Nov 15, 2006 02:36 PM
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(Updated Feb 10, 2007 11:29 AM)
The secret 7are a group of children who for oncein Enid Blytons large catalogue of books , do notgo to Boarding School ( Hooray)!
They decide to start a club (secret obviously) with meetings held in Peterand Janet’s shed .
The shed backs onto greenhouses as Peter and Janet’s parents own and live on a farm.
Peter and Janet own a Golden Spanielnamed Scamperwho is an honorary member of the club .
The other members are Barbara, George, Jack, Pamand Colin.
The children decide that to identify each member ,they will each have a badgewith the mysterious initails SSand a passwordmust be given before entering their meetings. The password is changed at the end of each meeting.
The club meeting usually consist of all the members arriving in turn and giving their password through the closed shed door. Only if the password is correct are they allowed to enter and they must be wearing their badge.
Lemonade and biscuits are on offer provided by Peters Mother.
When it is winter ,there is a stove at the far end of the shed which the children are trusted to light.
Colin has a twin sistercalled Suziewho is not allowed to join the club because she is silly and troublesome and so she and her friend Binkymake trouble for the seven whenever they can
( almost to the point of bullying).
All very interesting but a bit hum drum, I hear you say .
Well yes!
Fortunately ,the stories do not end there!
The club also undertake detectivework involving finding tracks,looking for evidenceand following suspects. They must make reports at the meeting using their notebooks rather like the police :)
In one story they hunt for burglars
in another Horse thieves etc
and there are 15 booksfull of their adventures.
Enid Blyton wrote these from 1949 until 1963and they feel more up to date than some of her other adventure stories. The last 4 are written in the 60’s.
The older hardbacked books often have a line of children holding hands printed into the cover which used to remind me of the paper doll chains one can make by folding and cutting.
A child of seven or eight would find these books interesting but I think once they had reached 13 or 14 ,they might find the plots a little bit simple . They are good for nostalgic readingthough.
