The twice yearly “Reading clubs” hosted by Simon and Karen are a lot of fun. I’m going to be reviewing 1954’s The Horse and His Boy by C.S. Lewis shortly, since it was also this month’s read for the Narniathon. But I found a couple of earlier reviews that I posted at The Emerald City Book Review, which might also be of interest:
Other books published in 1954 that I enjoyed and can recommend include Moominsummer Madness, Half Magic, Mio, My Son, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, The Children of Green Knowe (lots of good children’s books and fantasy!), The Toll-Gate, and Leaven of Malice. A book I have read and did not enjoy is Lord of the Flies. I have been meaning to reread it and see if I still hate it as much as I did when I was in high school, but not this week.
Are you participating in the club? What will you read this week? Have you read any of the above books, and what did you think?
Yay for these reading clubs! To answer your questions:
1. Yes, I’m joining in;
2. I’m also (re)reading The Horse and His Boy, and will be tidying up a review of The Two Towers; and
3. I’ve read and reviewed a few of the same titles you mention: Moominsummer Madness, Half Magic, The Fellowship of the Ring, The Children of Green Knowe, and of course Leaven of Malice!
I know what you mean about The Lord of the Flies, an unpleasant premise and tragic, but when I read it years ago when I was a pupil at a boys school it felt all too likely. I wonder what I’d think of it now…
I was thinking again about the Salterton trilogy when I was reading Atwood’s Hag-Seed. She mentions watching Christopher Plummer as Prospero at the Stratford Festival, and looking at past productions there I see that The Tempest has been performed there no less than eight times! And, interestingly, a stage adaptation of Tempest-Tost was performed there in 2001, fifty years after the original publication – I wonder if Atwood ever saw that?
Yes, that would be interesting to know!
It’s a great year isn’t it! I read The Lord of the Flies decades ago and can’t remember much about it apart from remembering that I thought the children were convincingly nasty (children *can* be unpleasant). But as I don’t have the book any more, it wasn’t an option!
Yes, it was quite an interesting year for books. Children can be very nasty indeed and we must not deny that fact, a point that was probably important to make in 1954. These days, I’d rather concentrate on more positive possibilities, but we shouldn’t blind ourselves to how bad things can get.
Thanks for spreading the word!
Of course, thanks so much for hosting!
My 1954 book is “Under Milk Wood”. I will post the review tomorrow. It’s lovely to see so many familiar “faces” among the readers.
And here is my review.
Great I’ll check it out.
Nice selection! I just posted a review – from Argentina: https://wordsandpeace.com/2022/04/20/my-top-8-books-for-the-1954-club/
Cool find there.
Ha – I’ve allowed myself to steer clear of re-reading Lord of the Flies forever! Good choices here. I did an Elizabeth Fair.
Saw that one, it sounds good, much more my sort of thing than Flies for sure.
I love this idea–I am currently reading a Mary Stewart book from 1955. So many interesting books from 1954–a great year for fantasy!
Yes, some very beloved and iconic books in that category.