Welcome to Writers Talkback. If you are a new user, your account will have to be approved manually to prevent spam. Please bear with us in the meantime

Books we loved when we were children...

LizLiz
edited September 2018 in Writing
Thought it might be fun to hear each others.

i loved all E Nesbitt and except for the Secret Seven, Enid Blyton

The Yearling, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings (made me sob for about 5 days)

Moonfleet,

Little House on the Prairie,

Biggles,

Anything by John Wyndham,

All 5 of Narnia (or was it 6?) up to The Last Battle anyway the Magician's Nephew a favourite

A Wrinkle in Time Madeleine L'Engle

The Wizard of Earthsea, Ursula Le Guin

Anything by Alan Garner

When Marnie was There, Joan G Robinson




Comments

  • edited September 2018
    Agatha Christie
    Malory Towers (EB)
    John Wyndham
    A A Milne
    Princess Tina annuals
    The Secret Garden
    Little Women
  • Secret seven, The Cradle Ship, Anne of Green Gables, Little Women, The Waterbabies, Girl Annual, Eagle Annual - my brother and i got one each at Christmas - and Beano Annual at my friend's house.
  • From very young: my Rupert Annuals
    Followed by: Black Beauty and Little Women (got so upset when Jo chose to marry Professor Bhaer instead of Laurie)
    Progressed to anything by John Wyndham and Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs
    I used to borrow any and all books about animals - especially African stories - from the library.
  • Me, too, Claudia... also loved Rupert (did all the magic colour pages!). Hated Little Women because of Beth. Loathed the Water babies. Loved Anne of GG.
  • Enid Blyton
    Bunty Annuals
    Heidi
    Little Women
    Tolkien
    Oliver Twist
    Jane Eyre
  • Famous Five
    Secret Seven
    Adventure series
    Billy Bunter
    Jennings
    Horsey books eg Jill’s Gymkhana and all that series
    Malory Towers
    Dandy Annual
    Beano Annual

  • Oh, and Sabu of the Elephants, I was in love with him!
  • edited September 2018
    Is anyone old enough to remember a girls' comic called Schoolfriend where all the girls went to posh boarding schools and had midnight feasts in the dorm. I always wished I could be one of them. The bad girl was called Imogen and the good girls had a secret group called the Silent Three - they went round in hooded cloaks doing helpful things. Of course I would be one of the Silent Three.

    When very young I was addicted to Milly Molly Mandy. I still have my 1949 copy (Santa brought it) of Robert Louis Stevenson's "Child's Garden of Verse." Progressed to "The Girl" comic and also read my brother's "Eagle". Later on I got hooked on "Jackie". After that I grew up a bit (sort of).
  • I remember the comic, betsie, though not the details. And Jackie. I wasn't allowed many comics.
  • My grandad's encyclopedias

  • Oh yeah, encyclopedias. Loved them - much better than google.
  • White Boots - Noel Streatfield
    Wind in the Willows
    The Family at One End Street
    Archie and Mehitabel - Don Marquis
    Agatha Christie
    Enid Blyton - like the Secret Seven and Adventure series more than Famous Five
    Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
    H G Wells - the Time Machine and Other stories
    Under Milkwood
    Great Expectations
    all of the series from Little Women onwards

    Everything I could lay my hands on - I was ill for long periods and books were everything
  • I read such a lot as a child because I lived within a stone's throw of the library. Once i read all the children's books (7 a fortnight at least) I went on to read my Dad's books (he didn't know this until I was an adult!)

    So I started with the usual suspects...The Secret Seven
    Mallory Towers books
    Famous Five
    The Water Babies
    The Diamond in the Wondow
    Tom’s Midnight Garden
    The Secret Garden
    The Narnia Chronicles
    Lord of the Rings/The Hobbit/The Silmarillion
    Alice Through the Looking Glass
    The Three Investigators series presented by Alfred Hitchcock a BIG favourite
    Oliver Twist
    A Christmas Carol
    Great Expectations
    Classic ghost stories - remember loving Edgar Allen Poe
    Horror - Peter Straub, Frank Herbert, Clive Barker
    Must have read every Stephen King book by my late teens


  • Oh yes, and my mum bought a section of an illustrated encylopedia every fortnight to create a huge volume and I devoured that.
  • Danny the Champion of the World by Roald Dahl. I already enjoyed reading books by the time I read this one, but it made me become a bookworm.
  • I went straight from Enid Blyton's adventure series to Dickens & Hardy. I was the kid in English that loved it when we got another Shakespeare play to read, except Henry 5th part 1 - hated that. But I think that's probably a bit weird.
  • No, I hated Henry 5th part 1 too.
  • Although I read the Enid Blyton Adventure series as my brother had most of them already I preferred the Lone Pine adventures written by Malcolm Saville. Does anyone else remember them?
  • Yes! I had several. I remember one with boys pointing on the front, and I think maybe mountains in the background.
  • Pleased not to be the only one to enjoy the Lone Pine series. I read them from the library but I have four later paperbacks picked up at a fete and read by my children and now grandchildren. Treasure at Amorys has a man pointing on the cover and I suspect the neglected mountain may be the other title you recall, Liz. My favourites were the ones set in Rye although at the time I had never visited. He obviously described his settings well as when I did I felt I "recognised" many features.
  • Yes Liz, I remember The Yearling and how I couldn't put it down. 
    Seem to remember liking The Water Babies.    Some of the morals could well apply today.  Later, of course, Arthur Ransome books. 
  • Treasure Island (and  I still read it every couple of years = wonderful)
    Coral Island
    The Molesworth Series
    Winnie The Pooh
    Now We Are Six
    The Wind In The Willows
    Alice In Wonderland
    Just So Stories
  • Used to read Hank Janson under the desk at school
  • Is that rhyming slang?
  • and, of course, all the Just William books. 
  • Loved my brother's Just William, Jennings and Derbyshire, Biggles' and Billy Bunters. 
  • William and Billy Bunter annoyed me - probably because my brother did!
  • Ha! My brother was unfailingly funny, kind and polite. I can't recall a single occasion when he was naughty... well, maybe one. He refused to lay the table, his job, so I poured a pint of milk over his head from an upstairs window. I was not unfailingly kind and polite. 
Sign In or Register to comment.