enid herself recommended just for those of eleven years and upward while still staying within child friendly themes.

That Boarding School Girl

After last weeks post which was really pretty rapidly assembled after I realized that with a few problems across the weekend I had not got around to  it I think this week we may get deeper and some indication of which is for the first time in ages I am using a Windows based machine.

One site I have used for donkey's years is closing at the end of the month, a matter of the increased liabilities anyone running a site they themselves own do face and in part the slow dwindling of traditional forums as much as I regret that as simply, a well designed forum is much easier to find your way around than the likes of X or Instagram even though the cool kids just stay in that "walled garden"

That place played a part in the establishment of my original blog being the direct inspiration for taking topics, be they around Trans Life, Music, Reading, the nature of Gender and Sexual identity and expanding owns own thoughts to many there that followed it.

Reading through some of the old messages still preserved reminded me very much of just how front and central that site was and why to this day the blog still has quite a high coverage given I don't push it really hard.

It was really the place where after some negative encounters online and a struggle balancing the more serious grown up side and what simply would never go away, the more little, child-like I just broke down and came out LG.

And they just accepted that.

My choice of avatar their reflected that, a girl on a swing with the forum signature line "I'll go on my swing if I want to" summed it up.: While prepared to engage with adult topics, I was to be open about my Little Sides needs. I created a spot for them there too.

That write large went into the more grown up That Boarding School Girl blog as an expanded entry.
 

kk

Revisiting an old book

There are things you may have and do feel like revisiting such as books you had for an awful long time and today I'm writing about one.

A good many years back was the internet was becoming more a thing and I first got online I learned from sites I visited not just a bit more about upcoming releases and some variants of Beatles albums but also of books that went more into the history the Band and their Singles and Albums together with marketing.

One name I learned about was the American Bruce Spizer who did write and I eventually got his more useful supplement to 2004's Capitol Albums Volume One box set which had more of the facts, figures and story of these albums than the official enclosed booklet.

Some years ago I bought a few in a kind of paper back form the first editions of a new series of books he wrote around specific albums and one I recently re-read was The Beatles Finally Let It Be, the title being a pun based upon just how long and how many attempts that sessions that ended up as the Let It Be album and its accompanying movie it book until they were "let be" and released.

In it for example you learn of Magic Alex who saw himself as an electronics wizard inventor who appeared to the ear of John Lennon and his plan to build for them the bestest recording studio around with 72 tracks in a world where most had only 8.

That plan effected the recording of this album they only found a 8 track system riddled with so much hum and noise it was simply not fit for purpose, a building where there was no provision for cabling from studio to control room to recording consoles and where the was so little screening of noises such as that from the boiler, it had to be turned off whenever they were recording.

He also inexplicably had eight speakers, one per track where you only needed two for stereo mixing.

Magic Alex was really way out of his depth lacking real knowledge but John believed him even though he was close enough to people who worked and even owned, as George Martin their producer did, studios and knew just what was really needed and possible.

That fascinating little story one of several showed just how gullible the four beatles, not least John were back then handing over vast sums of money to people who knew little but how to gain their money.

It was fun re-reading this volume.

A post of updates

 There we go another Wednesday and another post here.

I'm a bit better than I was people and thanks for the comment left last week, being able to be about a bit more if not fully recovered which did mean I got outdoors to hear the Last Post on Armistice Day from the local Cenotaph being played.

I have walked a short distance this week, going slowly and avoiding jerky actions.

I did have some trouble with an international order whose arrival here got messed up by Hermes as in not arrived but did get my not inconsiderable money back from Ebay after putting a complaint in.

At the site where various stories are read in real time we almost but not quite finished Camp Hangnail by Ursula Vernon with just the last chapter to finish off which has been quite a gripping story about witches, minions, and one fantastic castle.

I struggled with Dragonheart  by the same author probably due to my poor for age reading comprehension and poor short term memory that makes holding on lots of details in a passage hard going.

That seemed to me me written for a Sci-Fi geek.

See you all next week!

