Illustrated by Dorothy Lake Gregory
146 pages
Published 1924
Read September 17
Rating: 2.5 out of 5
One of the great contemporary British nature writers, probably Roger Deakin (though it might have been Robert Macfarlane), first piqued my interest about this series. It sounds right up my alley: Abruptly orphaned, refusing to be sent to their grandfather, four young siblings learn to subsist on their own, avoiding the clutches of meddlesome adults. For shelter, they luck into an old boxcar on an abandoned logging spur in the woods.
Children’s literature of this era lacks depth. The characters are little more than outlines, the plot only a series of incidents culminating, inevitably, in a fortune. But I grew up on fantasies of Mississippi River islands and running away on a raft, so the concept is immensely appealing. And small but skillful touches of natural beauty (not to mention the comforting descriptions of food) add to its appeal. I would have loved the hell out of this book had I read it when I was 8.
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