Antonia Forest Again

It's been a few years since I last read Antonia Forest's Marlow books, and I'm not sure that I've ever had the opportunity to read them straight through, as a series, back to back. It's difficult to come to them fresh, being so familiar with the later volumes and all the fan canon, but I still think Forest does a masterful job of juggling multiple complex characters, giving us insight especially into Nicola's mind, and handling engaging (if occasionally implausible) plots. But character is her real strength, and it's a testament to her talent that she presents us with three strong stories in three quite different genres, with pretty much the same cast: Autumn Term is a school story, The Marlows and the Traitor is a spy thriller, and Falconer's Lure is a country holiday story, complete with ponies and a local performing arts festival to showcase everyone's various gifts. However, in each book there is a twist of difference -- instead of succeeding at school accomplishments (netball, Guides, academia) as they'd planned, the twins find an entirely new way to shine (the play). The Traitor turns out to be someone the children find appealing, sometimes kind, and even worthy of pity. And the emphasis in Falconer's Lure is really on the hawks rather than the ponies.

Some themes definitely begin to emerge as the characters are fleshed out. Quirky, self-absorbed Lawrie; poor selfless Ann, despised by all; Peter, perpetually battling his own perceived cowardice and realising that it's just going to be 'one paper hoop after another' for his whole life; brusque, sensible Rowan; and perhaps most poignantly of all, pretty Ginty, who coasts through life but tends to fail at any real test. It's a bit harsh when her father, at the start of FL, says 'she should have got over it by now,' when in the previous book, she's been kidnapped at gunpoint, locked up in a lighthouse, very nearly drowned, and faced the prospect, as a claustrophobic, of being forced into a Nazi submarine... and then forbidden to discuss any of it! The stiff upper lip required by this class, at this time, and particularly in this family, is a constant refrain in these books, and the examination of how that affects each of these young people differently is what really sets these books apart from conventional YA.