Joan Aiken
Hardcover | Pages: 328 pages Rating: 4.18 | 610 Users | 122 Reviews
Identify Books Toward The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories
| Original Title: | The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories |
| ISBN: | 1931520577 (ISBN13: 9781931520577) |
| Edition Language: | English URL http://smallbeerpress.com/books/2008/10/28/the-serial-garden/ |
| Characters: | Harriet Armitage, Mark Armitage |
| Literary Awards: | Cybils Award Nominee for Middle Grade Fantasy & Science Fiction (2009) |
Narration During Books The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories
This is the first complete collection of Joan Aiken’s beloved Armitage stories—and it includes four new, unpublished stories. After Mrs. Armitage makes a wish, the Armitage family has “interesting and unusual” experiences every Monday (and the occasional Tuesday). The Board of Incantation tries to take over their house to use as a school for young wizards; the Furies come to stay; and a cutout from a cereal box leads into a beautiful and tragic palace garden. Charming and magical, the uncommon lives of the Armitage family will thrill and delight. Includes Joan Aiken’s “Prelude” from Armitage, Armitage, Fly Away Home, as well as introductions from Joan Aiken’s daughter, Lizza Aiken, and best-selling author Garth Nix. Illustrated by Andi Watson.List Containing Books The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories
| Title | : | The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories |
| Author | : | Joan Aiken |
| Book Format | : | Hardcover |
| Book Edition | : | First Edition |
| Pages | : | Pages: 328 pages |
| Published | : | October 1st 2008 by Big Mouth House (first published September 5th 2008) |
| Categories | : | Fantasy. Short Stories. Childrens. Middle Grade. Fiction. Young Adult |
Rating Containing Books The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories
Ratings: 4.18 From 610 Users | 122 ReviewsArticle Containing Books The Serial Garden: The Complete Armitage Family Stories
I was a bit skeptical when I heard about these because I'm not a big reader of short stories (sorry!) and so loved Aiken's children's novels that I didn't think these would hold up. Well, they do more than hold up. They are absolutely magical! Really. The Armitage family comes out of the tradition of families like those of Nesbit or Eager. There was for me even a tinge of the Peterkins in these stories (though, I assure you that these folks are not nearly as bumbling and there is no lady from1/23/09 intial read: If, like me, you've grown up reading Joan Aiken you will enjoy this book. I've always loved the stories featuring the Armitage Family scattered through Joan Aiken's many anthologies for their whimsy and sheer fun. So it was truly wonderful to find them collected together for the first time! I revisted many old favorites and found several new to me. What a treasure!Re-read in 2012.And re-read again 7/22/14.
Joan Aiken was probably my favorite author as a middle grader and I read it all from the light and humorous 'Arabel and Mortimer' to the psychological thriller 'Nightfall' and all 'the Wolves of Whilloughby Chase' in between, but I had never read any of the Armitage family stories and don't remember my library having them. It was a real treat to discover these and read them. What fun. Clearly would appeal to fans of E. Nesbit or Edward Eager and others who enjoy light family fantasy. Due to a
While other girls were reading Judy Blume and Beverly Cleary, I was reading Joan Aiken and Madeline L'Engle. The real life girls and their problems with periods and big sisters were all very well, and I enjoyed reading about them, but the girls and boys with pet unicorns and the ability to travel in time, well. They added something to my life I didn't have to worry about. Their's was a world I could escape into and forget all about the horrors of middle school. So it was nice to see that all of
Why abandoned? I've read other Joan Aiken books and liked them, but this one is a later one (1970s) and rather cynical about parent-child relationships. I don't mind that per se, but Logan isn't old enough to understand the humor, which often focuses on how glad the parents are to be away from their children. The parents are portrayed as fairly idiotic and self-involved. You can tell it's the 70s when at a party, a prize given to the mother is 100 cigarettes. Anyway. the whole feel of the book
Exceptional. My 'desert island' book. From my childhood I already knew and deeply loved several of the stories published here. But what inexpressible and absolute delight to find other Armitage stories that I was not previously acquainted with. Gaps in my knowledge of Armitage family 'history' have thus now been very satisfyingly filled in.Much as I love my own parents, I should have adored to have had Mr and Mrs Armitage as parents. What fun that would have been! The Armitages are a close-knit
The Armitage family is cursed with the gift of never being bored. This collection of short stories--very short, many only 10 pages--follows their whimsical adventures, like the plague of unicorns in the garden, or the time ornery witches transformed the parents into ladybugs. The success is in its continuity: later stories nod at previous events and to events unchronicled (noodle incidents that parallel the ridiculous truth of known events), creating a necessary sense of consequence to endings
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