Opal Plumstead revisited

This week I am revisiting a book that appealed to me a few years ago not least as with current events it has been taking me out of where I need to be, that boarding school girl and just be surrounded by groan up stuff that doesn't do me much good

This book was published in the autumn of 2014 and concerns the life of one Opal Plumstead aged 14 who got a scholarship to attend school planning to go on to university when she was older.

Alas her plans are shattered upon her father being sent to prison and so unable to take up the scholarship and having to get a a job at the Fairy Glen sweet factory to keep her family as was often the case in 1913. 

To start with she struggles with getting on the staff who think she's "stuck up" and snobby unlike them but she takes a shine to Mrs Roberts, the business owner introducing her to the Suffragette movement.

She also meets Morgan, the son and heir to the business who she feels she finally has a soul mate in but with war on the horizon bringing many forced changes it can only change Opal's life forever.

As a piece of historical fiction it helps to bring to life the lives and events of that whole era that lead to WW1 and in  its aftermath the widespread social  changes of Great Britain that I enjoyed learning about when I was younger.

To me setting things in their everyday context makes it easier to comprehend just how peoples could change so suddenly in an era without social insurance and where to see the doctor cost money.

Storytime

 

It may sound wierd but I often her myself saying that in my mind cos I've the simpliest of concepts in some ways, it's why I love listing to a streamed storytime for littles near enough every weekend with a couple of stories on the go.

I just find it incredably relaxing to just sit there enchanted taking in the story with nothing else intruding upon it in the way I loved at infant and junior school sat in a circle with friends as the teacher would begin.

You just go into that other world for a period, totally immersed where you are just there with them.

I know you read books too, but being read to just feels so different and I just come out of it so much more relaxed than before.

Perhaps that's the best thing for me?

More G.O.* fiction

I've not been too brilliant this week with one thing or another, not the sort of thing that benefit from "localized heating" not that mind that when it's needed but more bigger things being unwell so between things have been doing a spot of reading as it helps keep my spirits up.

With the Secret Seven's stories I had changed from a mixture of newer copies and old paperbacks to being in hard back editions with original texts over the years as the alterations made no sense.

This lesser known author wrote Jill At Hazelmere in nineteen sixty-four and Jill Investigates both borrowing from the Girl comic strip series Wendy and Jinx school based adventures where both are Forth Formers.

It's the very sort of book I love and actually it's the first time I've owned a copy - mine's from nineteen sixty-six  although I'm sure saw a copy at boarding school in the Seventies.

Sadly the Girls Comic site which had extracts from many British girls comics including Girl that was published between nineteen fifty-one and nineteen sixty-four has disappeared as has the middlescommonroom.com site where mainly older  junior fiction was discussed.

Trying to find a G.O* or mainly G.O discussion board where such staples of the junior fiction I read back then is proving difficult.

*G.O = Girls Only, the very girl centric type of novel or comic writing usually about schools, horses and princesses.

Rent a Bridesmaid

Recently I picked up a copy of book I'd thought about getting late last year but as things are want to do with me at times I'd forgotten all about it, bought a copy  and sat across a few days reading it.

The story is about a nine year old girl, Tilly who can scarcely believe it when her best friend and class mate, Matty, is offered the role of being a bridesmaid for she is as much a tomboy as Tilly is more girly girl and really wasn't looking forward to it.
Tilly's parents had split up and the dress is very much the focus of Tilly's longing for her parents to be reunited as she missed no longer living with Mom.
After her friend had worn it and it had been cleaned, Matty offers her the dress as she could never see herself ever wearing it again and this leads into Tilly's favourite daydream of being a bridesmaid in the must beautiful dress, walking behind the bride and after talking it through with her best friend resolves to sort this by advertising herself as a Bridesmaid for rent at the local store.

