We are three brothers who have four older sisters. We are best friends with each other.
The First Mate is 12-going-on-13 and he loves to play with Legos and learn different languages, this year he is studying Greek. He likes adventure books by Gary Paulsen. He's helpful to his younger brothers except sometimes he tries to get someone else to do his chore.
The First AB is 11 years old. He LOVES gardening and farming and reading books about these subjects. He likes to read seed and chicken catalogs. He loves to plant and transplant all kinds of growing things. He is really funny and a little wild. He's the loudest, quickest-tempered, goofiest of us all.
The Second AB is 7 years old. He was promoted from Ship's Boy in the fall and he is very proud of the hard work he had to do to achieve a higher rank. He likes NASCAR racing and is one of Jimmie Johnson's staunchest fans (he even eats peanut butter on his pancakes!). He takes this very seriously and he is currently reading The Physics of Nascar by Diandra Leslie-Pelecky. Everybody likes to hang out with him and he is amiable and fun.
Well, it's been kind of difficult to start this blog since we had a hard time deciding on which book deserves to be first. Should it be Hop on Pop? Freckles? The Dangerous Book for Boys? Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief? Pagoo? Redwall? The Big Friendly Giant? The Mysterious Benedict Society - oh no, there are three of them?
Oh, goodness, which one...
Drum roll.....
Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons
(note: This review encompasses all the books in the series that we have read. We still have to read Missee Lee, The Picts and the Martyrs, Great Northern, and Coots in the North.)
The order of the stories:
- Swallows and Amazons (published 1930)
- Swallowdale (1931)
- Peter Duck (1932)
- Winter Holiday (1933)
- Coot Club (1934)
- Pigeon Post (1936)
- We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea (1937)
- Secret Water (1939)
- The Big Six (1940)
- Missee Lee (1941)
- The Picts And The Martyrs: or Not Welcome At All (1943)
- Great Northern? (1947)
- Coots in the North
The First Mate's take on the series: "This series takes place mostly in the Lake District of England. The first book is about the children of the Walker family: John, Susan, Titty and Roger. They have a baby sister. Their family vacations near a lake. The landlords let the children sail a small sailboat, Swallow, around the lake which also has a few islands. The children pack up their things and set sail for Wildcat Island, where they meet up with a couple of Amazon Pirates named Nancy and Peggy. Nancy's real name was Ruth but she changed it because Amazons are ruthless. The adventures of these children are really fun. Sometimes they get into really serious trouble but they manage to solve their problems. I love these books because I like to solve problems on my own and I like being part of my family's crew. If you noticed, our screen names show that we really aren't duffers. A duffer is just about the worst thing to be.
Coot Club is a book that doesn't include the Walker children. It is about their friends the D's - Dick and Dorothea who meet the Coot Club - a club of children who protect coots. Tom, the Coot Club leader, is checking on the birds and sees that there are some "hullaballoos," a group of loud, obnoxious people who blare music loudly on their boat. They are about to crush a coot's nest and Tom asks them to leave the birds alone. The Hullaballoos are not very nice and not very cooperative and so Tom unhooks their anchor and sets them adrift. When the Hullaballoos notice that they are floating away, they become angry and speed down river to find Tom. To find out if Tom evades capture you will have to read this book. But read them in order or you won't know who is who."
The First AB chimes in: "In the book, Secret Water, the Walker children decide to sacrifice their baby sister, Bridgette. They meet new friends called the Eels. These friends offer one group member as a sacrifice every year. They tie someone to a stake and then eat eels. This year, they decide to use Bridgette. Bridgette falls and pricks her finger on a thorn bush. Roger is very happy about that because he was hoping that they could become blood brothers and sisters with the Eels."
The Second AB speaks: "One time they did not mean to go to sea. But they accidentally went to sea and saved a kitten. They sailed from England to Holland and their father was there. He was very proud that his children had safely navigated the stormy waters of the English Channel. He would have been heart broken if his children had been duffers! We like to play Swallows and Amazons when we are traveling."
