when the posh children in Enid Blyton have an "ice", I always thought it meant "ice lolly"...

[sadpapercourtesan]

...but I was reading "Five Go To Billycock Hill" last night, and they talked about having an "ice" in a tub with a little wooden spoon...surely that's an ice cream?!

Yes, I have too much time on my hands. I should be doing stuff

I always wondered what macaroons were. They sounded delicious.

Choc ices! Makes sense now.

When you would hear the ice cream van and your mum replies no, there's choc ices in the freezer grimaces at memory

TinyMetalBirds hmm that is one reading of it I know and I’d never support those attitudes. I think more to the point though is that the mother of Bob was not prioritising him at all, she was downright indifferent, even going to stay with a ‘friend’ (new boyfriend?) at Christmas when Bob was still grieving.

It is Blyton after all so I can’t confidently state there wasn’t some ‘SAHMs are wonderful while WOHPs are not’ but I think the actual characters were a bit more nuanced than that.

Tayto yep in the sequel to Mistletoe, Rose and her DH (David?) buy Holly Farm. At first it all goes horribly wrong largely because of Rose but then she sees the error of her ways and all is resolved and there’s a little golden spaniel puppy

taytocrisps me too.
I’d never connected them with macarons !

*Let's start with the basics: A macaron (pronounced mack-a-ROHN) is a confection made up of two round, flat, almond-flour-based cookies sandwiching an emulsified filling like ganache or jam. ... A macaroon (two os; pronounced mack-a-ROON) is a mounded cookie made with shredded coconut and often dipped in chocolate.

I loved the 'Circus' books where Jimmy joins the circus. I mean, who doesn't want to run off and join the circus? Poor Mrs. Brown though. Can you imagine her AIBU - "My husband and son want me to sell my house and join the circus. AIBU to think this is not what I signed up for when I said "I do".?" And you just knew Lotta would break Jimmy's heart and run off with some exotic trapeze artist.

One of lotta’s dogs had a really awful name in the circus books.

@Taytocrisps

Yes, you're right *@TinyMetalBirds*. One of the boys was a 'latch key kid' who became a bad 'un. Enid would have fit right in on MN with all the SAHMs vs. WOHM arguments.

@summerredroses really? I've read both books but I've clearly forgotten that ending.

I'd love to read some of these books now and see what I make of them as an aul one a more mature reader.

But there wasn’t child care available as there is now and school was very different.Latch key kids were a potential problem.They’d have been home alone hours. It was only until the early 70’s that kids left school at 15. Look at how many questions on leaving kids at home there are these days. And the all the comments on why parents don’t know where their kids are, even given mobile phones. The past is another country.

So I used to have the Famous Five books on VIDEO and they always ate choc ices.....

@summerredroses

One of lotta’s dogs had a really awful name in the circus books.

Was it the N word? I remember I was lucky enough years ago to get hold of some 1930s women's magazines. I reared back in shock when I read a handbag described as N brown. Quite commonly used back then. Unthinkable now.

Yes twentie

Piggy has it - the plan to sacrifice Prince Paul was The Secret Mountain, according to google.
Loved the circus books, the boarding school series and the farm books.
However I didn’t really enjoy the Secret Seven.

@Papergirl1968 There were too many characters in the Secret Seven books. None of them really stood out.

@Leflic you're quite right about the lack of childcare back then. And I think (like so many authors) Enid was a product of her time and her upbringing. However, the fictional mother in question was on her own (was she a widow? I can't remember) so perhaps she needed to work to make ends meet. We never got her side of the story.

There are a few Enid Blyton books available to buy. Hmmmm.......

Six Bad Boys definitely has some really unfortunate parts, but the mother does explicitly say she works for “better clothes and to go to the cinema” which is very cliched but it is a children’s book. I don’t think the issue is so much that she works but more that she is indifferent to her young ds.

@TinyMetalBirds

was it Five Go To Mystery Moor with a shifty villain called Block and a lot of thick fog?

