Books you thought no one else has read

[tweetysylvester]

It's so fun to find rare books to read, or just look up or hear about less known books, so thought I'd start a thread about this. Nostalgic novels, YA books, current titles you discovered very randomly...

This sounds like my platonic ideal for a novel - I must get hold of it!

Glad to see Antonia Forest getting the attention she deserves.

I so hope Nicola ended up with Patrick.

If that's what she ultimately wants. Though I'm not sure wife of a country landowner is really the lifestyle for her.

Anyway, I hope she takes her time and has plenty of adventures before she settles down to be Mrs Merrick, if that's what she decides on. Oxford, the Navy, travel, whatever she wants to do.

(I think Nicola could do better than Patrick, but Patrick could certainly do better than Ginty.)

I think Patrick would have been very tedious as an adult. Nicola is better off travelling the world with the Wrens.

Aahhh, I read this! I loved it too.

Did anyone else read Antonia Ridge - "Cousin Jan", "Family Album"? I went on holiday to Nimes because of "Family Album" . I can't find much out about her except that she was Dutch by birth and wrote the English lyrics for the song 'The Happy Wanderer.

… And I’m glad to see Laurie Colwin getting a mention. I read Another Marvellous Thing when I was pregnant with DS, and added William to our list of potential names because of it.

I was a voracious reader as a tween/young teen; the local library was next door to my primary school and 5 minutes from home, so for the past years of primary and the early years of secondary, I was allowed to go after school by myself. There was an extensive section of Lion Teen Tracks books and I think I read all of them. Paul Zindel, Cynthia Voight, Zibby O’Neal, Lois Lowry… good times!

@MrsFrumble I am so excited to find someone else who read it!

Personally I visualise Nicola taking a couple of gap years after Kingscote to travel, and then going to university to study veterinary medicine. Sailing would remain a hobby. She might end up with Patrick, but I suspect he will marry some Catholic aristocrat with an impeccable pedigree.

I haven’t read it either, @NotSoFar. My to be read pile is growing and growing!

I love Another Marvellous Thing. Another fanatical LC friend and I nearly came to blows in our 20s about exactly what the ‘nice yellow dress’ Francis says he’ll pay Billy to put on looked like, ditto the blue and striped linen one she wears to Penny’s wedding. Though my favourite of her fiction is either A Big Storm Knocked It Over or Shine On.

I’m late to the party with her cookery books, but I share her devotion to aubergines, and my most frequent solo supper is roast aubergine with miso.

Patrick needs to go into the Cistercians.

I think Forest became a little unsure what to do with him - I found the suggestion of him going to Northern Ireland with the army quite horrifying. Better for him to fail his medical, go on a retreat, and never leave the monastery.

The twist at the end blew my 12 year old mind 😂

I’d love to re-read it and remember all towns and states Nina lived in. The only one that sticks in my mind is Montpelier, Vermont. Back then the US seemed remote and glamorous, but I live here now and have probably been to some of the places.

Same! I cried and cried every time I read it. I also remember Montpelier (I think because it had a cool name) and can't remember any of the other places. It was one of the first books I'd read where there was a bit of nuance around "good" and "bad" characters. I think Joyce was so well written.

@NotSoFar I’ve just finished A Big Storm Knocked It Over - loved it.

King of the Copper Mountains. I read this as a child and absolutely loved it! No one else seems to have heard of it!
Also The Farthest Away Mountain.

Clearly, I had a mountain thing going on as a child!

@Welshwabbit I also loved Where It Stops, Nobody Knows! There was a book by Caroline B Cooney with a similar plot called The Face on the Milk Carton. I must reread both one day!

I did too! I remember when the mother dyed their hair. For some reason that bit stuck out in my mind.

@Welshwabbit @bookworm14 having enjoyed The Face on the Milk Carton (and many other CBC books "Among Friends" "Don't Blame the Music" "The Girl Who Invented Romance" anyone?) I was delighted as an adult to discover about 3 sequels to it. I never really forgave Reid (I think that was the boyfriends name!)

@GuineaHyggaeReturnsWheeking Yes, I looked it up just now and saw it had a load of sequels. I had no idea!

Yes! The Girl Who Invented Romance! That was a very odd book in retrospect 😂 I never read The Face in the Milk Carton. I love CBC’s spooky stuff though.

There were 2 books by Jean Ure I read over and over: Hi There, Supermouse and Nicola Mimosa, about a tomboy who turns out to be a talented dancer, and her stage school brat little sister. Did anyone else read them?

Caroline B Cooney was very prolific. She also wrote a lot of the Point Horror series as I recall.

@MrsFrumble I love Jean Ure! My favourite of hers was probably Play Nimrod For Him, about an intense relationship between two teenage boys. It’s terribly sad. I also still love and reread the Dancing Dreams series about girls at ballet school.

Do you recall Jean Ure's Peter High series about Jo Jameson and the Laing Gang (Barge Bozzy Fij)? Loved those . Jam Today I especially enjoyed . I never thought that other younger girls felt the same way about an older girl as I did! I thought I was the only one.

Yes, I also read Play Nimrod, and If It Weren’t For Sebastian. The names from Peter High look familiar, so I’m off to Google…

Edited to add: I googled, and the original covers came up on Goodreads which I recognised instantly! So much nostalgia.

Accidents Will Happen by Andy Tricker. It was a true story written by a young man who was paralysed after a motorcycle accident. It’s always stuck with me and I’d love to know what happened to him if anyone has more luck on Google than me! He appears to have only written that one book and Google brings up numerous Andy Trickers but I don’t know if any are the right one!

I'm sure I've read Hi There, Supermouse. Did she also write A Proper Little Nooreyev?