Throwback Thursday: The Children of Green Knowe by L. M. Boston

 

Author: L. M. Boston (original illustrations by Peter Boston)
First published in 1954 by  Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc
Reissued with new illustrations by Brett Helquist in 2002 by HMH Books for Young Readers

The novel concerns the visit of a young boy, Toseland, to the magical house of Green Knowe. The house is tremendously old, dating from the Norman Conquest, and has been continually inhabited by Toseland's ancestors, the d'Aulneaux, later Oldknowe or Oldknow, family. Toseland crosses flood waters by night to reach the house and his great-grandmother, Linnet Oldknow, who addresses him as Tolly.


I was hoping this book would be a fun middle grade Throwback Thursday book.  I had high hopes for it as it had a lot of great reviews and the series has won awards.  What I found out instead was that just because it is an old book, doesn't mean it's a good book.  The Children of Green Knowe was boring.  I was really glad the audiobook was only 4 discs long or it would have been a DNF book for me. 

Nothing much really happens.  There were too many characters that shared the same names.  That lead me to have to re-listen to certain passages to figure out what was going on.  I can't imagine, had I read this in middle school, that I would have liked it any better.    I'm not sure if I will give the second of the six books a try.  If they are anything ike this one, I think I'll pass.