FOR YOUNG READERS

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31030, 9 April 1966, Page 4

FOR YOUNG READERS

A Secret to Sell. By Milva Lear. Angus and Robertson. 147 pp.

This children’s novel is set in Western Australia in the 1820 s and tells of two children, Robert and Charlotte Morton, in the party which founded a new settlement in King George Sound. Unfortunately, in her attempt to write an exciting story the author has allowed her imagination to run riot and we have an incredible yet stereotyped plot set in a far from accurate historical background. Here are all the usual trappings of such stories, Snark, a wicked convict with only one eye, the intrepid children venturing into absurd adventures, their handsome, brave friend, wrongfully transported and at the end proved innocent, even a stolen diamond necklace cunningly hidden by Snark and discovered by Robert in a most improbable way. Moreover even to the children for whom this book is intended it must seem strange that the convicts were permitted to roam at will through the settlement night and day, and that Major Lockyer, though in command of the venture would set off on a long overland trip with no-one but two convicts for company. All this could perhaps have been excused had the reader been caught up in the story and able to identify himself with the children, but alas the characters all appear unreal and stiff, their dialogue stilted and their actions unreasonable.

The Giant who Drank From His Shoe and other stories. By Leonce BourliagueL Abelard-Schuman. 93 pp.

How rare they are!—the children’s stories which appeal to their parents as much as, or more than, to the children themselves. Here is one—a modern collection of folk-tales full of a zany whimsy and a florid imagination. The characters might have stepped from the pages of the Brothers Grimm or Hans Christian Andersen. The stories all have a sane and refreshing moral implicit in the narrative. The title story would make fascinating material for a school lesson in French life and customs, for it concerns a giant's request for those Gallic necessaries of life —wine, garlic, oil, vinegar, and dandelion leaves. The illustrations are charming and the translation very good.

The Apple-Stone. By Nicholas Stuart Gray. Dobson. 191 PP-

The Apple-stone is bright and yellow, and was found by Jeremy, Jo, Jemima, Nigel and Douglas inside a small withered apple at the top of a gnarled old tree. It talks, and tells them of its age-old magic properties—chief of which is that it can give life to any inanimate object which is touched by it. The children are enthralled, and try to use its power in a sensible way; but magic is bound to have some extraordinary and dangerous consequences. The children’s life is full of excitement until the apple's magic is worn out. They make the acquaintance of Guy Fawkes, an old glove, a rocket, a bird of paradise, and a Crusader. There is plenty of fun for 10-12-year-olds.

Come Along to New Zealand. Mattie A. Adair. Denison. 144 pp.

Mrs Adair has produced a broad survey of New Zealand life and land which will interest young American readers. The photographs are excellent and the print is large. The connecting link between sheep farms and ski fields, suburbia and stalactites, picnics and poi dances, tea-drinking and transportation, is John, a 12-year-old from San Francisco, who spends a year in New Zealand with his grand-parents. We see all too little of him, however, and he never becomes more than a name. Apart from this flaw, which lessens interest, the book serves its purpose well and would be appropriate for children of John’s age.