Alternatives to the Great Blyton

[fatwildwoman]

Can anyone recommend anything to read to ds that isn't by Enid Blyton? I always declared I'd never have any of her books in the house, I totally agree with all posters on other threads who denounce her writing as being moralising, stereotyping piffle, but now I find they are creeping in cos they are so easy to read to a 4 year old - the humour appeals to him, it seems. But what can replace Pink-Whistle? Even something more up to date would be a start - "Dame Grumble boxed her cook's ears" ... wtf?

5foot5 well said. I think we forget how insightful children can be, and they read with a critical eye too.

we love the Katie Morag stories by Mairi Hedderwick. they are about a tomboyish girl who lives on an Island in the hebrides. They are beautifully illustrated too.

DD1 loves the Magic tree house series by Mary Pope Osbourne. I think they might be american.

Hey, I'd forgotten all about Dick King-Smith, I used to love his books.

I'm not censoring EB exactly (well, okay I am) but only because I have to read the books
to ds at the moment - I fully appreciate that as soon as he can read himself (roll on that day! ) the house will be awash with Famous Five et al.
I am that parent who takes all Topsy and bally Tim to the charity shop. I think it was Alan Coren who described them so accurately as 'irksome little clots'

I think Enid Blyton books are good on a history level too. The twee language,pictures and some references have lead to many a discussion on the olden days when grandad was a boy.

Out of date doesn't mean a book shouldn't be read.

"I am that parent who takes all Topsy and bally Tim to the charity shop. I think it was Alan Coren who described them so accurately as 'irksome little clots'"

Ha ha! Spot on!

DD once borrowed "Topsy and Tim get itchy heads" from the library. DH and I thought that title hilarious and had a bit of fun inventing our own titles for the tiresome little wretches:

"Topsy and Tim play chicken"
"Topsy and Tim talk to a strange man in the park"

Just a quick post (as I really need to stop looking at Mumsnet) but I can really recommend the Jeremy James stories.

www.amazon.co.uk/Triple-Trouble-Jeremy-James-Wilson/dp/0330441019/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=bo oks&qid=1276024454&sr=8-1

They're lovely and very funny. Stories such as Jeremy putting superglue on his hair because he doesn't want to be "balded" like his dad, then going to hospital and having his head shaved in order to remove the superglued hair; finally being delighted that his hair grows back after this and convinced that the superglue did the trick.

Maybe I need to get out more ...

I loved the Brambly Hedge books when i was little (so much so that a few years ago i bought the collected books - ditto Milly Molly Mandy!) and Mr Men books. Roger Hargreaves also wrote Once Upon A Worm which i still adore (and can remember). Its all written in rhyme and so good - worth getting if you can find a copy!

The Tiger That Came to Tea was another favourite.

Just out of interest, have the really dodgy and borderline racist bits of Blyton been taken out? I remember one Famous Five book where the unwashed Gypsy circus kid takes Julian by the hand and says something along the lines of 'cor guvner, yer 'and smells nice, like' and Julian does the smarmy git act and answers 'you could be like me if you washed your hands five times a day'. I'm quite glad my kids have never really caught onto Blyton given scenes like that.

Having said that, we only ever censored one of her books (a present from DM), a picture book about a lovely and blissfully happy community of dolls in the playroom who are distraught to find that a nasty family of gnomes have moved in next door (complete with racially offensive, somewhat anti-Semitic illustrations), and then they find out the gnomes are thieves and they have to move away and everyone is happy again in toyland.

Anyone who lets their DC read stuff like that is not doing them any favours.

Re Brambley Hedge. My cousin and his wife named their daughter Primrose and my husband and i named our son Wilfred. We didnt realise the connection to Brambley Hedge till after!!

And we have the Worm book by the toilet to read!!!

Caroline Lawrence: Roman Mysteries are a fantastic alternative to Blyton.

They are fun: children solving mysteries and having adventures. But are inclusive, not sexist or racist and you get to learn about a historical context too.

This is an amazing offer from The Book People £12.99 for all 15 books. (We've bought them every six months or so as they've come out and paid full whack for them!)

This reminds me of when I was about 8 years old and my mum - a teacher- came home with an enormous box gor me.

I opened it and found the entire Famoys Five series along with Malory towers and St Clares.

Her school was chucking them because they were sexist.

I read them all.

I think that this should be compulsory reading for young children actually. How else are we going to give them nightmares?

I've got onecalled ''noddy and the magic rubber' where he puts the golly in the bath to wash him bcause he is black and dirty.

Shirley Hughes 'Alfie' stories... any and all of them... perfectly pitched at a 4 yr old's life experiences and wonderful illustrations.

Judith Kerr Mog stories and The Tiger who came to Tea

I still love them..!

both of my DC absolutely loved all Shirley Hughes books esp DS who now repeats the entire Dogger book verbatim! My DD aged 11 thoughly enjoyed the whole set of Malory Towers books I cobbled together for her from various charity shops. She even named our new baby Felicity (Darells sister!)Kids will have to study literature from different cultures and different times later on at school anyway and kids are a lot more'tuned in' to old fashioned ideas and concepts of class and culture than we think

I lovesd Enid Blyton when I was younger and would ask my parents to send me to boarding school (bearing in mind we came from a Scottish council estate). Not sure about censoring books that were written in a different time. Blyton might be considered classics now - they can be used to show what people used to live like and what the world used to be like - even the not so nice, racial bits!

What I love about old classics is that they were actually written by people who lived then - not some modern day person tryint o imagine.

Look for Pumpkin Soup (can't recall the author offhand). It's a great funny, touching tale and the illustrations are glorious - my kids still love it.

Enid Blyton is fantastic, my kids love her books as did I as a child. Really got me into reading.

'The Owl who was afraid of the dark' and the other short chapter books by Jill Tomlinson have gone done well here as have the 'My naughty little sister' stories.

Winnie the Pooh (the classics, not the Disney-fied adventures) are currently popular as is EB's 'Folk of the Faraway Tree'.

Lots of the picture books around these days are incredibly clever e.g. Beware of the story book wolves by Lauren Child (and others by her that aren't the Charlie & Lola ones) or 'That rabbit belongs to Emily Brown'.

Another vote for Judith Kerr and Shirley Hughes and the 'Happy families' by the Ahlbergs.

IMHO ALL children should own a copy of Roald Dhals Revolting Rhymes as a basic human right!!

absolutely heverhoney.

I read dd the cinderella story the other day though and did pause and substitute the word slut for something a little more 2 year old friendly!

A. Mazing Monsters books too!

I loved Green Eye!

I'm also not in favour of censoring books written in a different time. If we seriously did that then there'd be precious little worth reading.

I love Enid Blyton, was an avid reader from a young age and have a literature degree so she didn't do me any harm. My 7yo niece is currently hoovering up the Faraway Tree and the Wishing Chair and loves them. I'm already buying nice editions of the books for DD when she's older. I found a newly printed copy of the Faraway Tree with the original names in! None of this Beth and Franny crap.