Tom Tackles the Chalet School (by Elinor M Brent-Dyer)

(Amazon UK link)

Elinor M Brent-Dyer was a prolific writer, and I've enjoyed her books for over thirty years. Staying in a house with dozens of Chalet School books, I find myself reading lots of them - although in fairly random order - as a quick means of relaxation.

'Tom Tackles the Chalet School' features a girl, who insists on being called Tom. It clearly isn't her real name, and as we quickly learn, it's not an abbreviation of Thomasina either.

Tom is a very boyish and determined girl, who doesn't in the least want to go to a girls' school. Brought up amongst boys, she is convinced that girls are sneaky and dishonest. She believes that only boys understanding concepts like loyalty, integrity and sportsmanship.

This is slightly surreal in today's climate of equality. But it presumably was a realistic (if unlikely) possibility in the middle of the 20th century when this book was published. Anyway, Tom is determined to look down on everyone at the Chalet School when she arrives. But she finds - to her amazement - that the girls are as honest as boys, and she slowly begins to settle in.

It's all terribly sexist, of course, and completely ignores the possibility of gender dysphoria. But I found this book quite enjoyable on the whole, one of the better ones in the series.