The Birds by Daphne du Maurier

I was going to get my mother to post this while I was away, but the plan didn't work! So here is last week's post, our first horror story review!


Ratings:

Age Group:  15/16 + Availability: 6/10 Cleanliness: 4/10 Overall: ***

Review:

From the safe and happy world of Winnie-The-Pooh we move now to one of the best-known horror stories of the twentieth century - Daphne du Maurier's The Birds. Although it is a short story, The Birds still manages to contain a very gripping plotline and an ending that keeps you guessing. In the story huge numbers of birds turn on mankind and little can be done to stop them, which has a tragic outcome. I won't, however, spoil the story by saying how it finishes. All I will say is that I really wouldn't suggest it as bedtime reading. I will definitely never think of flocks of starlings in the same way again.
As well as being a horror story, it can be interpreted as having a similar meaning as George Orwell's Animal Farm, as in powers subduing the world, but whichever way you care to view it, it is a horror story nonetheless. That said, it is probably appropriate for ages sixteen and up, although some students may encounter it in school. in the 1960's The Birds was also the basis of a film by Alfred Hitchcock, although I cannot comment on the screen version as I have not seen it. My father tells me, however, that it varies a lot from the story and really only retains the same premise, that of birds attempting to obliterate humans.

The Birds by Daphne du Maurier, first published in 1952 in The Apple Tree. Available in many anthologies of short stories, but not online.

The Enchanted Places by Christopher Milne

Ratings:
Age Group: 12+ Availability: 5/10 Cleanliness: 10/10 Overall: ****

Review:

The full title of this week's book is The Enchanted Places: A Memoir Of The Real Christopher Robin And Winnie-The-Pooh, which should give you some idea of what the book is about. For those who like the Pooh stories, it is an enlightening book that gives the reader a deeper view into the world of the books. It also tells about the real Christopher Robin's childhood and how his father wrote the books to try and engage with his son during a time when parents were not involved much in their childrens' lives. Mr. Milne also tells in the book of the house he grew up in and the woods where it all started. He recounts as well how he hated to be identified with the Christopher Robin of the stories. The association with the books lasted all his life and caused the shy boy much grief at school and in daily life. Christopher Milne eventually outgrew Pooh and took up cricket, an action which I applaud as a fellow cricket fan. He later owned and operated his own bookshop in Dartmouth, England, where my own father met him many years later.

The Enchanted Places is an interesting and informative read, both for the Winnie-The-Pooh aspect of it and the pre-WWII view of childhood. Mr. Milne has an good style that serves to draw the reader along and the entire book is under two-hundred pages, making it a good school read for older children once they have finished the original Pooh books.

The Enchanted Places: A Memoir Of The Real Christopher Robin and Winnie-The-Pooh By Christopher Milne, Published in the U.S.A. by E.P. Dutton & Co., 1974 and in Canada by McClelland and Stewart, Limited.

A Quick Note

I'm afraid its been a bit of a long time since I last posted a review. Summer has finally arrived here in Victoria, so I've been outside as much as possible. As a homeschooler, I have also still been doing schoolwork all day, especially as I am writing the last few essays for my Engish course. Add to this the fact that the cricket season is well and truly upon us and I have been practicing frantically for a cornet solo in church and you get one very busy girl. Unfortunately (especially for a book-lover like me), books have had to take second place through all this.

However, I am writing this while waiting for my essays to settle a bit before finally proof-reading them, so soon I will once again have time to post ... at least until I leave to work at summer camp for two weeks! I shall be leaving a few extra posts though (including one of the essays!) for you to chew on until I get back!

~Alice