Customer Reviews

The Picts & the Martyrs: Or Not Welcome at All (Swallows and Amazons)

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It's hard to pick a favorite -- all the Swallows and Amazon books are good, and I'm sure everybody has their own favorite -- but I particularly like the character of the Great Aunt in this book. She is so...PROPER and so...INTIMIDATING, and the interactions the other characters have with her make for a good story. There is plenty of intrigue, plenty of almost-crisis, plenty of devious scheming by Nancy & crew to subvert the tyranny of the Great Aunt so they can achieve their own goals.

When Dick and Dot arrive in the lake country they are expecting a pleasant visit with friends while learning how to sail their very own boat. But things never work out as planned, especially when Nancy has a hand in things -- first thing anyone knows she has Dick and Dot living in hiding from "the Great Aunt" and everybody else reluctantly in on the secret that must not be found out.

This is a charming book telling of a simpler time, yet it manages to be adventurous and exciting, too. Perfect for all ages, even my 4 year old enjoys listening to these novels.

Very few things scare Amazon Pirate First Mate Peggie Blackett -- mostly thunder, but also the Great Aunt.

The only thing that scares Amazon Pirate Captain Nancy Blackett (well, "Ruth", properly, but Amazon Pirates are ruthless) is the Great Aunt.

Great Aunt Maria Turner, who raised Nancy & Peggie's widowed Mother and their Uncle Jim, is a formidable maiden lady of firm opinion, unbending will and repressive manner. "Having fun" is not on her list of summer tasks that well-brought-up children need to perform during the Summer Holidays. And dressing in comfortable shorts, knit shirts and red stocking caps is hardly suitable for Young Ladies in their early teens.

Not that this is particularly worrisome in the normal frame of things, because she lives Far Away.

But somehow Aunt Maria gets word that Ruth and Margaret are to be alone for a goodly part of the Summer Holidays as Uncle Jim (Captain Flint) takes their mother on a cruise for her health... and decides to visit Beckfoot for most of that period and make sure that Nancy and Peggie don't get into trouble.

Not that this, even so, would be worse than Unpleasant... except that their friends, Dick & Dorothea Callum ("the D's") are to be staying at Beckfoot... and it's a sure bet that the Great Aunt would visit a devastating scold on their Mother if she found out that they were having other guests their own age to stay, to be supervised only by Cook.

And so, quicker than you can say "Are you sure this isn't a Bad Idea?" Dick and Dorothea, city kids with limited experience at camping and fending for themselves, wind up ensconced for the length of the GA's visit in "the Dog's Home" -- a one-room stone forester's hut in the woods up above the lake.

And, since a number of people know that they're supposed to be at Beckfoot, and don't know it's a secret, and because Dick is supposed to be working with Captain Flint's friend on Captain FLint's houseboat on some chemical analysis of samples from a mine they discovered in the previous book and because Murphy's Law applies to everything in life, from there the story becomes more and more complex and full of hair's-breadth escapes and humourous adventures and close calls (the burglary at Beckfoot being particularly fun).

In the end, of course, all is (relatively) well, the GA gone, the D's have their own boat to race with "Swallow" and "Amazon" and the Swallows are due to arrive any day and most of the Summer still stretches ahead.

Like all the rest of the series, humourous adventure fiction for the YA age group. (And perhaps a bit younger; since they were mostly written for British juvenile audiences, and sixty to seventy years ago to boot, the "Swallows & Amazons" books may contain references and language that today's younger readers may have some problems with. OTOH, i first read "Swallows & Amazons" [the first book] at age eight or nine and i had no problem with it.)

Which is not to say that adults can't enjoy them -- many do. Buy them for a son, daughter, nephew or niece and give them a try before you pass them on; Ransome has a huge adult readership worldwide, even today.

This story gives us the D's and the Amazons together in their own tale.





Dick and Dot Callum have come to the Blackett home, to stay with their friends Nancy and Peggy, aka the Amazons. Things are a little odd; Mrs. Blackett is away on a Scandinavian cruise (recovering from a bad bout of the flu) and her brother Jim (nicknamed "Captain Flint" by the kids) is with her. The children are to be watched over by the household servants and Jim's friend and business partner Timothy (surely not a situation to be condoned today!). But the Blackett's great-aunt, whom series fans will remember from previous volumes, gets wind of the mother's absence and is quickly on her way to oversee things.





This is simply unacceptable! The children look for a solution, and finally find one worthy of an "I Love Lucy" episode: until the Great-Aunt leaves and Mrs. Blackett returns, the D's will hide out in a nearby abandoned hut, still in good shape, and the Amazons will have to act like proper little ladies until Mother returns.





Quite a bit is spent on the D's learning to cope for themselves, with the help of a local farm boy. The D's are more intellectual than physical (Dick is an analytical naturalist, Dot is a dreamy would-be novelist), but they quickly learn to deal with life in the wild. But when they have to get some of Jim's chemical equipment from the house, and then the Great-Aunt disappears, things start getting out of hand....





This is an amusing tale, perhaps one of the more comic of the series. This one brings back the infamous Great-Aunt, an ogre of previous novels, but this time Ransome treats her with more depth and compassion. Instead of simply being an ill-tempered fussy brute, we see her as a woman shaped by her times and circumstances, trying to do what she thinks is right and do well by her family. As a reader, I certainly can't blame her for wanting to be sure the children were propery watched over, although I could emphasize with the kids' desire to have their usual freedom back.





As always, all ends well, and the reader is left with a sense of a growing understanding between the Great-Aunt and the Amazons, and some mutual respect.





As always, the feel of rural England in the 30s is part of the fun of the novel, and the adventures of the D's as they grow in self-confidence and self-reliance, handling their own boat and cooking their own meals.





Coming up next: A last hurrah for the gang in GREAT NORTHERN?

It's another fun holiday with the Amazon Pirates, Nancy and Peggy, until their Great Aunt discovers that Mother is away, and they have no one to look after them! Nancy and Peggy know they must hide visitors Dick and Dot, but where? Of course! In an old abandoned hut in the woods! They will be "Picts" while the suffering Amazons will be "martyrs." Will the G. A. find out? Will the doctor give away the secret? Will Dick be able to help Timothy with his experiments? Will the amazons be stuck in frilly frocks for the rest of the summer?

Sail with Dick and Dot on their new boat--the Scarab--in this funniest of Arthur Ransome adventures through the Lake District.

One of the greatest of the series, this book unusually partners the Ds and the Amazons, with the Swallows not arriving until the day after the last page. As usual Nancy and Peggy are in dire straits, this time thanks to a surprise visit from the dreaded Great Aunt. With their guests, Dick and Dorothea just arrived, they are forced to take extreme measures to keep life on, what they consider, an even keel. Dragged into their web of deception are a myriad of Natives including the doctor, Squashy Hat, Cook and the postman. As usual, there is continual suspense and excitement and once again we are transported to a better world and left the better for it.

This is a typically terrific Arthur Ransome book. Who on earth listed it for babies and toddlers hasn't read any of Arthur Ransome's works let alone this one.

This whole series is great for reading aloud to children 7 or 8 and up.