Find-Outers Readathon

The books! Over seven hundred of them and still counting...
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Moonraker
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Post by Moonraker »

Phew, thought I might have missed the discussion!

My first real query is with the cover illustration. It clearly states in the text, that the cottage is a workroom, with only two rooms, which have had the dividing wall knocked down to make a one roomed building.

However, the illustration on the front shows a thatched cottage on fire - clearly more than a one-room workshop - complete with upstairs. (This picture is shown again opp. P 2)

On the back cover, we see a single story cottage which surely is the cottage in question, although we see what appears to be a fence between the two properties.

Is this a blooper by J Abbey?

It is also interesting how Fatty comes to Peterswood. I wonder why the family are staying at the local inn? Maybe they're house hunting, but no mention is made of where they have come from.

How apt too, that David Cook has started a FF-O&D series of articles in the new Journal. What a scene-setter.
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Ming
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Post by Ming »

moonraker wrote:Phew, thought I might have missed the discussion!
We wouldn't leave any regulars out of any discussions you know! Welcome back!

I think Hick's cottage has a thatched roof, by the way. Wasn't there a line like , "The roof was made of thatch, and it burned strongly"? Can't check, another Blyton fan-to-be has borrowed Burnt Cottage from me -- before I finished reading!! I got her into Blyton after I made her read only the first page of Island of Adventure, but she couldn't resist and read the whole series.
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Lucky Star
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Post by Lucky Star »

On page two it is stated that "it's not the house, it's the cottage he works in". It also says that "the place was old, half timbered and thatched" so the illustration of such a structure would be correct. Perhaps Mr Hick lived in some great big eight bedroomed house as Pip and Bets appear to do and the rather normal sized cottage was used as a workroom. Though this does'nt explain the two rooms knocked into one business a little later on. Perhaps the illustrator took his inspiration direct from page two without reading further?
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Post by Moose »

It's here it's here! It had a sticker on the front saying it had been held up in the post for some reason :). I will reread it today and post thoughts later.
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Time to die.




EF
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Lucky Star
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Post by Lucky Star »

Moose wrote:It's here it's here! It had a sticker on the front saying it had been held up in the post for some reason :). I will reread it today and post thoughts later.
Well done. :D
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Post by Steve Alpe »

HeatherS wrote earlier:

From chapter 2:
Quote:
Buster crunched up the bone and then swallowed the biscuit. They seemed to fill him with joy and he began to caper round and about the children, inviting them to chase him.

I have two dogs myself, and I've never once seen them "crunch up" a bone. Gnaw for hours, possibly, but never crunch.

The dog we had always crunched his bones, they never lasted long enough to gnaw. He was a mongrel but we were never sure whether he was a Alsaador or a Labrasion!
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Post by HeatherS »

Now that I can imagine - he's a larger dog. But Buster was a little Scottie. It would either have had to have been a miniscule bone or he had an extrememly strong jaw!
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Moonraker
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Post by Moonraker »

A few points I've noted as I've been reading:

I haven't noticed it elsewhere, but the "others'" name-calling of Fatty seems a bit rude on P105 (Methuen 1954).

Larry: "Fatty's an awful baby, cheer up, Fat-One."

I think now, we see someone who is obese as a person who overeats, so damaging his health. Back in the Find-Outers era, it was seen as something that couldn't be helped. I've heard people say that they are big-boned to explain obesity! Let's face it, the Kirrins all ate like horses, and they weren't fat! Nevertheless, I don't ever hear people called Fatty these days - I guess we are all getting more PC (or maybe just more polite). It seemed when I was at school, any peculiarities (if that's the right term) had to be pointed out. For example, a boy wearing glasses was always Four-Eyes and I was called Big-Ears!

[Page 107]

Lily: "My father said he'd thrash me if he caught me walking out with Horace,"

We are told that Lily is "about sixteen" [P38]. So her father would give a 16 year old girl a good thrashing? That doesn't sound too healthy to me. I know plenty of boys got thrashings (not at 16 though), but it was extremely rare to thrash a girl.