This is the dress and most beautiful it is too.
The dress leads to her meeting different people such as an older couple, a same sex couple of professional people and a family who had planned a large church wedding with five other bridesmaids, all of which enrich her life.
The one thing sadly all of this cannot do is the very thing she longs for the most -to reunite her family- so when her Mom who it transpires later on hadn't been well mentally does come to see her after Tilly appears on a tv program about weddings, her hopes are dashed .
This said there does seem to be a relationship blossoming between Miss Hope her teacher and her dad and maybe if there's to be a sequel Tilly will be the bridesmaid at that wedding!
One of things I liked about it was the exploration  of the friendship between Matty and Tilly, that although being in so many ways polar opposites not just their personalities but lifestyles and that despite this they really do gel, becoming best friends. That comes over so well in how it is written showing how disagreements that for those of who remember just high emotional we were around their ages soon get minded with some tlc.
To conclude although on the face of it it's a relatively uncomplicated story about a girl and her dress it has more depth exploring the nature of friendship you can see at a more grown up level very intensely heartfelt and emotional coming over through intelligent use of subtle nuances of mood and character. It is a great joy to read.

Riding Freedom

Seeing we've just started into the new month, I thought I'd kick off the first entry of March with something that goes back a few years where two friends and I read a book together, sharing our thoughts on it.

 Written in 1998 by Pam Munoz Ryan, Riding Freedom is a fictionalized story about a mid 1800's pioneering woman, Charlotte Parkhurst who was raised in a orphanage for boys  that tells the tale of her life from escaping the orphanage, becoming a legendary stagecoach driver as "Charley", getting a ranch of her own in California and being the first American woman to vote.
While the book has received a number of positive reviews from people such as the School Library Journal and I loved the gritty female emancipation theme it contains, I wasn't to taken with the way it was written.
To me it feels more a straight on fictionalized retelling of a life being more an account of  "Charley's" life from the orphanage , escaping life limited to domestic  chores  to owning a smallholding than a actual story, fascinating for the historical detail but lacking in character development in areas like examining in detail how she felt and how whole incidents really played out.
This was especially noticeable in the secondary characters such as Ebeneezer as we seldom really got to know them, having more a cursory description  that lift them more into your minds eye although there was so much that could of been made of it.
A disappointment.

Wave Me Goodbye

It was just about three months ago that I was given by a kind relation who enjoys reading, a gift voucher for a well known book and stationery store and in early June, a new book by a favourite author of mine came out so I called in and used it to buy this book.

Entitled Wave My Goodbye, it is about the world of one Shirley L. Smith who lives with her Mom who works in an office and Dad who has joined the Army in the centre of London in Nineteen Thirty-nine.
It has been decided all the children need to be evacuated as the threat of war with Nazi Germany for their own well-being from bombing and it is being done on a school by school basis.
The whole of Paradise Road Junior School is called up, so Shirley has to have a suitcase packed with a change of clothes including night wear plus her favourite dolls and  books before her mommy sees her off at London Victoria railway station which after some fuss she is allowed to sit with the girls of the St Agatha's Convent School of whom it transpires seem to get the best of everything, enroute to Meadow Ridge way out in the countryside.
Arrangements for billeting the children and staff seem very rushed as nothing had been prearranged between the W.V.S. and W.I.and the children are taken around the village until someone claims  them. Unfortunately Shirley plus two east end boys, Kevin and Archie appear to stuck with nowhere to go until with some reluctance Mrs Waverley and Chubby who is her assistant at the Red House, decides to take them in although it appears they hadn't enough food in for them straightaway nor beds .
The children are bought new clothes which for Shirley includes a School Tunic and tie as she only had a pleated skirt with attached bodice and a party frock to change into plus Mrs Waverley also loves reading so they have something in common.
The story sees them attending school in extra classes of the villages local school with lessons by  who is brisk, kind in some ways but not opposed to strapping misbehaving children.
They appear to get on although life has it's ups and downs not least with one of the boys having a problem with bed wetting that creates a lot of work but following an accident  when Kevin follows Shirley who can look at Mrs Waverley's dolls house from the end of the war and to which is a kind of model of the life who had hope to have until her husband was killed in the Great War (W.W.1) and in the course of playing with it breaks the arm of the dolly of him, she gets upset and Kevin and Shirley run off back to London where she is met by her dad for a few days.
He returns them and smooths over the misunderstandings with Chubby and Mrs Waverley so they feel at home and so stay there until the war is over.

