To ask the Abbess to find me a solid lump of comfort and a cream cake

There is a new fill in due out at the end of this month, it covers the missing 10 months in exile, from when they arrive in Guernsey, Jo & Jack's wedding to just before the triplets are born. It is called a Refuge for the Chalet School by Amy Fletcher, there is also another one about that time being written by Katherine Bruce. If anyone is looking to buy the unabridged copies of any of the books, there is a group on Facebook called Chalet School sales & wants, I've spent a fortune on it this last week, I got Chuleigh Hold, CS Christmas Stories, Janie of La Rochelle, Janie Steps In, Highland Twins & Bettanys on the home front. All Girls Gone Bye publications

Could I please get the Dropbox link? I was deprived as a child of the pleasure

Yep, it’s in every single book, the winter ones anyway. With some old hands explaining to a wide eyed newbie how their skis are fatally attracted to each other.
Yawn...

If I read the absolutely hysterical description of how your skis keep crossing when you learn to ski, I am going to scream 😱

Redheads was a strange book altogether, Ekundayo - it was like EBD suddenly decided to branch off into thrillers

Yes, and we know Adrienne is a ‘nice’ girl, even if she lives in a slum, because of her ‘pure’ French and exquisite needlework.

And yes, both EBD and Joey are totally into Roger Richardson’s six foot of young manhood in his minimal trunks!

Oh, yes! Those opening chapters of Adrienne - with Robin as avenging angel - are stonkingly good. And again made me wish it had been written for adults not children. Even so, the ‘trade’ aspect is kept well away from the school itself in EBD’s mind.

@Parker231
Me too please?! Dying to get stuck in!

That’s right, @Paper. The nasty Parisian landlady could not be any more obvious about Adrienne having to earn her rent in the oldest profession — she’s like a cartoon brothel madam, complete with lipstick, but gets her ass handed to her by Robin in full-on melodrama nun mode.

And another slightly seamy bit in (I think?) Redheads where the wrong girl (Val?) is kidnapped with the intention of turning her into a drug addict and returning her to her father?

The bit that cracked me up when I read it is that when the international crime gang baddies realise they’ve got the wrong girl, they leave her drugged on a train with the correct ticket home tucked into her hatband!

And also, it was Val’s fault she was kidnapped, obviously.

There was a hint of being saved from the white slave trade (or worse!) in one of the books, was it Adrienne? The girl left destitute in Paris who is saved by the nuns?

Oh! Poorly at home and just found this thread! Amazing! Please could I have the Dropbox link @Parker231 ?

Please could I have the Dropbox link too @Parker231🙏

I headcanon that Prof Richardson was murdered by the Russians.

Also, that bit where Margot's devil and angel are fighting over her is one of the maddest bits of writing in the whole series.

I'm amazed there's not a white slave trade plot line anywhere.

Cannot help feeling someone must have pointed this out to EBD during her writing life. (Just imagine the CS written by, for instance, Evelyn Waugh ...

Still, we made up for this lacuna in earlier threads!

Wasn’t Joey married by the time they got to Guernsey?

I’m pretty sure that back then, women were supposed to give up things like university and careers if they got married. IIRC at one point women were automatically fired from certain professions if they got married, so I can imagine universities having similar policies.

Absolutely!

Serendipitously the Chalet School’s war effort has segued brilliantly into this R4 afternoon drama set in 1942. Wonderfully written and acted.

Exile is EBD at her very best IMO.

My god, but Exile - the full version - is magnificent. Really outstanding.

EBD’s writing had improved so much since Eustacia, which was a compelling story rather stiltedly told. I forced myself through that over days; but after starting Exile late last night I sat up till 5am with it, then resumed after breakfast. She really hit her stride with this one. Flawless, wide ranging storytelling, all the insights make sense. And, after my recent diversion into the La Rochelle series it was an utter joy to see how beautifully she linked the two series together.

Thank you again to everyone who’s made it possible for me to read this version - I’d been cursing the loss of so much of my Summer to the tail-end books, but this was worth all the time in the world. Especially the bits left out of the Armada publication.

I guess my main question is just exactly why no-one suggested university for Joey - once they’d escaped and were safe in Guernsey. All her cleverer friends seemed eager to seek degrees. For some reason I’m not finding baking triplets or writing school stories an adequate explanation. They could have waited. But then, thinking about it, Jack was a Catholic, so perhaps not. I just wonder whether in later years she might have regretted her relative lack of - not education - but scholarship.

I had no idea about the other books when I read the Chalets so I was always totally mystified at all the characters we were clearly meant to know already.

That's her, yeah. Jesanne Gellibrand and Lois Bennett, they both appear in Lavender during the war years. There was a lot of crossover in the war years with the La Rochelle familes, Gillian Culver (although she has a different name in the Chudleigh Hold series, Arminel Chudleigh), Monica Marilliar and the McNabs (Monica Turns Up Trumps) and Jesanne and Lois.

Jesanne.

Wasn't there a Gellibrand at St Briavels? Jesayne or something? There was a secret staircase in their house and she promised to tell Joey the story so that she could write a book about it.