I found Pip's question on P 112 disturbing.

Pip: "Are we allowed to get into people's houses and hunt for their shoes?"

Come on, with the strict upbringing he has had, he should know jolly well that you can't do that!

Even more strange is Larry's reply;

Larry: "Well. we can't ask anybody that, we'll just have to do it. We're not doing anything wrong."

Really boys!

I also found a passage on P117 rather sad.:

The children all felt excited as they went up to bed that night. At least, Fatty didn't go to bed, though Larry did. But then Larry's mother usually came to tuck him up and say good-night, and Fatty's didn't.

Poor Fatty. This seems pretty uncaring of Mrs T not to see that Fatty was okay. My wife still checks on our two when they're home with us, and they are 22 and 26!!!

All in all, this is a very good story. It is a Whodunnit, and like David Cook, my favourite genre of this series. I think Enid's love of Agatha Christie's work shows through here. It does have a different atmosphere to the rest of the series. I suppose that's mainly as the characters have to be introduced and their personalities built up.

I also find Bets really endearing in this novel - in spite of the really, really annoying habit of referring to clues as glues. Bets innocent remark on P110, "It only leaves Mr Smellie," provided an astonishing result. What a gem she is.

That's all for now, more later!
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Post by Kitty »

It was adroit of Enid to give him the FAT initials - makes the Fatty-ness slightly less un-PC! Though she dealt quite well with the Alma Pudden stuff in St C, so I suppose she did differentiate between types of plump - even if the advice that Alma should basically just laugh along with everyone else at her size is somewhat brutal! It's funny that Gwen never really had nicknames at MT.

The corporal punishment in EB used to make me uneasy as a child, though I wouldn't have it cut out for that reason. It's very interesting, that we see the upper-middle class Peterswood most of the time, but hints of other types of lives do drift through occasionally. There aren't that many direct mentions of dating in EB, are there?
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Post by Lenoir »

moonraker wrote: I found Pip's question on P 112 disturbing.
Pip: "Are we allowed to get into people's houses and hunt for their shoes?"
Come on, with the strict upbringing he has had, he should know jolly well that you can't do that!

I also found a passage on P117 rather sad.:
The children all felt excited as they went up to bed that night. At least, Fatty didn't go to bed, though Larry did. But then Larry's mother usually came to tuck him up and say good-night, and Fatty's didn't.
Poor Fatty.
I think it was a rhetorical question. He knew that it was wrong, but didn't want to protest too strongly as he was the youngest of the 3 boys. Also, things were getting exciting and he was caught up in the excitement of it all.
Anyway they learnt their lesson and didn't do it again as far as I recall.

P117. Yes, poor Fatty. The way it is written, it does seem sad.
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Post by Moose »

I finished it, I finished it! *rushes in late as usual*

Much that I thought about it has already been said here but just to give a quick summary of my impressions - I didn't like it. As others have said, Fatty seems different in this book - not the likeable, kindly and grown up character we've come to expect but more a spoilt, chubby little boy. Although he boasts in the other books, in this one his boasting just seems empty and unnecessary whereas in the later books it's always clear that he really does have something to boast about..
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Time to die.




EF
Moose
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Post by Moose »

Just to add also, I was interested to see the characters of Lily and Horace Peeks, who were, again, characters from a different social class. The children didn't seem quite so patronising towards them in this book as they are to some others in later books tho.
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Time to die.




EF
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Post by Viking Star »

Sorry this is a bit late. I haven’t had more than a few minutes at a time to spare recently. :shock:

Like the first books in some of Enid’s other adventure/mystery books, Burnt Cottage is noticeably different from others in the series. The Secret Island and the Island of Adventure are examples of other books which strike me as being more than a bit different in feel to others in the same series.