The story is one that is undeniable moving, based on what happened across much of Great Britain during the build up and shortly after World War Two, when our major city areas were deemed to unsafe for children and they travelled often more in hope that everything would work out being without their parents.
It is also true that some didn't want 'city children'  and their ways around and others only wanted them for much more for what they could bring them on say farms for labour rather than providing a safe place to live and yet for others it did bring changes for the better in their lives having access to fresh air and countryside.
As a book I found it highly enjoyable although a bit sad in places, telling an important story about the social history of being a child caught up in the storms of war having to adjust to vastly different realities.

Malory Towers revisited

After all the excitement of last week and writing up all the adventures on Monday I'm writing what in some ways is a continuation piece from a 2011 entry of mine that kind of gives you an idea of just how long I've been blogging.
When I wrote way back in more or less exactly five years ago about Malory Towers, the  six part series of novels by Enid Blyton, I remarked about a couple of things I had noticed since originally encountering them in childhood.
One was about the illustrations which I feel is relevant not least in the Country I presently reside in because for a school based series, you see, you may well have personally even worn, the uniforms many schools have so have a mental image of what a school boy or in this case a school girl generally looks like. The tendency for cartoonish illustrations in particular used on the  first decade of this centuries editions of this series  particularly made them look cheap and detached them from their era.
I'd never of bought them as a child cos I wanted something that looked presentable and clearly hooked me into the story.
I saw the paperbacks with those images and bought at the time a nicer looking set of softbacks from 2004 that served me well until something else came very much to light.
Like with a good number of her books, the text had been altered with no clear indication and so I did pick up a 1987 omnibus edition of the first four novels published by W H Smith but printed by Methuen Children's books under license.

I didn't actually realize Dean's who were an imprint of Methuen's  did a complete  set in the form of two hard back books until very recently and given these were from the early 1990's was a bit concerned about those troublesome alterations and updates.
The first volume not so imaginatively titled Malory Towers came out in 1991, a year later than the separate six volumes issued in their Rewards series with more modernish but generally tasteful front covers.
I did check the text over as in the first novel, First Term at Malory Towers, there are clear references both to Darrel's behaviour that are toned down in modern editions and the threat to spank with a hairbrush common enough when first published but removed completely in newer editions. That was big shock I found moving to the 2004 set to that incomplete omnibus late 80's edition because it does alter the feel of those schoolgirls in a boarding school, like I was, and makes the adults responses more understandable.
This 1991 set surprisingly uses the same text as if they had used the same typesetting as that and had carried it over to the 1990 Rewards too and keeps a good number of the original black and white illustrated plates by Jenny Chapple.

While the cover looks slightly too contemporary to my eyes, the advantage of having the second volume over the 1987 is in part less weight for having just three novel per volume compared to four and again it uses a less modern so-called politically correct text.
My suspicion are that actually these three in one omnibus editions and the 1990 separate ones are just repackaged editions of the versions Methuen  had out during the 1980's with newer covers for sale by certain book sellers who specialized in discounted hardback books aimed at adults buying for children.

 Now that is the original hardback dust jacket from Third Year at Malory Towers which I feel sums up the feel of playing sports together at an all girls school wearing era specific uniform.
While to be honest I'd sooner they had used front covers more in that style for these two three in one omnibus editions, they do make for a good way to get relatively recent pre-political correct text versions often been found for just a few pounds each in good condition.
They do match my St Clares and The Naughtiest Girl Dean's omnibus editions being from the same era with their vanilla coloured spines.
I was very glad to spot these just before I went away.
Original entry: Malory Towers

Christmas report

Christmas here was a bit different for a few reasons one being we didn't go out for lunch between some inter family stuff that tested patience to the limits and Mommy and I being very unwell just before and still recovering  so even if we had, it really would of been a waste as we'd not of eaten much.
With that we ate at home between ourselves,with the Turkey being put in over night to cook right through, vegetables done across the morning and the Christmas Pudding zapped in two minutes flat before eating!
As it was 2015 I had to help out getting stuff out, setting the table, clearing the table and with washing up.
I did have a number of presents this year although somethings are in transit as as I wasn't well enough to organize them to just before Christmas which does give me something to look forward toward I guess.

A perennial with me is comic annuals which are a direct run on from the Christmas presents I has as a child featuring special and sometimes Christmas themed cartoon strips from my all time favourite characters such as the no longer running apart from specials, Dandy which had Korky the cat, Desperate Dan of Cow Pie fame and others in it. 