Block was Smugglers Top but the fog was Mystery Moor. Although now I am confused between the one with the spook trains and the one with the horses and the girl called Harry, I think there may have been fog in both.

Yes, Mystery Moor was the fog/spook trains - when the Five were camping with Professor Luffy, the absent-minded butterfly collector, iirc.

A PP mentioned EB's fetishizing tomatoes. There was an incident in Malory Towers where Gwen eats five tomatoes at tea time and is absolutely ripped to shreds by the other girls for being greedy . They were an unpleasant lot though, I always preferred St Clare's.

And I love Mr Goon, he's an unsung hero imho, and whoever said good on him for taking no cheek from those Find-Outers was absolutely right I also used to like Ern - wasn't he the one who was always writing poems?!

You’re right, Tayto. And the Secret Seven didn’t seem to actually do much except sit in someone's garden shed!

I never liked The Secret Seven much.
Same with St Claire’s...I always preferred Malory Towers.

I remember the Secret Seven going out collecting a penny for the guy, and also some story about stolen horses.

But yes they were mostly in the shed, bullying Jack's little sister Susie by excluding her.

Also I never understood why Timmy was one of the Famous Five, while Scamper wasn't part of the Secret Seven, given they fulfilled pretty much the same role in each set of stories.

I've read a few of them recently and adored them as much as I did in my childhood. Had to skip through the circus one due to the animal cruelty. I love how from quite a young age their parents went away leaving no forwarding address 😂 I always wonder what those children would grow up to be. I reckon Julian would be a barrister, Dick would be working his way up through the ranks in police force. My real hope is that Anne sets up her own company and is incredibly successful and ends up earning way more than her smug brothers. George I think will inherit Kirrin Cottage and the island once her parents pass away. She'll take over her fathers scientific work and will obviously be spectacularly successful as a a scientist. She'll be godmother to her cousin's children. Then she'll meet someone once she's in her thirties, fall passionately in love and get married on a Carribean island without informing any of the family
There will be a massive fallout, particularly when George reveals that she's pregnant

In terms of working out when the books were set, I seem to recall Uncle Quentin working on a top secret atomic formula? So post WW2?

@PrivateSpidey, no Mystery Moor was the one where George and Anne at staying at a riding stables with a boyish girl called Harry. I think the one with the spook trains and Mr Luffy was Five Go Off To Camp.

My favourite was the one where they stay on a farm where a company of travelling players comes (Five on Finiston Farm? Alas, it’s not on Faded Page!) and Five On a Hike Together, where they go on a slightly grim-sounding walking holiday at half term and have to align some obscure topographical clues to discover a sunken boat and treasure.

@summerredroses, that’s my issue with it — working mothers, with the exception of saintly widowed Aunt Allie (who needs to work) in the Jack, Philip, Dinah, Lucy Ann and Kiki series, are neglectful. Which is a bit rich for EB who focused on her own career and was a neglectful mother even by the standards of the UMC parenting of her day, while inventing fictional children and writing a cosy little fan magazine for her child readers as a sort of Perfect Mother Figure. One of her daughters says in a memoir that she was about six when she realised the woman who gave her her Saturday penny was her mother.

Also I never understood why Timmy was one of the Famous Five, while Scamper wasn't part of the Secret Seven, given they fulfilled pretty much the same role in each set of stories.

Yes, at least the 'Five Find-Outers and Dog' made the dog's exclusion from the number clear! I think they were my first EBs and my favourite.

@fucknuckle

was it Five Go To Mystery Moor with a shifty villain called Block and a lot of thick fog?

That was Five Go to Smugglers Top.

@PrivateSpidey, no Mystery Moor was the one where George and Anne at staying at a riding stables with a boyish girl called Harry. I think the one with the spook trains and Mr Luffy was Five Go Off To Camp.

I think Harry was in Five Go to Finniston Farm. She was actually called Harriet but insisted on being called Harry for short, she was one of boy and girl twins and her brother actually was called Harry.