Christmas books

for juniors

The reading public aged fiv

to 12 has never been bette catered for, even if book buyin must be an increasing strain o]

the family budget.

AMONGST the usual spate o Christmas books, Ivan Southall’

Ash Road and Paddy Hooper’

Muster Up are well worth consider ing for “special presents”—neither i cheap, Southall has a gift for writin] about youngsters in a way that mos antipodean youngsters can appreciate His situations are real situations a in this case where the villain of th< story is a bush fire, something tha affects some part of Australia, evei its cities, every summer.

Probably the story is based on th< disastrous Victorian bush fires o 1939 but the interesting thing abou the narrative is the way in which hi child characters face up to rea difficulties.

Muster Up is also founded on j real incident—the rescue of ai injured man by the RAAF fron Gippsland’s Mount Wellington som« years ago.

For the purpose of this story it i; young Geordie’s father who is hur while he and Geordie and statioi hands are out mustering in the wik mountain country of eastern Victoria It is Geordie’s job to look after hi: father while the rest of the party gc for help. The arrival of the RAAF medical officer by parachute and th« making of a rough airstrip to ge the injured man out are just part o; the action that keeps the story mov ing along smartly.

Something of a quite different typt is Chou San and the Very Wisa Hermit, by Doris Norman. This i: as much a work of imagination a: any fairy story and should be reac as such. These days one needs tc be no more than five to make mucli sense out of dear little Chinese boys who live in house-boats and lister to Very Wise Hermits who live ir caves and have some sort of pul with River Dragons who cause floods; The Chinese People’s Republic woulc probably regard such goings-on a* a crime against the state.

(Ash Road; 22/6. Muster Up; 19/6!

and CHOU SAN AND THE VERY WISI HERMIT; 15/-. All published by Anguu and Robertson, Sydney.)