I'm trying to recall the names of some of the books I used to read as a child. Many I only have vague memories about which is frustrating! My mother used to buy my books for me: I'd come home from school and there would be another lovely book to devour, waiting for me on my bed.
I recall obvious books such as Anne of Green Gables, The Children Who Lived in a Barn, The Good Master, Carbonel, Marianne Dreams, the Rumer Godden books, Ballet Shoes, The Phantom Tollboth, The Little Princess and so many more...but there are plenty of others I can't really recall that well.
One was about a wild young girl who might have been a gypsy or lived on a houseboat, who was finally 'civilised' and ended up dressing like a 'lady' - I loved it at the time but now it sounds cringeworthy! I wish I could recall the name!
Another was about a family who went on holiday by train to Switzerland, but again I can't recall the title.
I recently found online 'For the Leg of a Chicken' which I loved as a child and would like to buy again, but it's more espensive than I'm prepared to pay!
Several were specifically girls' books. Anyone else recall what they used to read as children or in their teens?
Did anyone read a book called" the peppery old colonel."?
I think I bought it in a jumble sale and it was old in the 40s. It was about two orphans who lived in a mansion.
Also I haven't been able to trace a school book whose heroine was called Lindsay Dysart . Has anyone else read this book?
I loved Enyd Blyton when I was young. I think I just wanted to go to boarding school and have all those adventures. Then loved The Swish of the Curtain and the other books in the series. Little Women, Anne of Green Gables, What Katy Did etc.
DH was a Swallows and Amazons' fan and read all the books to our children during every camping holiday. I can hear it now. Laying in the dark in my sleeping bag. I was usually asleep before the children! SIL now reading them to grandchildren. They love them, even though they seem to be very dated now.
I still read avidly now. Get 9 books at a time from library and usually have a couple on the go on iPad. Can't beat a good book.
Great memories here... though some I seem to have missed out on. We had a library a handy busride away so I read average of two books a week for years. One I still have from childhood is "The Little Wooden Horse".... must go look for it! We had Beatrix Potter books of my father though no idea where they are now. I gravitated to Agatha Christie, Anya Seton, Pearl S Buck, Nevil Shute, Walter Macken.
Might it have been Wish for a Pony ?? I loved it too !
I read a lot of the ladybird books.when I got older I read Little Weoman, Enid Blyton and at school had to read 39 steps.
NOTTOOLD it was nice see that you also read Malcolm Saville Books they were brilliant, yes they are out of print and some quite rare probably why I'm so cross my mother did what she did (as explained in previous comment) but there you go!!
Read most of the above mentioned, but my absolute favourites were by Violet Needham (The a Black Riders is the best known) they were dated even when I was a child, but I loved them and still read them when stressed - escapism. There is a firm called, I think "Girls gone by" or something similar, where you can buy modern reprints of Needham, Geoffrey Trease, Malcolm Saville et. al.
At junior school I won a prize for English called Son of a Walrus King, can't really remember what it was about now, but the books I read where Sherlock Holmes and the Cormorant books, very like Swallow and Amazons set if I remember correctly around Flamborough Head.
Of course the William books and Biggles
Outofstepwithhumanit
I have read all your lovely posts and have made a list of the books you all read. As a child my mother would not allow me to read any books, and all books were kept securely locked in a cabinet so that no-one could read them! I was not allowed to get books from the library as they were (in her words) "full of germs". I wasn't allowed to read newpapers either. Maybe this should be posted in a different area? Sorry if I'm putting a dampener on all your lovely memories. Wish I could share them.
Was into Famous Five books when young. Even younger still I loved a book about some mice who lived in an attic and one Xmas the family who lived in the house bought a Xmas tree which was too big. They had to cut a circle in the ceiling to let the tree through. The mice decorated this part and had their very own tree. Can't remember the name but would love to have it for my grandchildren. Anyone else remember it?
Thanks for your suggestion elleks - I will google that title and find out more 
I did go to ice skating classes for a while as a child so maybe that is why it appealed.
Oh dear, so many books from childhood, firstly the Enid Blyton ones especially the famous five, then Nancy Breary who wrote lovely school stories. Malcome Saville's books set in Sussex and in the wild country around Welsh border, they were all so exciting. Arthur Ransome of course, favourite being 'We didn't mean to go to sea' and all the Pamela Brown ones about the Blue Door Theatre and the three families. Oh dear - must stop, could go on for ages!
