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Children's books

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books from the 1980s that no-one else remembers!

343 replies

GoldenGreen · 21/12/2010 11:22

For some reason I have been compulsively trying to track down half-remembered books that I read as a young teenager - not sure why as they are not classics but I would really like to revisit them. I had hoped my younger sister might have picked them up but she never liked the same books as me.

Does this ring a bell with anyone:

Series with the children of detectives - I think a brother and a sister and an adopted sister (her parents were police officers who died - I think she was Irish, red haired and fiery - obviously) - they solved mysteries based around school. In one they caught a vandal because of the paricular way he wrote "H". In another there was a school trip to France with an old fashioned type of Polaroid camera - this was a key part of the plot but can't remember any more!

The other book that I remember reading obsessively was a teen romance one with a girl whose parents were repressed and abusive. She was not allowed any freedom at all but managed to meet a boy and sneak out. The thing I most remember is that she had no clothes apart from school uniform so she had to embroider flowers on her school shirt when she went out to meet him.

Anyone else got any vague memories of books they once loved and that no-one else ever remembers?

OP posts:
saltyseadog · 22/12/2010 22:35

I remember The Silver Sword, Z for Zacchariah and Across the Barricades.

Did anyone ever read a book called Rebecca's World by Terry Nation? (Terry Nation apparently invented the Daleks).

JaneS · 22/12/2010 22:22

Btw, Roll of Thunder Hear My Cry has sequels (very good, also).

I remember one about a boy who dreamed about someone his age trapped down a mine - he eventually went and found the body stuck in the mine and found the ghost some peace. Creepy. Any ideas?

DownyEmerald · 22/12/2010 22:19

Some have fallen apart - Mistress Masham's Repose springs to mind - I will be buying replacements for dd where I can!

DownyEmerald · 22/12/2010 22:18

I have about a third of my books. My mum and dad downsized recently and I took what I could - not everything, I don't have space for what I did take! There was an earlier donating session to my younger cousins who got most of my pony books (but not Horse in the House which I think is superb), and my school stories (but not Chalet School which I loved too much at the time). Haven't reread them so can't comment Grin.

What I enjoyed most rereading after many years are the Antonia Forests, but also Peter Dickinson, and lots others mentioned here - Joan Aiken, Monica Edwards off the top of my head.

What I regret most is not taking Trebizon, tho' I think my dad might have kept hold of those.

Is there really a sequel to My side of the Mountain? When I got together with dp this was one of the few books we both had, that and Rats of NIMH I think (oh yes and the Moomins!). He mostly ignores my books but has read and reread my Arthur Ransomes and Laura Ingalls Wilders.

LauraNorder · 22/12/2010 22:17

I read a great book as a child, it was really thick and it was about a parachutist in the war. I never finished it and I have never been able to find it since as that's all I can remember - long shot I know!

JaneS · 22/12/2010 22:17

(Btw, I too keep all my childhood books ... and buy more ...)

JaneS · 22/12/2010 22:16

Bronze - of course, My Side of the Mountain!

Thanks! Smile

AngeChica · 22/12/2010 22:15

I love this thread... and have read many of the aforementioned titles.

I became a nerdy librarian while at seondary school with the express purpose of being able to smuggle out excessive amounts of books (and replace them on the shelves once read).

The Darkangel trilogy by Meredith Ann Pierce was a favourite that I recently found on Amazon and re-read.

CommanderDrool · 22/12/2010 21:51

Yes ! It's my life, that's the one.

I have faint memories of Brother in the Land too - post apocalyptic novels seemed to bevpopular then. Was also shown Threads at the sane time.

BertieBasset · 22/12/2010 21:30

Yes - brother in the land was the name. Thank you!

scouserabroad · 22/12/2010 21:22

I think all my books are in my mum's attic, unless she's secretly disposed of them Grin I'd love to go and get them!

talkingnonsense · 22/12/2010 21:21

Is "brother in the land" the one where the girls sister gets pregnant and everyone is happy until she says "Hiroshima vegetables and Hiroshima babies"? I loved and hated that book!

norfolkBRONZEturkey · 22/12/2010 21:16

Littleredragon- definitely sounds like my side of th emountain. Theres a sequel too

Please tell me I'm not the only person who kept all their books.
I have all the Monica Edwards bar one which sells for about 500 quid and I think all the Malolm Savilles along with Rosemary Sutcliffes, Enid Blytons etc
In fact I don't tend to read mordern 'adult books' as I find most never beat the magic that was those books.

SnowWoman · 22/12/2010 21:10

I re-read the Rosemary Sutcliff one about the chalk horse, Sun Horse, Moon Horse - and cried just as much this time round

Tribpot - the Iron Lily is one of Barbara Willard's Mantlemass novels which are some of my favourite historical stories, specially the Iron Lily, and an earlier one A Cold Wind Blowing (another weepie, about the dissolution of the monasteries).

I think the post-holocaust one is Brother in the Land by Robert Swindells. I howled over that one too!

bit of a pattern here, methinks :)

barbarapym · 22/12/2010 21:09

Across the Barricades was in the Kevin and Sadie series by Joan Lingard - I've still got those!

barbarapym · 22/12/2010 21:07

Ashamed to say have never read or heard of the Gemma books, and I loved NS! Great to have something to look foward to - dd is only 4 but it's all to come...

Have discovered my Emma book was The High House by Honor Arundel - the first of a series of three about Emma. The joy of google! Going to order online - seems to be out of print but there are a few of the 70s edition I had floating about out there.

tomgoodswife · 22/12/2010 21:04

Def remember z for zachariah. Also I remember Across the Barricades about a young couple in Belfast think there was a series.

tribpot · 22/12/2010 21:04

The Ordinary Princess - another gem!

Off to google This Time of Darkness, that sounds right.

Feenie · 22/12/2010 21:02

Gin drinking pregnant girl was It's My Life by Robert Leeson - her mum runs off with another bloke, and her dad expects her to help him bring up her little brother and cope with being a teenage girl, etc. I think her period was just very late in the end, she wasn't pregnant.

scouserabroad · 22/12/2010 21:01

OMG the Ghost of Thomas Kempe we did that in English but I haven't a clue what the story is anymore. I'm sure we must have spent hours analysing it too!

Udderly · 22/12/2010 21:00

Coldtits, its This Time of Darkness, I think I still have it gathering dust somewhere!

tribpot · 22/12/2010 20:59

Barbara, have you never read the Gemma series? Well worth it, even though not La Streatfeild (Ballet Shoes) at her peak.

I remember The Ghost of Thomas Kempe but literally nothing about it.

I've now got 'Iron Lily' in my mind - girl runs weaving mill? Sort of Woman of Substance for teens?

dyzzidi · 22/12/2010 20:58

another vote for z for Zachariah here! I also vividly remember spring and port wine. I seem to remember it being a bout a family who were arguing because one of them wouldn't eat a herring for tea.

Also Adams Ark about a school group visiting a nuclear bunker when a bomb is dropped and the group staying there although they shouldn't as it is meant for the PM. On e of the girls gets pregnant by one of the lads and he sneaks out into the town and gets her tinned peaches.

I liked the anastasia ones and loved Sweet Valley High and Christopher Pike horror books.

barbarapym · 22/12/2010 20:56

Tribpot - no, I don't think so, but having googled Gemma in Love it looks like one to investigate anyway!

I have given ds The Ogre Downstairs and The Ghost of Thomas Kempe recently - mostly so I could re-read them.

PenguinFeet1 · 22/12/2010 20:54

Commander, the gin drinking pregnant girl may have been in The L Shaped Room. Sounds familiar but not 100% sure!