Website Additions

[Anita Bensoussane]

Bobs clearly takes his role of Tail-Wagger seriously as we see him helping an injured dog called Toby this week.

We have a photo of Dion too (Dick Hughes' dog). Later, Enid Blyton owned black spaniels (one of which, Laddie, was the inspiration for Loony in the Barney mysteries). I wonder whether Enid was thinking back to the days of Dion when she chose to have black spaniels?

https://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/bly ... &perid=654" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Courtenay]

Gosh, that poor little dog — I always take Enid's stories with a grain of salt (if not a whole handful), as we don't always know how much she, well, added a little colour to the facts, so to speak. But if Toby actually existed, that's wonderful that Bobs and Enid rescued him and I hope he recovered. Was there not a vet (or a "dog-doctor", as Enid herself insisted on saying in later letters) anywhere near them, though? I would have taken the dog there first, with injuries like what she describes!

Lovely to see a photo of Dion, too, even if it's hard to make out his facial features.

[Anita Bensoussane]

There's a great deal of drama at Old Thatch as a storm brings down an ash tree in the garden and a farmer whips Dion for getting into his field and worrying his sheep. The farmer threatens to shoot the dog if he does it again. I wonder whether Enid Blyton was thinking back to those incidents when she wrote Five Go to Smuggler's Top and The Mystery of Holly Lane respectively.

https://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/bly ... &perid=655" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Tony Summerfield]

I have just loaded Jacqueline Wilson's new Faraway Tree book into the Cave. It comes out in about a fortnight and I see Amazon are already offering it at half price (£6.49 instead of £12.99). It is a handsome looking book and is aimed at 6 to 8 year-olds. I read it a while back (proof copy), but I have to admit when it comes to reading I am more of a 10 to 12 person.

https://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/boo ... raway+Tree

[Katharine]

Thanks for the link Tony.

I'm not a big fan of continuation books anyway, and I'm afraid that the 2 or 3 Jacqueline Wilson books I've read in the past I found very unpleasant. I would hope that there are none of the 'grittiness' of her normal style of writing in the Faraway Tree, but don't think I could bring myself to give her another try.

[Fiona1986]

I'm quite looking forward to this. Other than it being aimed just a little below your age, Tony, what did you think of it?

[Anita Bensoussane]

I'll give this a read at some stage, though one of the things I like about the originals is the old-fashioned charm.

[Lucky Star]

Thanks for adding it Tony. I must admit I haven't a great deal of interest in this book though I may give it a go at some stage. Like Anita I love the old fashioned charm of the originals and I doubt there will be much of that in this new effort.