The Thief - Takers Peter John Stephens (Harrap Historical Novels For Young
Read- ers 30s) drops us back into the past: eight- eenth-century London and all that: crooked bounty-hunters and some real historical names like Sir John Fielding to plug the authenticity. Unpretentious, but a well-told tale.
The first of a promised series is The House at World's End Monica Dickens (Heinemann 21s). Parent-deserted (he's sailing round the world; she's in hospital) the four Fielding children take over a wish-fulfilment house. As professional as you'd expect from Miss Dickens.
Humour is rare among the new children's books.. welcome, .therefore. The Further Adventures of the Robber Hotzenplotz Otfried Preussier (Abelard-Schuman 22s). A daft villain . .. some surrealist situations ... all highly enjoyable. The illustrations by F. J. Tripp catch the zany mood exactly.
Serious fantasy with The Fight for Arken- wald Thomas Johnston (Collins 21s): two schoolboys in a confrontation with evil. Shades of C. S. Lewis, without his poetic dynamic, but compelling nevertheless.
The Ballad of the Belstone Fox David Rook (Hodder and Stoughton 25s). If David Rook had lived I feel he would have chal- lenged Henry Williamson as an unsentimen- tal, nonhumaniser of animal personalities. A fine book.
An unusual location and some surprising characters in Bless the Beasts and Children Glendon Swarthout (Seeker and Warburg 30s). Starting-off point is a teenage summer camp in Arizona and the principal characters are delinquent drop-outs from rich families. Very American and very contemporary. The Daybreakers Jane Louise Curry (Long- man Young Books 22s) is yet another time- travelling exercise with an energtic portrayal of a lost civilisation. A not-very-demanding read.
The Wol/ling Sterling North (Heinemann 30s). 'A documentary novel of the eighteen- seventies.' It's set in Wisconsin and is full of animal lore. Even then, it seems, all right-minded folk were concerned with keep- ing natural rife unstained by pollution. Filled with a Conservation Year moral it isn't as priggish as it sounds; the atmosphere snares you.
A more solid book about natural history is The Living World of Animals (Reader's Digest Association in collaboration with the World Wildlife Fund; distributors Hodder and Stoughton. Special offer: 90s. Book- selling price: 126s). A Reader's Digest As- sociation run-down on the other species that share our planet. Painstakingly, beautifully photographed; superbly documented. It may seem pricy but for the animal enthusiast it contains scores of known and unknown wonders. The republican child can always ignore the foreword by Prince Charles.
Another specialist book—but for the more mechanical boy—is The World of Model Trains Guy R. Williams (Andre Deutsch/ Rainbird Reference Books 70s). Mouth- waterin- Nvouts. excellent illustrations, easy- to-read h"stories and instructions . . . the propagait.la to add to your already existing tracks :ould make you happily bankrupt.
__Finallyi—tcLituse_twks_whigh_oormally would not be reviewed in serious columns but which, because of the merchandising quality of the product, will automatically distend Christmas stockings: Look and Learn Young Scientist (12s 6d); Jag Annual 1971 (10s 6d); Buster Book 1971 (6s 6c1j; published by IPC Magazines.
The Young Scientist is a popular skim- ming of science fact to whet testtube appe- tites. Jag Annual is an aggressive mingling of stories, strip cartoons and jokes not quite so vicious as its cover—two muscular sol- diers machine-gunning the enemy—would suggest.
The Buster Book 1971 is an annual de- rived from the 'Buster' comic. This is for me; filled with strip cartoons it's a genial Christmas Day read-in. Its fun-poking is mainly at adult father-figures who prove to be more stupid than their offspring. Its psychology must be dead-on because three newsagents I tried told me they're already sold out. So, now we know what our kids really think of us Tom Hutchinson
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