The BIG comic with me as a Child was Britain's Beano a veritable parallel world for those of us who were of official school age  during the 70's thru 90's it's peak period with it's own school and characters in the form of the Bash Street Kids, my heroine Minnie the Minx and Dennis the Menance who like us also got smacked if they were naughty (and they were!).
As time went by some strips like Lord Snooty got retired and others like Bananaman who did have a tv series too joined the old favourites and the questionable practise of featuring in the news real people like pop stars and the like in story-lines crept in.

To say I like Jacqueline Wilson's stories is an understatement outside of the likes of Enid Blyton and co which I was raised on (and as you may know do have a good number of complete series by), she treads the line well between old school story telling but set in the world of todays children (and sadly some of society's issues) producing funny, very readable and thought provoking work.
This is set of short stories, some Christmas related featuring some of her best loved characters like Tracy Beaker and Hetty Feather with quizzes too which is just the sort of thing I like, a more middles take on an annual in a paperback book format.

Mommy bought me  this, Maddie who is a 14 inch soft rag doll who I think is adorable in her pink candy stripped outfit and some grey long school socks which is a very sensible choice for an adult middle like me.

My Auntie brought me a selection box which was a super inspired choice on her part as she not formally known about my Middle side but can tell straight I'm very child-like.

To be honest I'd sooner people either asked ideally or just bought me things more like this because I just so not relate to *adult* likes and that at all so buying for a middle child really is more sensible.

Chilling little style

Well Sammy's moved so while Ik is down I thought I'd get this weeks entry written up.
One of things I recall thinking about heaps was about everything that would happen after the last period of afternoon school finished. When I went to day school it was kind of easy in that you'd pair off with a few friends and call in at the neighbourhood store to fix some candy to share while you talked about the day and what you thought of Master x's lesson.

At boarding school we had it back in the dorm but because tea was early it was frowned on as it 'spoilt your tea' so you'd leave them for later or weekends.
I have always loved lollipops still walk around the sidewalks  licking them that speaks volumes about me I guess.
Actually I have a pinafore dress not a million miles like that of the girl on picture and used to read while sucking on a lollipop so perhaps one way to visualize me is think of that girl at least in spirit if not in dress. The only thing that matters is having fun reading and sucking your lollipops.

Link:Lollipops

Christmas 2012

If you have just come to this site you probably did not expect me to publish a Christmas edition as I had said elsewhere I wasn't doing one before Christmas as I was going to be very busy organizing stuff for other peoples Christmas's, visiting and the like.

You might be thinking what is a Joanne Christmas like?

A Joanne Christmas is unapologetically a little affair, simple, very childlike wrapped around some groan up parts such as being with relatives so while they may do sophisticated things and talk about groan up stuff, I don't cos I'm the child.

I woke up, got dressed and spend most of the morning  in full uniform and I see I wasn't the only one in our community that spent at least some of our time like that today.

We went out for Christmas lunch where apart from having some lovely well cooked food, I played a small springy man with a sucker that holds it down for a minute before it goes pop and jumps up in the air landing all over the place. I had loads of fun doing that and Mommy was okay with it too. Having a Mommy that'll let you do this in public is so awesome.

Below is my present pile with an unexpected present on the top.

Hmm I wonder what it might be cos it came from a borderline lg colleague of mine who really knows what makes me happy.

Oh look, she bought me a Hello Kitty selection box with chocolate and other candy in it because when she saw it, it reminded her of me. It was so sweet of her as knows all about my little side.

I had some money cos really most groan stuff doesn't really do anything for me at all so I bought this years super annuals by Jacqueline Wilson who writes lovely children's books and yes a Hello Kitty annual with games,activities and other really fun things to do in them like colouring.

 As well I had this the 75th Anniversary annual of the British Comic the Beano with special stories, jokes and other things in them that make me happy.

