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This story features a summer term at the Chalet School, following on from ‘A leader in the Chalet School’, which I reread in March. So there are the usual sports, and some details about the annual sale. But this is slightly unusual in that some of the main characters are not Chalet School girls - or not yet. They’re five girls who are in the area because of relatives in the nearby Sanatorium.
These girls are staying at a Pension - a kind of inn - and because their parents or guardians are taken up so much with their loved ones who are ill. And, at first, they’re pretty much running wild. Audrey, the eldest, is almost fifteen and is supposed to be in charge of the others. Her sister Celia is around the same age as their friend Val - I assume about eleven or twelve. Audrey and Celia’s youngest sister is called Win. Then there’s Solange, a French girl, who is around thirteen.
We first meet this group when Rosalie Dene, secretary of the Chalet School, finds them about to light a fire on the school cricket pitch. They didn’t realise what it was, and their motivation was to emulate a camp fire group which they had read about. But Rosalie, unsurprisingly, is horrified, and speaks to them quite sharply. And this starts a series of events where the five girls become increasingly hostile towards the Chalet School.
The theme reminded me a little of the ‘Mystic M’ storyline in ‘The new Chalet School’ (which I last read in 2021), but it’s not quite the same. These girls aren’t quite as vindictive, and while there are some stresses, they don’t end up with a terrible natural consequence of their behaviour.
Audrey is basically a likeable girl who’s somewhat easily influenced by others; I thought her character was very well developed. She’s aware that her father is much more unwell than her mother has told them. She’s also beginning to be aware that money is tight. And she tries to take her responsibilities as the eldest seriously. She doesn’t quite realise that Win not only adores her, but adopts all her ideas. So even when Audrey realises that the Chalet School folk are much nicer than she had thought, Win continues to hold a grudge.
I thought it was mostly a well-written book. My only real irritation was the way Win is called a baby so many times; not when she’s behaving immaturely, necessarily, but because she’s the youngest. It’s said early in the book that she’s around the same age as Felix and Felicity, the Maynard twins who have just started at the Chalet School kindergarten, so I assume she’s around five or six. But some of her speech is that of a much younger child, and there are times when she has to be carried.
Still, Elinor M Brent-Dyer did seem to consider children as babies until the age of at least eight or nine, sometimes more. In earlier books Robin is called ‘Baby’ and still put to bed when she’s much older than Win in this book, so I should really be used to it.
There are plenty of side stories or subplots in this book to allow for continuity; one of them involves Mary-Lou and her family, although Mary-Lou (previous school head girl) is now at the finishing branch, and the rest of her friends are barely mentioned. Josette is the head girl now; we learn a little of what her future will hold, although, again, it’s only really in passing.
There are a lot of other references to events or characters from earlier books, some of them with footnotes. So while all the books stand alone, this is one that’s best read after at least some of the earlier ones.
But overall I liked it very much. Originally intended for girls of around 11-14, the reading age is a bit younger, and these books are now mostly read by mothers and grandmothers who enjoyed them in their own childhood or teenage years. Not always in print, and sometimes hard to find; if you can buy a hardback or a 'Girls Gone By' reprint, they have the full text.
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