Most of the ones already mentioned. We had a teacher at junior school who was obsessed with Ww2 and for the last half hour of school each day she'd read to us books like Reach for the Sky and The Dambusters.
I also remember reading a book called The Blue Bird when I was about seven. The story was so sad and haunted me. I've tried to find it since but don't know the author and can barely remember the story but would love to track it down.
Tamzin and the horses appear in the Romney Marsh books by Monica Edwards
The first book is Wish for a Pony there are 4 friends Tamzin, Rissa, Roger, and Meryon.
They also appear in the Punchbowl Farm books by the same author. Monica Edwards actually bought Punchbowl Farm near Guilford so the books were based on that.
You can see Tamzins bedroom window supposedly at the vicarage at Rye harbour, and lots of places in those books are around Romney Marsh too.
I can remember a book long ago and would like to know if anyone can provide me with any information about it. Was about a family who went on a cruise, very unusual in those days! This family visited Gibraltar, where they saw the apes, also Tangier, and somewhere else where local children dived under the ship to retrieve coins thrown by the passengers. I don't know the title or the author but would love to find it again!
I liked Elizabeth Goudge too - who I think first published in the 1930's/40's. I recommend Henrietta's House, The Little Grey Horse, Smoky House (about smuggling in Cornwall in the eighteenth century). But most of all, as a 13/14 year old I liked her story Green Dolphin Country, about two nineteenth century Channel Island girls, one of whom chooses to emigrate to New Zealand in the days when it took six months in a sailing ship.
But my very favourite teen book of all time is 'I Capture The Castle' by Dodie Smith, who wrote 101 Dalmations. They made the first of these into a film in recent years with Romola Garai and Bill Nighy.
The Blue Bird, if I am thinking of the same story, may have been based on a play of the same name by Maurice Maeterlinck (spelling?!, HannahLoisLuke. This is referred to in Noel Streatfield's story Ballet Shoes.
Oh, memories!! When I was tiny: the Tommy the Tugboat series by Marjory Beresford and the Little Grey Rabbit series by Alison Uttley; then The Ship that Flew; all the "Jill" pony books, and the pony books by the 3 Pullein-Thomson sisters; The Three Jays series by showjumper Pat Smythe; all my brothers Biggles books - and I never found them racist, which they're accused of being today! - Black Beauty .... Monica Dickens' books about Tamsin, Rissa and their ponies, then when I was about 12 my Mum introduced me to Georgette Heyer's wonderful Regency romances.
Does anyone remember the Pookie books about the little rabbit with wings? Such beautiful illustrations. They are hugely expensive on eBay sadly as I would love to share them with my little granddaughters
Through the barricades by Joan Lingaurd,i grew up in SW Scotland in the 70s and early 80s and sectarianism was just normal, being CofE i didnt belong to either side, they both hated me equally. Reading this book made me understand that catholic or protestant we are all the same inside, and your football teams colours really didnt matter
In late teens I read a translation of Bonjour Tristesse by Francoise Sagan, after seeing the film. She wrote a second book which I also read but don't remember the title. These must have been what would now be shelved as YA I guess.
What a lovely thread! I think all my favourites have been mentioned: The Family from One End Street, Emil and the Detectives, The Silver Sword and the Sunny Stories series from a young age. I can't really remember anything in particular from my teens. I was probably temporarily distracted! Nowadays I love all crime/thriller novels and some non-fiction, such as autobiographies, most purchased from local charity shops and either passed on to friends or returned to the charity shop for resale.
Wurzelernie - except for Nancy Breary, are you me?!
Leftout - I didn't get public library books as my DM, who'd had diphtheria and scarlet fever as a child also thought they'd be 'full of germs'. I was allowed my own books however. Always thrilled to get one for Christmas, I was disappointed when an aunt and uncle's book shaped present was a dictionary!! Tell us what books you enjoyed later in life, or favourites you've charged with children since. You must have longed for those locked away books. Did teachers introduce you to books, I hope so.
As a child in Canada , I was delighted to get a book from my English grandmother. I was about six years old. The book was called ' Deep Sea Mokey ' . It told of a donkey who had an adventure under water, it was beautifully illustrated . I loved it and re-read it dozens of times. In one section primroses were mentioned and drawn. We didn't get them in Canada and I longed to see some. Finally did and I've loved them ever since. At my daughter's suggestion I tried Amazon to see if there was any chance of getting a copy. A second hand bookstore in Aberdeen did and within days I had Deep Sea Mokey in my hands. Despite its age it's still a lovely book.
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