The Adventurous Four Series

[Anita Bensoussane]

I haven't read the Adventurous Four books for ages so I can't remember whether the village is ever named (though I doubt it is), but it's on the north-east coast of Scotland.

I don't know who Mrs. Andrews is but maybe she's a "daily", or possibly the owner of the house. It's unclear whether the house where Tom and the others stay in the first book is the same place as the cottage their mother has bought in the second book. In the second book, Mother has a "Mrs. MacIntyre" in to help (mentioned in Chapter 1). In the Enid Blyton's Omnibus! story, "deaf old Jeanie" is in the house overnight while Mother spends the night with a friend.

No surname is given for Tom and his siblings (I'm not sure about Andy). In the French translations I believe that Tom, Jill and Mary are given the surname "Robinson" so you could perhaps use that, Rob.

[Rob Houghton]

Thanks Anita - 'Robinson' seems as good a name as any!

[Chrissie777]

As some people might know, I am currently writing a sequel to The Adventurous Four - which has been planned since last April - but is now underway. I've currently written about six chapters.

Wonderful news, Rob!!!
I didn't discover the Adventurous Four before 2008 and have re-read them several times ever since.
One of EB's best "series".
I'm also happy that this thread has been revived.

[Chrissie777]

Perhaps so although the Find-Outers were pretty much tied to one location, Peterswood, and she wrote fifteen books about them. Granted Mysteries are possibly easier to site in one location than adventures but she still might have got some more mileage out of visits to remote islands etc.

And EB wrote at least 7 Famous Five books taking place in or near Kirrin Bay.
So I think there would have been potential for more Adventurous Four sequels.

[Chrissie777]

Yes, it would have been great if there were more books in the series. I reviewed The Adventurous Four on my blog, this morning: here.

Too bad your blog is no longer available, Poppy.

[Chrissie777]

I was surprised to see, when I looked at my versions of the Adventurous Four and it's sequel, that Adventurous Four Again was actually published 6 years after the first book - quite an unusually long gap for Enid. I wonder why there was such a gap? Was she badgered to write a sequel? Was the sequel well received?

I think it's a pity regarding many famous authors from the past that their reviews have not been transfered to the Internet.
For instance Anne Golon's series of "Angélique" books were extremely popular in Germany. In my twenties and thirties I read a lot about this French author, her novels and the films based on the novels. But all this is lost.

The only exception from the rule seems to be Daphne DuMaurier. When "Rebecca" celebrated it's 80th anniversary, I found more than 45 articles on the Internet and printed them out, before they could disappear again.
When I was much younger way back in the 1980's I once requested paper clippings with articles on Enid Blyton from the so-called Dortmund Zeitungsausschnittsammlung (Dortmund paper clipping collection) and copied many of them at a copy shop.
All this stuff could be scanned and made available on the Internet. Of course that's not possible because of the copyright (I wonder at which point the copyright expires???).
Strangely enough, the most I can find about my favorite authors are a few amazon.com reviews and that seems to be it (and sometimes a Wiki page if I'm lucky).

When I see this plethora of Internet articles that movie characters tend to find in thrillers when they do research, I'm always in awe and wondering WHAT search engine they use? Certainly not Google.

[Chrissie777]

I actually think everyone on here should have a puffin in their avatar...!
I have!

I never noticed the puffin!

[Chrissie777]

The puffins 'joke' started with watching real puffins on a web-cam some months ago now. They gradually took on a life of their own. Remember this? - http://burhou.livingislands.co.uk/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Daisy, in two months we can watch the puffins again.

[Chrissie777]

In David Cook's review he says the following:
One plot idea of an undersea secret passage, first used in The Island of Adventure in November 1944, would be re-used yet again in Five on Kirrin Island Again published a month later. But in many ways The Adventurous Four Again preludes the similar plot of the more elaborate The Sea of Adventure, which was written ten months later."

The undersea secret passage was first used in 1942 (FOATI).

[Courtenay]

My reason for posting this is a bit lazy, and selfish, lol! As some people might know, I am currently writing a sequel to The Adventurous Four - which has been planned since last April - but is now underway. I've currently written about six chapters. Anyway - writing such sequels always throws up a few questions, and I wondered if anyone here might have the answers. Or maybe there are no answers!