In a Joanne Christmas, new childrens books feature as I love reading about people and their adventures so there's Emerald Star, a follow up to Hetty Feather and Four Children and It by Jacqueline Wilson in their hardback editions.
Mommy bought me some pastel pink super soft slippers that's she's happy for me to wear around her, a pair of soft snuggle socks and Scottish shortbread. I had a tin of chocolates to share cos well sharing is a 'very good thing tm' although Ill have to change some gloves as my hands are small, the fingers are smaller than Mommy's even and these are way too big.
I have record coming just after Christmas too as it was in the Christmas Eve sale too.
Now the funny thing is people this is so similar to the Christmas's of of the past and you know what? It just feels so right.

Children of Cherry Tree Farm

I grew up in the countryside in a small hamlet with just one store and public house that we spent summers outside drinking lemonade in when we weren't playing out  so it isn't that surprising I love stories about the kinds of communities I lived in.
Enid Blyton wrote three super books that deal with this topic that I adore.
We start with four children Rory (13), Sheila, Benjy and Penny - that's the youngest at 7 - who lived in London are sent to their Aunt Bess and Uncle Tim's farm, Cherry Tree Farm,as they were poorly to recuperate while their folks were on business in America.
It's an old country farm with thatched roofs and little mechanization.

They learn about country life and lore encountering Tammylan a person who understands about looking after animals and explains the them all about different species and their role in the countryside. For the period this novel is set in Tammylan has enlightened views about the importance of the environment. The fresh air soon helps the children recover and also ignites their imaginations.
They learn about how farming families pull together and have a pleasant surprise as their folks upon returning decided too forgo their city life to return to farming.
The Children of Willow Farm and More adventures on Willow Farm are the stories of bringing a farm back to life, establishing new crops together with livestock as it is a mixed farm and the trails and tribulations of running the farm that the children increasingly learn to do for themselves.
The children learn about being responsible, working as a team and dealing with disappointments.
What I love about these books isn't just the story about the children it's how carefully information about wildlife and farming practise is slipped into the book so you learn about the basics of agriculture and making things like milk, cheese and cream!

Guilty secrets.

We might begin by saying according to Google, I have now 14 followers of this blog and it is going to circulated a bit more widely with a short introductory message.
For most of this week I've been reading a mixture of Enid Blyton's Secrets series with the first two stories in their 1960's paperback editions as modern editions haven't so much edited as partially re-written the first chapters that are essential to understand why 4 children would runway in this period from their guardians.

Guilty secret time:

Okay, the eagle eyed will spot a modern no-no on the front cover of this, one of the original three story collections in the Amelia Jane stories.
Amelia is a home made ragdoll who lives in the toybox with the other twos of the children who own them with a teddy bear, sailor boy, wooden mouse and a clown as well as a 'golly' a black faced doll if you grew up in the 70's or before you may well have had in your toybox.
I have fond memories of my toy box I can assure you with dolls teddy bears and even a golly (eek).
Amelia being home made hasn't been what we'd call socialized and so is gets very bored doing incredibly naughty damaging things, playing with matches, being very rude and spiteful, just like many young children, something that no doubt makes it very easy to identify with.In some respects it's almost a moral tract showing action and consequence through the adult narration.
The other toys do with the help of the brownies (another no-no in modern editions) restore order. Amelia has to stand in the corner  and is smacked, just rather like I was at that age for doing pretty much the same things cos like any kid I was capable of 'naughty'.
'Golly' is a no-no too but anyone who has read these stories know he's a really sweet but strong character who will stand up for himself and isn't afraid to take the lead on bring Amelia back under control.
I guess the 'Golly' problem lies with parts of his depiction having prominent eyes and red lips being too close for some to 'blacked up' white actors who some see as promoting a negative stereotype of black people although Enid Blyton sure doesn't in her stories and in the UK at least 'Golly' or 'Gollywogg' was never frequently used as a racial insult.
Given I at least have been called a 'muppet several times before now and no one has insisted on removing that word from public tv and literature, shouldn't we judge a book by it's content and only take offence when a character is being portrayed in an offensive way?

