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For years, Chris' father has given him money to buy presents, since he's never with his son much himself to get to know what he'd like. When aunt Elizabeth drops Chris and Nan off at a movie soon after Nan's arrival, Chris opts to shop for a present instead. In a strange store he's never been to before, he finds a very old model inn, bearing the sign of a red hart (i.e., a male red deer).
Chris and Nan soon discover that the Red Hart carries some kind of magic; in their dreams, they find themselves in the real Red Hart, an English inn, in various periods of the past.
"The King's Hunters", in King James' reign, finds the two of them thwarting a Pursuivant who attempts to prove that the inn's owner is secretly a Catholic priest (a capital offense in that place and time). Catherine Aird's mystery _A Most Contagious Game_ would be a good read for anyone who's interested in how priests managed to survive and the tricks used to build hiding places for them.
In "The Gentlemen", a wounded Excise officer is being sheltered from local smugglers in the inn. This story makes a sharp, interesting contrast to Vic Crume's _Dr. Syn Alias the Scarecrow_, a terrific book that's also a movie by Disney with Patrick McGoohan (the hardest Disney classic to find on video as of this writing, may I add). The chief of the smugglers in "The Gentlemen" is as anonymous as the masked Scarecrow - 'he could be any man in the village, leaving out the parson and the squire.' (If you've read or seen the Scarecrow's story, you'll get the joke.)
In "Hue and Cry", Chris is falsely accused of setting fire to Squire Mallory's barn, a blaze that could have killed several men. Harry Hawkins, a friend of his father's days in Wellington's army, one of the Bow Street runners, is called in by Ira Fitton to uncover the truth. (This is *long* before the runners evolved into the Bow Street Station of Anne Perry's Thomas Pitt.)
In the present, the kids have their own troubles, apart from getting along with each other. Nan is 'befriended' by the most popular girl in class - only to find that the price of entry into her circle is too high. Chris, on the other hand, is the favorite target of the most popular kid in *his* school - the bully who's captain of the soccer team. The lessons they learn in the past stand them in good stead.
they started to rebilding it. This book is real heart touching.
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I always remembered this book and recently decided to order it from Amazon so I could re-read it. (I found my old childhood copy in my father's basement a month later, so now I have two).
The story is a magificent portrayal of a relationship between two loving, but very different sisters, Kate and Joss. Joss is somewhat of a "free spirit" and Kate clearly envies her that.
It is sweet, soft, gentle and heartbreaking at times, but I highly recommend that this book be in any young girl's (or 36-year-old girl's) book collection.
And, if you ever have the unlikely opportunity to see the TV version starting Melissa Sue Anderson ("Little House on the Prairie" and beautiful Katy Kurtzman (2-time guest-star on "Little House"), you must!
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The story concerns Jess Aarons, "the fastest kid is school", until a new girl, Leslie, beats all of the boys, in a race. But school bores them down, so they go deep into the woods and construct "Terabithia", an imaginary world where they rule as king and queen.
Sounds like a nice, little fairy tale? No! Soon after the joy, tragedy follows, as Leslie accidentally dies. This is a sad story, actually, and no fun-loving child wants as sad story, so I do not recommend this to easily bored kids. What's the moral here? Death. What's the message? Death. What does it deal with? Death, death, and loads of death. "The Bridge to Terabithia" concerns the meaning of life and death, and how serious life can be. It uses a lot of drama, that no excitement comes.
Two words: VERY OVERRATED!