The Children of Green Knowe - Softcover

Boston, Lucy. M. Illustrated By Peter Boston

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0156168707 ISBN 13: 9780156168700

Publisher: Penguin Puffin, 1977

Synopsis

Green Knowe COMPLETE SET OF FIVE BOOKS IN SLIPCASE (The Chimneys of Green Knowe; The Children of Green Knowe; An Enemy at Green Knowe; A Stranger at Green Knowe; The River at Green Knowe)

About this title

Review

This is not an easy book, and therein lies its charm. L M Boston's classic is a sophisticated mood piece disguised as a children's ghost story. As young Toseland goes to live with his grandmother in the family's ancestral home, the reader is plunged immediately into the world of Green Knowe. Like Toseland, who actually rows up to his new home in the midst of a flood, we have a hard time finding our bearings. Toseland discovers a funny kind of grandmother awaiting him--one who speaks elliptically of the children and animals she keeps around the house: they might be memories, they might be ghosts. It's never quite clear where real life leaves off and magic begins. Toseland admires a deer: "A deer seems more magic than a horse." His grandmother is quick to respond: "Very beautiful fairy-tale magic, but a horse that thinks the same thoughts that you do is like strong magic wine, a love philtre for boys."

With this meshing of the magical and the real, Boston evokes a childlike world of wonder. She compounds the effect by combining gorgeous images and eerily evocative writing. Toseland goes out on a snowy morning: "In front of him, the world was an unbroken dazzling cloud of crystal stars, except for the moat, which looked like a strip of night that had somehow sinned and had no stars in it." The loosely plotted story is given more resonance still through liberal use of biblical imagery and Anglo-Saxon mythology. For those willing to suspend their disbelief and read carefully, the world of Green Knowe offers a wondrous escape. - -Claire Dederer

Review

"This is a book . . . to own and read aloud and come back to over and over again. It is one of the best fantasies I have ever read."--"Horn Book"
"An uncommon tale . . . told with a gratifying blend of the eerie, the sinister, and the familiar."--"New Yorker"

Edition details

• Publisher: Penguin Puffin
• Publication date: 1977
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0156168707
• ISBN 13: 9780156168700
• Binding: Paperback
• Illustrator: Boston Peter
• Edition number: 1