I first read The Secret Garden many years ago. I loved it then and I still love it now. I believe it is one of the best children's books ever written. It combines fantasy, mystery, and history with a wonderfull plot. No matter how old I am when I read it, or how long it has been since I last read it, I enjoy it imensely. I strongly recomend buying it or borrowing it from your library. The Secret Garden certainly is a true classic.

To be ten or twelve and reading this is heaven. To have your ten or twelve year old read it, is also heavenly. Read it in winter, and spring will be in your heart before it is through!

The tale of a stubborn child who changes with the help of some unlikely friends to work miracles in a secluded garden: it is a story of healing and adventure, without coming off sappy or silly. Remarkable in its telling, it is timeless in its appeal. For those who might not have read it, The Secret Garden has a "Harry Potter" sort of flavor, with characters that are so well written you might feel you know them. I read it more than once as a child, and as an adult I re-read it every few years.

Over the years, I have collected several versions of Secret Garden from various internet bookstores. This production, beautifully done by Focus on Family, is by far the best version I have ever heard. The narrator, using first person in her narration, effectively weaves in the story smoothly. And the original story and sequences of story are well kept so that it can be easily followed with the text. Another good thing about this cd is in its cover. The audio actors and actresses are properly introduced and thus given its listeners the first hand knowledge about who is who on this wonderful sound production. Keep up the good works! Focus on Family

This rendition of the beloved book "The Secret Garden" is a wonderful production that is sure to keep you glued to your stereo. I read this book as a child a few times and watched the Hallmark version of the movie, but I always favor the imagination over the cinematic portrayals of characters in books who become your friends.
My daughter is six and received this for Christmas. I didn't know if she was ready for the involved plot of "The Secret Garden", but I thought we'd try the audio version anyway. She fell in love with it and had to listen to it all in one sitting-it's over an hour long-and as soon as she finished it she wanted to begin it all over again. I thoroughly enjoyed listening to it as well, and my 3 year old followed along too. We then read the book and found the book to be a bit lengthier and wordy. The abridged version of the audio is great. The accents are marvelous and there is much "scope for the imagination!"

Did you ever wonder how the food Mary and Collin ate tasted? This book answers that question with over 40 recipes and lots of fun facts straight from the Victorian age. Try Mulligatawny soup from India, Tattie Broth like Dickon would have eaten, and enjoy an authentic English tea. These recipes are not only fun to make, but they taste good too! You will love this book!

The book is set in the 19th century, but the heroine, Bettina Vanderpoel of the filthy rich New York Vanderpoels, is no shrinking violet. That role is left to her older sister, sweet and not overly bright Rosalie. The story starts out with Rosalie being courted by and married to Sir Nigel Anstruthers, an impoverished English aristocrat on the make for a rich wife. Although she is only eight at the time, Betty hates Sir Nigel. Her instincts are on the money. Sir Nigel is a rotter, a blackguard, a cad, and a bounder. He is utterly infuriated that he did not automatically gain control of Rosalie's money when he married her. He and his equally appalling mother start a loathsome campaign of emotional abuse that gentle Rosalie is not equal to. Luckily, by chapter five it is 12 years later and Bettina has grown into a fine, strong-minded woman who has all the business sense that made the Vanderpoel fortune. The rest of the book tells us how she rescues her sister, her nephew, and the Anstruthers estate from Sir Nigel. The hero of the book is another impoverished aristocrat, but cut from genuinely noble cloth, even if most of his ancestors were of the Sir Nigel type.
Before the book is over, Bettina will be trapped, injured, and at the mercy of Sir Nigel, who has Perfectly Awful plans for the lovely lady. Will Bettina wring her hands helplessly and beg?
Don't be silly. Read and see how love, virtue, and justice triumph and Sir Nigel gets his.

This is one of Burnett's lesser known novels but highly worth the read. Young Tembarom suddenly comes into a large inheritence and a large estate in Great Britian. His American way of life comes into a sharp contrast and he keeps his chin up the entire time. His love of his life who he met before coming into money refuses to have him unless he stays one year among the posh and still wants her. The deal is he can't see her and must surround himself with beautiful higher class women (with funny results). Old friends are found and new friends made and a ten year old mystery is solved by Tembarom. This is a typical Horatio Alger style book with a woman's touch and far older characters that you usually associate with what we see as a children's author. Very turn of the last century style of writing but highly enjoyable.

I feel that the boog was wonderful. I laughed, I cried, and I smiled not knowing what was going out. I loved the book more then a pugy child likes his/her cake!

Why this book is out-of-print is anyone's guess! This lovely novella, written by the author of the ever-popular Little Lord Fauntleroy and The Secret Garden, is a classic dealing with life after death. After her first son's untimely death, Burnett delved into spiritualism and found this a great comfort in dealing with her grief. This was a subject she was interested in for the rest of her life. During World War I, Burnett finally got a chance to put her beliefs about what happens after death into writing. The story involves a young woman with unusual insight living as a semi-recluse in the Scottish Highlands finding the love of her life. The White People is very evocative of life in the Highlands and is also a fictionalized validation of life after death. This is an old-fashioned, innocent tale that will warm your heart. Anyone tired of the graphic type of novel currently popular should certainly give this a try. Highly recommended.

Frances Hodgson was very fond of her own family garden, but when her family moved to the center of Manchester, she began to write stories as a way to escape the ugliness of her surroundings. She was inspired by the old rose garden at Great Maytham Hall in Kent, England, her second home.

In this story, Mary Lennox is living in India when cholera takes the life of her parents. She then travels to England to live with her uncle at Misselthwaite Manor on the edge of the bleak Yorkshire moors.

Mary is used to being waited on hand and foot and she soon starts to feel lonely and becomes very unhappy living in a manor filled with a maze of dark passageways and tapestry walls.

Soon she ventures outside and finds the key to the hidden door of the locked garden which has been shut up for over ten years. Once Mary meets Dickon she tells him she has: "stolen a garden."

"When Mary entered the secret garden she found Dickon already kneeling on the grass working hard. "Oh, Dickon! Dickon!" She said. I'm so happy I can scarcely breathe." They ran from one part of the garden to another and found so many wonders that they had to remind themselves that they must be quiet. There was every joy on earth in the secret garden that morning, and then came the most delightful surprise of all. Swiftly something flew across the wall and darted through the trees to an overgrown corner." Pg. 33

Soon she finds another project. The rather spoiled Colin, who is crying pitifully. Mary bewitches him and soon he is reading pictures books. Dickon also becomes a friend and soon the three of them are out in the garden teaching Colin to walk again.

A story about how one person can change the world they live in for the better.

The 1993 Secret Garden movie: ASIN: 0790720434
is the best one I have seen so far.