In Burnt Cottage both the characters and the relationships between them are very much at a formative stage (and some of the characters like Larry and Daisy pretty much stay at that stage for the rest of the series :wink: ). It seems a bit odd that the book (and the series) starts with Larry and Daisy in such a key role, given the sort of ‘add-on’ role they play for the remainder of the series.

As Anita and others have noted, I don’t think Fatty doesn’t come across quite so well in this first book. He is variously referred to as “awful”, "the fat-one", ‘his brains don’t show in his face’ and and the other Find-Outers think him stupid (although Daisy also recognises him as clever). In addition to being endearingly named Fatty, we also learn that he is referred to at school as “Tubby” and “Sausage”! :shock:

Fatty possibly never comes worse off in any other one situation than in Burnt Cottage, when the other Find-Outers pull his leg about his footprint drawings “I think you’ve got the tail a bit wrong……etc”, when Fatty goes purple with rage! It’s probably not surprising that at one point Fatty almost leaves the Find-Outers! :shock: :shock:

However Fatty does predict with accuracy “As for being head - I shall be. I always am”.

Both Fatty and Bets’ characters develop through the series, as also – to a lesser extent, does Pip’s. Daisy continues to have good ideas from time to time during the series (Anita :wink: ), in line with what we are informed about Daisy at the beginning of Burnt Cottage. I sometimes have wondered whether Enid, when writing subsequent books and looking at her notes about the characters thought “what can I give Daisy to do? Oh yes, she has good ideas”! :roll:

We don’t really find out much about poor old Larry, other than he is good looking (steady on girls!) and he can be very polite to impress grown ups when he wants to. He is obviously loyal and brave, but that goes for most of Enid’s adventurers. 8)

Many of us have mentioned that we really like the ‘atmosphere’ or setting of the Five Find-Outers books. These books are different from Enid’s other adventure/mystery series (apart from the Secret Seven series) in that they all occur in the same place, Peterswood. It is a setting that is clearly defined, as opposed to going off on a hike to an unfamiliar area (Famous Five) or even another country (Adventure and Secret series).

The same familiar location of Peterswood (apart from the odd sortie to a neighbouring village or town!), together with the distinctive period piece feel, serves to create a very distinctive setting - a ‘knowing of what to expect’ in Peterswood. For me this all creates a familiar, comfortable, cosy, closed in (?) feel.

Several forum members have mentioned that they like either the cosy Christmas feel of some of the books, or the summer days without end feel. Interestingly this first book takes place in April – and a wet, muddy April at that! Perhaps this is one of the reasons why some members of the forums don’t immediately take to the book? :(

Oh well. That’s enough for now!
This is a Green Knight Book which means that it is a book by one of the most popular authors of all.
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Post by Moose »

Yeah Larry is always sort of overshadowed by Fatty really. Pip is the younger one, the weedy one but Larry is the same age as Fatty and, once he's been rightfully displaced as head, I can't think of any occasions when he particularly does anything of note. Neither do we learn much about his home life or his relationship with individual members of the Find Outers.
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe.
Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion.
I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate.
All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain.
Time to die.




EF
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Post by Viking Star »

moonraker wrote:
We are told that Lily is "about sixteen" [P38]. So her father would give a 16 year old girl a good thrashing? That doesn't sound too healthy to me. I know plenty of boys got thrashings (not at 16 though), but it was extremely rare to thrash a girl.
I agree it's quite odd!! :shock: :shock:

A more minor point but I also thought it a bit unlikely that Fatty would accidentally throw water over Fatty, given the likely size of the fire. If it were a bonfire I could understand. But where you have a big fire where the heat is intense and the roof is about to give way, you need to keep your distance. Seems a bit unlikely Fatty would get the direction that long from such a distance. Oh well, I'm picking holes!

I also agree with Moonraker, Anita and others that Bets comes across as an endearing character, but on the other hand I also agree that the constant references to "glues" is irritating. However, Booklover liked these references, so on balance perhaps we should assume that, as usual, Enid knew her audience!
This is a Green Knight Book which means that it is a book by one of the most popular authors of all.
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