Another Antonia Forest thread

[tvaerialmagpiebin]

We haven't had one in a while.

I have just won "Attic Term" on ebay and almost got "Marlows and the Traitor" from a dealer but it turned out their website was out of date and it had sold in December. Boo hiss.

I tried to find the thread from a while back about "Nicola Merrick" the radio producer but I think it must have been in Chat because it has gone. I am re-reading all the AF books I have, in order, and it is surprising how things slip into place now. Can't believe I got "Ready-made family" for 25p in a charity shop 10 years ago and that launched me on such a fantastic discovery.

Now I have to convince my local library to get out the copy of "Run away Home" that they claim to have in the HQ store, and I will be very happy..

I re-read the marlowes and the traitor not long ago. Love it!
I also have Attic Term, Falconer's Lure and Peter's Room (somewhere).

I've just reread The Marlows and the Traitor and I've decided it is one of my least favourites (although I still enjoyed it).
It seems to have dated more than some of the other books.
I love Attic Term and Run Away Home - although in RAH I am desparate for Nicola to contact Esther.

I see what you're saying about it dating perhaps more than the others. The whole cold-war espionage navy story is what does it I think. Still like it. Perhaps because Lawrie hospitalised and out of the picture for much of it!

Lawrie not playing a major role is a bonus!

Has anyone read the GGB publications where they include some of the deleted scenes from RAH?
Buster was to have died after the trip to Bacca Cave but her publisher felt it was too much. The scene where Nicola finds him made me cry.

There is a poster with the username Lawrieisluckybutnickyisnicer - she must be a Forest fan - I wonder if she will show up on this thread.

Hello pantryboy
I am after that book from GGB too. But I haven't read RAH yet. I think my favourite (so far) is Falconer's Lure, but I like them all. I do skip over the very crickety bits in Cricket Term, though.

Hi Pooka
Oh I am really after reading MATT now..... feel a trip to Hay on Wye coming up (but not with ds in tow)

Attic Term has not yet dropped through my letterbox and I will have to read something else now, out of the groove, grr.

I am interested to know how everyone found Antonia Forest, and where we got our books from.

I still haven't read all the books, but love the ones I have read. Desperate to read RAH, but will just have to keep hanging out at charity shops and car boots and hoping I think!

I have them all, having rescued most of them from the chuck-out pile in the stacks at Morden Library over 20 years ago (I used to work there, I didn't just wander in and grab them!)
I was furious with myself for years for forgetting to pick up The Thursday Kidnapping the day before I went on holdiday & when I got back it had gone, especially as it was about £70 on Amazon. I was really happy that Girls Gone By brought it out last year, though as so often happens when you've been waiting that long for something I was vaguely disappointed - it's not quite as good as the Marlow books, or maybe it's just the different characters.

They are so expensive, aren't they. I did email GGB to ask them for another print run but they won't do it. I would have bought them all....

I bid on RAH and Peter's Room on ebay about a month ago, the seller started them off at 99p....... needless to say they didn't sell for that.

I wish I had the lot.

They are just so so so good.

My copy of Cricket Term has fallen to bits

Lawrie is a brilliant character, why do you all hate her so much? Ginty much more dislikable imo.

I suppose my dislike of Lawrie is her lack of sensitivity and self-centredness. She just seems so "me, me, me". Agree though that Ginty is harder and less likeable - for all Lawrie being frequently insufferable there is still a vulnerable core to her I think.

I'm keen on Peter, Nicola and Rowan. I actually rather like Ann too for her goodness.

Wish I had a house like Trennels.

Ooh I don't much like Ginty, but I do like Karen, she is my favourite. Possibly because I am a bit of a booky geek like her. I would have liked a "prequel" with a bit more about her days at Kingscote.

When I was about 10 it was one of my favourite games to "imagine" a boarding school, I used tolike to draw plans of the dorms etc....

I first read AF when I was little, I remember getting Autumn Term out of the library again and again. Peter's Room was my favourite for ages. I even love the cricket bits. Falcolner's Lure I only read once in someone elses house.

I would like to discuss WHY the books are so good. And why such a talented writer wrote school stories (I am glad about that, but imagine if she had tackled other subjects). The characters are so well drawn, they are most vividly present in my mind.

I have never read The Ready Made Family

God I had forgotten about RAH. Only read that one once too.

We ought to do a swap, temp only, of ones we have but others don't. Mind you I don't know if I would trust the post office. I would trust MNetters though

I think that they are not really children's books, despite some of them being school stories. The themes are just too adult. I was astounded by re-reading The Thuggery Affair by the drug storyline, for instance, for the time of writing it struck me as being highly unusual for a so-called children's book. Her style is adult, not patronising in that "oh what fun let's have a midnight feast" way of a certain E Blyton.

I've just reread Cricket Term after my dad found it in my parents' loft! I don't possess any of the others but read most of them from library when younger.

I am pg and if it is a DD I want to name her Rowan or Miranda, but DH doesn't like either of those names

Rowan was my favourite sister. Always said the right thing at the right time.

I always wanted to go to Kingscote - love the fact that they played cricket as I have always loved cricket and it was a revelation that girls' schools that played it existed, even if only in fiction! I always wondered if it was based on Roedean as that was the only girls' school I was aware of that played cricket.

I lie - I have Autumn Term too somewhere, I know - just need to get dad to find it!

Oh I love Miranda too. That bit in End of Term when she is in the minster being a Candle Angel.... and all the anti-Semitic stuff... yet another example of the adult theme. Oh, and all the Catholic stuff.

Yes Rowan very sensible sister. Brave to take on the farm. Again I would have liked to know what she had got up to, a bit more, like Karen.

We could provide an armed guard.

I think her style is just so accomplished. She conveys so much with so little, there is never a wasted work.

I might have to kiss the postman tomorrow if he has Attic term for me

lucy mangan in guardian

slightly more eloquent than me. i am a total dunce at conveying her greatness.

oh what a lovely thread
i have them all, mostly from GGB
my favourite apart from schools ones is Run Away Home, I think - I also love the Players titles

i am the oddball who loves lawrie
i had NO IDEA as a child that i was meant to prefer Nicola, and was gobsmacked to work it out as an adult
Lawrie is just so cool - so funny - so guileless in her faults and her ambitions and her egocentricity
i adore that bit in The Thuggery Affair where she gets carried away being a beatnik and completely gets into bother

i also think Lois Sanger is the most amazing character
god they are good books - too good to be left in the children#s fiction section

more on the lady herself

sorry - DOH - it is Ready Made Family that is my favourite, not Run Away Home

oh i heart these. though i only have autumn term, something else term (th one with the dog and the jewish girl) and another one with rowan's step family in...i need more as there are too many gaps...

isn't marie in autumn term just in dire need of a good slap? she is such a drip...