Joanne is reading for pleasure

A return to work this week after being poorly but immersed in littleness for the preceding two  prompts this weeks entry.
Reading  for people like me who have difficulty recognizing words and following English grammar is hard going but we are getting somewhere as I actually enjoyed for once reading while unable to work.
A good while back we were talking in chat about favourite stories and Jennifer said she liked the Famous Five series to which my reply was one of once I'd finished paying back some money I spend on a big cd box set, I'd consider getting a set cos although I did read a few when I was officially younger, I'm missing a set.
The stories feature the adventures over their vacations of Julian ,Dick, Anne and George aka Georgina and her dog, Timmy. George lives with her father Quentin, a Scientist, next to Kirrin Island that George 'owns'. In total there are 21 stories the earliest being 1942's Five on a Treasure Island to 1963's Five are together again

That bundle of books is the "classic" edition which retains Eileen A. Soper's original illustrations not to be confused the 2011 significantly altered set and only set me back just under £25 shipped from Amazon that's really quite a bargain.
One bone of contention regarding all of Enid Blyton's books is, over the years some subtle and not so subtle alterations have been made.
While this set isn't too bad from that point of view with no loss of  or major changes in characters, some of those made make no sense such George - the girl who wants to present as a boy - we are told in this edition wears a jersey and jeans however the illustrations clearly show her in shorts (something boys under 14 in the UK did wear during the period these books were written) and further research I did showed this to a fairly recent alteration. Equally a reference to Quentin in Five on a Treasure Island  threatening a spanking to George for being very awkward as well as cheeky is removed (even though it would of been very likely to had been made back then) and yet in Five go off in a  caravan, Nobby the circus boy is still threatened with a whipping and gets it from Tiger Dan his circus step father.
For all cackhanded so-called Political Correctness though I'm enjoying reading these stories and it's interesting she made 'George' the way she did without any implied criticism. A heroine if ever one needed one.

Not unsurprisingly I love school stories especially boarding school ones and one series I've been slowly collecting inspired in part by our motley alg crew's tastes is by Anne Digby and is called Trebizon that runs to 14 stories.
If that sounds terribly Cornish it's meant to be cos it's based on this super school for bright girls next to the beach and being written and published between 1978 and 1994 covering a  period when I was in boarding school (yay!) we are treated to such cultural references such as British Rail, Wimbledon, duplicating machines with their stencils, cassette tape recorders and finally Television!

That is the 1993 first three stories in one hardback book edition as published by Deans.
The stories are centred around Rebecca who joins the school having been at a London Comprehensive following her parents stationing in Saudi Arabia with a common theme being her emerging talent at Tennis although (hurrah!) she does play Hockey too! Of the other major characters we learn about her best friends Tish Anderson and Susan Murdoch and her boyfriend Robbie. We learn about the trails of fitting in when you join a school in the second term after everyone's paired off with friends, about hard choices deciding what to major in and what you may need to drop to keep your schoolwork schedule manageable.

Back to St Clares!

Apologies for the brevity of this weeks edition but I'm unwell with seems to be a bad cold but never fear Joanne always comes up with something.You can thank her boarding school for that!
Picking up with the themes of returning to school where I've been trying last week to get to grips with times tables, the little adventure dayout and so on, I decided to take stock of my small book collection.
Actually it came to me last night, there were two reasons why some of the first books I bought at the end of my formal education were more like textbooks, first first being my problems in reading meant something more simplified like a study aid was easier to follow and the other was - wait for it - an early indication that really I wanted my childhood back by having some of the books I had or read at the time with me.
Anyway, I found a few books that I never read much because as good as they are (some won literary awards), they're too far above my reading age meaning I struggle to really follow them so I'm replacing them.
Why replace them rather than just give them away? Simply I realize that reading is something I need to do to improve within my own learning disabilities restrictions, my ability to read, follow and understand stories.
What I decided to do was to get the older two book collections of the original 6 story edition of St Clare's by Enid Blyton because it's a  bit more wordy than some of her other stuff so it gives me a bit of a word workout (I can look up the words in my new Dictionary and learn their meanings) and a school, based adventure story is the kind of thing I love to read (which helps keeping the interest up).
They were issued several years back with new computerized art covers however I feel they just don't look right and also Pamela Cox ghost wrote three new stories for that series that aren't really essential.
These are my 'new to me' editions:

This edition has the first three books in a single  volume namely The Twins at St Clare's, The O'Sullivan Twins and Summer term at St Clare's, written between 1941 through 1943 although many more memorable characters such as Claudine, a mischievious French girl and feather-headed Alison also feature in a world of tricks and jokes, midnight feasts, sports matches, thrilling rescues, fun and friendship as well as hard work, exams and snobbery!