Sounds exciting, Rob!

I'm currently back at my parents' home in Australia and I THINK we may have our Dean's copies of the two Adventurous Four books around here somewhere. I'm seriously considering re-reading them, as I know Mum and I read them when I was 6 (I remember one of them was specifically during a holiday we had that year), but all the war references and indeed a lot of the excitement went right over my head. I still preferred the Faraway Tree and the Wishing-Chair at that age! (I did get into the Famous Five a year or two later.)

While I'm here, does anyone know if the Dean editions are abridged / edited at all from the originals? I will probably read ours anyway, if I can find them, but if I find I like the books enough now to add them to my relatively restricted collection, I'd prefer early editions if they are significantly different from the Deans.

[Chrissie777]

...Then I noticed on the back of the book there was a story No.37 entitled 'The Adventurous Four.I was so excited I asked my Mum to get it.
I think around this time I also started to make lists to give to the relatives who bought me Enid Blyton books showing which books I already had and which books I needed.
They would also give me money,or take me to the bookshop and let me choose the right book for myself.

Pete, how I envy you!!!
Sounds like the perfect childhood and the perfect relatives to me.
I wrote lists with missing EB books for each birthday and for each Christmas from 1965 on, but with the exception of one EB book per occasion I always got lots of other books which I didn't ask for and which I didn't like (I've read them all).

Don't know if I ever mentioned this on EBS?
Recently my mom (she's 91 now) reminisced on the phone how she always bought children's books for me all year long to have enough presents on my birthdays and on Christmas, because I only longed for books.
I had to hold myself back blurting out "I wish it would have been all EB books instead".
My intellectual parents unfortunately were anti-Blyton.
And so were the German teachers and school libraries and public libraries in Braunschweig, Germany, in the 1960's and still in the 1970's.

Not before 1980 did I find the first EB books in a small library at the suburbs of Braunschweig (Gliesmarode) and that happened to be the FFO & Dog series.
Those other childhood books which my parents gave me on birthdays and for Christmas like "Nils Holgersson", "The Little Prince" and "The Langerud Children" are long gone, but for many years I collected all suspenseful EB books and will never part with them as long as I live.

[Chrissie777]

Jessie Land's illustrations leave a lot to be desired, I always think - look at the hand in the above example - monstrous! Although her illustrations were by no means 'bad' and some are pretty good, they were inconsistent in quality. I much preferred EH Davie's. For me, I think Jessie Land's illustrations are one reason why I feel The Adventurous Four Again is less enjoyable than the first book.

Rob, my old hardcover version of "The Adventurous Four" has E. H. Davie illustrations, my "The Adventurous Four Again" has Jesse Land illustrations.
Is there another version out there of "The Adventurous Four Again" with E. H. Davie illustrations?

[Chrissie777]

Jessie Land's illustrations leave a lot to be desired, I always think - look at the hand in the above example - monstrous! Although her illustrations were by no means 'bad' and some are pretty good, they were inconsistent in quality. I much preferred EH Davie's. For me, I think Jessie Land's illustrations are one reason why I feel The Adventurous Four Again is less enjoyable than the first book.

I enjoyed both very much. The one scene that stands out for me the most is Tom riding through the underground waterfall (I believe that's in the first book).
In no other book did EB recycle that scene (as far as I know).

[Chrissie777]

I have never thought that Jessie Land's illustrations were too bad, with the exception of that depiction of Andy with very broad shoulders! But, now you mention it, there are various flaws and clearly incorrect proportioned objects/etc, which seem to have a knock-on effect throughout the rest of the illustrations, including that very strange hand in the image Pete posted, earlier! They are quite disappointing illustrations compared to E.H.Davie's wonderful illustrations that accompanied the text in The Adventurous Four. Despite this, I think Jessie Land captures the personalities of Jill and Mary, perfectly.

That's what I thought, too. Jesse Land made beautiful illustrations of Jill and Mary.

[Anita Bensoussane]

Rob, my old hardcover version of "The Adventurous Four" has E. H. Davie illustrations, my "The Adventurous Four Again" has Jesse Land illustrations.
Is there another version out there of "The Adventurous Four Again" with E. H. Davie illustrations?

The Cave will tell you all, Chrissie!:

https://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/boo ... Four+Again" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;