Favourite Five Find-Outers book

The books! Over seven hundred of them and still counting...

Your favourite Five Find-Outers book

1. Burnt Cottage
4
4%
2. Disappearing Cat
2
2%
3. Secret Room
12
12%
4. Spiteful Letters
14
13%
5. Missing Necklace
13
13%
6. Hidden House
6
6%
7. Pantomime Cat
8
8%
8. Invisible Thief
12
12%
9. Vanished Prince
2
2%
10. Strange Bundle
6
6%
11. Holly Lane
1
1%
12. Tally-Ho Cottage
10
10%
13. Missing Man
3
3%
14. Strange Messages
9
9%
15. Banshee Towers
2
2%
 
Total votes: 104

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Courtenay
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Courtenay »

Look you, whateffer! :D
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Rob Houghton »

Moonraker wrote:I don't think an underground garage is any more far fetched than a certain mountain in Wales.....
Oh - I agree - I was just meaning in the Find Outer books, which are usually slightly more grounded! :-)
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by burlingtonbertram »

Firstly - apologies. I couldn't really decide the most suitable thread for this post so I have just bunged it here.

I read the Mystery Of The Spiteful Letters a day or two back, and something occurred to me. Was there actually a crime committed?

The UK passed The Protection From Harassment Act 1997. I'm no legal expert but I'm guessing that would encompass anonymous letters. There may well have been some preceding legislation.

Anyway, my point is that i) If something is true then it isn't libellous. ii) If no threats are made then the recipient is not in any danger as such. So, all that is left is 'harassment'. Was that an offence at the time The Mystery Of The Spiteful Letters was written? Does anyone know?
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burlingtonbertram
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by burlingtonbertram »

Bump ^^^^


No legal experts on here? :shock:
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Daisy
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Daisy »

I've just 'googled' it. It seems it is not illegal as long as the letter does not contain any threats or blackmail.
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by burlingtonbertram »

That's what I am wondering. Seems to me that maybe a certain character could sue for unlawful arrest :D Where there is blame there is a claim!
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Anita Bensoussane
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Anita Bensoussane »

An interesting question, BurlingtonBertram. Like Daisy, I did a spot of Googling. I discovered that a Malicious Communications Act was passed in 1988, which covers poison-pen letters, but I don't know whether there was any earlier legislation:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malicious_ ... s_Act_1988" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Maybe the writer of the anonymous notes in The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters couldn't have been fined or imprisoned under the laws of the time. However, if the newspapers ran the story that would serve as a punishment of sorts, because everyone in that person's community would be made aware of his/her nasty behaviour. So the Find-Outers' work wouldn't have been wasted!

Edit: Just remembered the solemn warning about poison-pen letters which is given in In the Fifth at Malory Towers, when a girl who has been sending them is caught. Again, the letters are spiteful rather than threatening. Miss Potts says she is shocked that "there is a girl in this school... who is guilty of something for which in later years she could be sent to prison - a thing that as a rule rarely begins until a girl is much older than you, because it is only depraved and cowardly characters who attempt this underhand, stab-in-the-dark kind of thing. We call this kind of thing 'poison-pen' writing, when the writers are grown up, and they are held in universal loathing and hatred, considered the lowest of the low."

So the possibility of prison (for an adult writer of such letters) is mentioned by Enid Blyton, but whether she was right I've no idea. In the Fifth at Malory Towers was published in 1950, and The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters in 1946.
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Daisy »

I have been wondering if there has been a change in legislation since the books were written or whether Enid Blyton was just using the situation she had created as a Big Warning to the children who were eagerly lapping up her books.
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Daisy »

There seems to be a grey area - malicious letters can be classed as criminal ... I think ...and some of Mrs Moon's statements were certainly that.
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Anita Bensoussane »

We know such letters are regarded as criminal nowadays (since at least 1988), but what about in the 1940s as BurlingtonBertram was asking? It does seem hard to believe that there was no legislation on the matter until the late 1980s!

Are we told what is to happen to the culprit in The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters? What about writers of anonymous letters in stories by other crime writers, like Agatha Christie or (even earlier) Sir Arthur Conan Doyle? Or does anyone know the details of any real life cases?
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by burlingtonbertram »

It could well be a grey area, if there is no blackmail element or actual untruths. I would never dispute that such things are malicious and Enid was doing a good thing getting that point across to younger readers. Hats off to her for that.
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Poppy »

I think it was just a milder interpretation of a Poison Pen crime, obviously to introduce it to children and to make it more suitable for the intended age group. I think it is an interesting and enjoyable book, and I always appreciate the unique and unusual genre. On the Wikipedia page for 'Poison Pen Letter': there is a reference to Enid Blyton's The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poison_pen_letter" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by Anita Bensoussane »

It's interesting to see the list of books with poison-pen letters as a main theme, Poppy. I wonder if any of the other authors shed light on the legal situation.
burlingtonbertram wrote:I would never dispute that such things are malicious and Enid was doing a good thing getting that point across to younger readers. Hats off to her for that.
Good point. Even if writing such letters wasn't always illegal, it was always immoral and harmful.
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by pete9012S »

I was thinking it might be because it was something children could investigate.

Obviously Enid couldn't set a bad example and have the Find Outers investigate a murder or really serious crime,but poison pen letters,yes.
Very Agatha Christie like too.She had one were a couple settled into a quiet village were poison pen letters were flying about.
They even received one themselves I think...just can't remember the book.Nigel will know.

That made me think: what was the most serious crime the Find Outers solved?
They did meet some dangerous brutal characters though didn't they- some even more brutal than PC Goon...Secret Room,Hidden House spring to mind...any others??
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Re: Favourite Five Find-Outers book

Post by sixret »

Yes, Poppy. I can say that Enid tried her hand on detective mystery for children in Find-Outers series. She also injected the series with humour. Fans who think that FFO series is ridiculous have missed the point altogether. The series is meant to be funny in the first place with Fatty's antics. Mr. Goon is just "an object" for the FFO to ridicule. I enjoyed and preferred reading FFO series when I was a child(and still do!). There are clues, intuitive thinking(usually by Fatty or Bets), piece together the puzzles from various clues, interview the suspects and disguise. These are elements in many adult detective novels from Golden Age in this series. Since the early age, I've been destined to love this genre(detective mystery) rather than adventure. And it's only natural, I read Agatha Christie after FFO series. :D

The element of detection(plus humour) in FFO series is strong. There is very little adventure in this series. Fans who like to be thrilled by adventure, usually think that FFO is pale in comparison to The Famous Five or Adventure series. I think, we should regard and classify FFO in the correct category accordingly for us to actually enjoy the series as it is i.e. children detection with humour. If we expect to read "another adventure" when reading FFO series, that is when the disappointment sets in. :D
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