This delightful novel begins when a family of five children moves from London to the English countryside. While playing in a gravel pit soon after the move, they discover an ancient and rather grumpy sand-fairy known as the Psammead, who agrees to grant one wish of theirs per day. The children’s wishes send them on adventure after adventure, but rarely turn out as expected. (Summary by Kara)
A short memoir about the author’s school days, serialised in The Girl’s Own Paper from October 1896 to September 1897. It includes stories about teachers, fellow pupils, the things that scared her most as a child (and even as an adult) and a vivid account of the best summer of her childhood.
Summary by Cori Samuel.
Edith Nesbit’s classic story, in which three children, pulled suddenly from their comfortable suburban life, move to the country with their mother, where they come to know and love the ways of the railways. (Summary by Karen Savage)
The Phoenix and the Carpet is a fantasy novel for children, written in 1904 by E. Nesbit. It is the second in a trilogy of novels that began with Five Children and It (1902), and follows the adventures of the same five protagonists – Cyril, Anthea, Robert, Jane and the Lamb. Their mother buys the children a new carpet to replace the one from the nursery that was destroyed in an unfortunate fire accident. Through a series of exciting events, the children find an egg in the carpet which cracks into a talking Phoenix. The Phoenix explains that the carpet is a magical one that will grant them three wishes per day. (Summary from Wikipedia)
A dragon who flies out of a magical book; one whose purr quiets a fussy baby; another who eats an entire pack of tame hunting-hippopotomuses: These eight dragon tales are filled with the imaginative wit of children’s author Edith Nesbit. (Summary by Laurie Anne Walden)
Three children, forced to remain at school during the holidays, go in search of adventure. What they find is a magic castle straight out of a fairy tale, complete with an enchanted princess at the center of a maze. Or is it? The castle turns out to be just a country estate, and the princess is only the housekeeper’s niece, playing at dressing up. But the magic ring she shows them proves — to her surprise and horror — to really be magic. Soon they are caught in an adventure where statues come alive, lost lovers are reunited, and wishes can be granted — but always for a price.
A collection of gentle stories that draw us into that hidden world where fear is just around the next corner, and where loving hands can touch across the boundaries of death. (Summary by Peter Yearsley)