Elinor Lyon

[Chrissie777]

Split from 'What other author are you reading at the moment?'

Tonight I'll finish reading the first volume of Elinor Lyon's Ian & Sovra series.
The first book "House In Hiding" is very blytonesque and even has a map in the front.
It's located in the Scottish Highlands, not too far away from the Isle of Skye.
As we just went to Eilean Donan Castle (from where we could see Skye in the far background), I thought it would be nice to finally re-read "House in Hiding" and then read the sequels ("We Daren't Go A'Hunting" is the next book):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elinor_Lyon" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[pete9012S]

Thank you for the recommendation Chrissie - not heard of this book/author before.
Just managed to snaffle a copy of The House in Hiding from ebay for £1.89 inc. delivery which seems very reasonable.
I will look forward to reading it when we go away in early July!

[Chrissie777]

Pete, that sounds like a very good deal to me!
Please let me know your opinion on the book after your July vacation.
Are you going to Wales?

I found "The House in Hiding" by chance more than 30 years ago on a German flea market. When I leaved through it, I thought that it sounds quite promising.
It turned out to be one of my favorite adventure books from a British children's books author, almost as good as EB and Norman Dale.
Before I had access to the Internet I didn't even know that there were 7 sequels.
Volume 2 takes place in the same area.

[Daisy]

I did a reread of my Elinor Lyon books recently, having first met her when I borrowed "Run Away Home" from the library when I was in my early teens. They are good stories, mostly set in a part of the UK I do not know at all.

[Chrissie777]

Daisy, it all felt so familiar when I reread "House in Hiding" this time, because we just had admired the Highlands.
When I did Google search on her life a few years ago, I could only find a picture of her when she was still very young, probably younger than 25. There was not much on Elinor Lyon, but they had a Wiki page.

[Courtenay]

Wow, sounds like another author I would enjoy reading! I'll have to make a note of her.

Maybe these last few posts could be split into a separate Elinor Lyon thread? - 'Tis done!

[timv]

The only Elinor Lyon book I've read is 'The House in Hiding'; as with Violet Needham and Geoffrey Trease, there were copies about n the 1970s (often battered first editions) but they've dropped out of the public memory since. I think Fidra Books in the UK have republished some of them recently.

Elinor Lyon's Scots holiday books seem to be set in the Western Highlands, featuring a family with a holiday home in a remote region with few roads and lots of deserted islands - a bit like the 'Sea of Adventure' setting but on the mainland. Her 'take' on holiday adventures is as a sort of 'anti-Arthur Ransome', which I found rather more realistic - and their parents' letting them go off camping alone nearly ends in disaster on more than one occasion. Her children aren't super-competent, frequently get lost or forget things, and get trapped by the tide. Highland 'lairds' and poachers do crop up from time to time, but aren't central to the plots . In House In Hiding the main characters, Ian and Sovra , are resentful at being told to make friends with a 'townee' visiting girl and deliberately ignore her until they find she's more skilful than they thought (a bit like AR's Blackett girls with Dick and Dorothea).

[pete9012S]

Pete, that sounds like a very good deal to me!
Please let me know your opinion on the book after your July vacation.

Will do - If I can stop myself from reading it before then!!

Cheers Chrissie

[Chrissie777]

Will done - If I can stop myself from reading it before then!!Cheers Chrissie

[Chrissie777]

The only Elinor Lyon book I've read is 'The House in Hiding'; as with Violet Needham and Geoffrey Trease, there were copies about n the 1970s (often battered first editions) but they've dropped out of the public memory since. I think Fidra Books in the UK have republished some of them recently.

Tim, I tried to read "Swallows and Amazons" as a child and once more in my mid to late twenties realizing how very important his books were for British children, but each time I just couldn't get into it.
EB and Norman Dale are both a lot more compelling to me.

So far "House in Hiding", "Cathy Runs Wild" and "Wind ueberm Hochland" (The Dream Hunters) were the only Elinor Lyon books that I've read, but the German translation of "Cathy Runs Wild" and "The Dream Hunters" was done many years later by another translator than "House In Hiding" which was translated into German in 1955.
Yes, Fidra reprinted two or three Lyon books around 2006.
"Dragon Castle" sounds very good, but is not part of the Ian & Sovra series.

[Chrissie777]

Maybe these last few posts could be split into a separate Elinor Lyon thread?

Courtenay, that sounds like a good idea! -'Tis done!

[Chrissie777]

I also wish I could find the Norman Dale thread on EBS again which I created years ago to make other EBS members aware of Dale, because his books were IMHO even better than Elinor Lyon's. He wrote more in the style of EB than in the style of Arthur Ransome. I've read Norman Dale as a 10 year old child shortly before I discovered the FF books and thought he was very suspenseful as well.

Too bad that Fidra only re-discovered Elinor Lyon, but not Norman Dale. He was originally published at The Bodley Head in London where not even the over 60 years old employees could remember him (I corresponded with one of them and he asked his older colleagues).

[pete9012S]

I also wish I could find the Norman Dale thread on EBS again ...

Norman Dale

https://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/for ... le#p358473" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

[Chrissie777]

Thanks, Pete.
Norman Dale is another excellent children's books author who published at least 7 adventure books (that I know of), maybe more. They are all taking place in England and most of them are located at the coast or in Cornwall like "Skeleton Island".
He wrote mostly in the 1940's and 1950's.