The final volume has Second term at St Clare's, Claudine at St Clare's plus Fifth formers at St Clare's written between 1944 and 1945. I remember the fifth form vividly!
It's a bit odd for missing out completely the third form  but perhaps everyone leapfrogged it?
The school predates Malory Towers and is seen by parents as being  a "very sensible sort of school one  not to pander to children who feel their above everyone else.
The school Headmistress Miss Theobald is a believer  in the idea people get out of life what they put into it, telling her pupils: "Do your best for us and St. Clare's will be able to do its best for you!  Oddly enough that was what my Head teacher said too!
These editions came out in 1993 but with the artwork still looking a bit more in keeping with the period they written and the stories themselves still hold up. Indeed many 9 through 11 year readers today have written glowing reviews as have parents whose children having gone though today's supernatural based stories were given these only to find their offspring can't get enough of them.

Joanne returns to school

Well I did leave a bit of a hint a few weeks back but I will be undertaking a bit of learning this term brushing up on my numeracy, penwomanship and English as for one thing I'm a litle rusty part from my dyslexia, dyspraxia and other learning disabilities I'm not too good at this stuff.Really I'm not.
I'll be doing some UK KS1/2 worksheets as appropriate to my needs each week sat at a desk suitably dressed which no doubt Jennifer would wholeheartedly approve off although sadly I won't have a Games Mistress. The rotters!!!   Playtime will happen though.
But that means I need some new tools as my tools well, there a bit old really dating from the last time I set foot in a classroom.

That's right Jennie, a circa 1977 Commodore 796M LED calculator that if you knew how you could spell words on it! I'll be getting a newer one with pink keys but in the mean time this laptop has one although I'll be only using that to check the answers with cos I really need to bring my mental arithmetic aka Math up to scratch.
Spelling as well as picking the best words for something in English isn't my strong point and you see, if your dyslexic like me, a spellchecker only gets you so far plus it often suggests world you weren't thinking of so I'm going to have to learn new words by rote and learn to use a dictionary from now on.

Well that's my old very battered one the girl immediately under the Head Girl at my boarding school gave me back in the day but apart from the seams going, English has gained quite a few new words over the years as well as some old words having newer, more current meanings that I don't understand.

Well Hello Kitty can help me learn as she's made this new version that's easier to follow and as well as having some tips on how to use words better which I'll be using.
Dyspraxia means in simple terms I have difficult making and co-ordinating small movements such as those you use to draw and critically write. It's a pain!
My handwriting  has never been good and for a period stopped completely following the industrial injury that further messed my life up (in some ways at least, in others it bought the inner kid to the fore).

I'll be following the exercises Hello Kitty uses to practise my letter drawing together with forming the shapes that make the top and bottom of letters which is something I'm really really bad at.
Sometimes even in this electronic age we need to write things and many people appreciate a hand written letter, postcard or birthday greetings card so being able to make a good job of it will be a help to me.

Tales I read from the past

This was an original paperback book from my childhood which being in the early 70's as a bit gaudy from an aesthetic point of view and probably more  with a nod and a wink to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and rather like that it has a more tale.
More accurately it has moral tales because it is a series of 30 short tales of children being naughty though I venture to suggest in 2009 someone has given them a condition or syndrome rather than using the other 'n' word.

The original hard back illustration by Eileen Soper.
In it children see character acting up, just as a child you would with the consequences unfolding and some sort of punishment being metered  at the end because it was written for more six to eight year olds to help show what was and was not acceptable behaviour.
It can be seen as a replacement for the old stodgy Victorian morality tales for being funny and engaging more with a child's imagination.  
A key feature is that the a strong sense of just punishment is included that children strongly identify with.
The fact I've kept it so long is an indication of the extent to which I feel it is relevant to me and the failure to learn to behave in a mature way.