Treasure of Green Knowe

I’ve read these books by Lucy M Boston all out of order, but it doesn’t matter. This is the second one; Tolly returns to Green Knowe, afraid that the magic will have disappeared; it hasn’t, of course. There’s a threat that a picture of his 3 ghost friends might have to be sold, because they’re poor – but Tolly gets to work and finds some alternate treasure, and an alternate ghost, too, while he’s at it. The most exciting part in the book is where Granny’s telling him an ancient story and you realise that he’s in the story, because he stepped into the past just that morning . ..

This would be a fabulous book to read or hear out loud. The atmosphere is everything. Boston is so clever, cleverer than most children’s authors, because she doesn’t try to make her child characters too wise – they remain child-like, innocent and quite ordinary, not strangely gifted or unduly burdened like many child heroes. The magic is not in the children, but in the place itself, simply for being old and hosting the past. No one can help be part of it, through stories, through the objects that have been passed down. This is a true thing; the magic is another way of saying it. A wonderful book.