The Cloud Forest

by Joan North, Carol Everest (Illustrator)

Andrew Badger’s life has not been happy. Taken from an orphanage and adopted by a woman teacher, twelve-year-old Andrew lives uneasily as the only boy in a girls’ boarding school in England. He himself attends a school for local boys and girls in a nearby town, but his free time is spent at Searly House, where his “Aunt Badger” teaches and where he is expected to make himself very scarce indeed.

Marion Badger shows no fondness for her adopted son, who grows more and more unhappy and withdrawn. He is especially reluctant to go to Annerlie Hall, on old manor house on the edge of the school grounds, where Sir Edward Annerlie lives with his invalid brother. Andrew senses a strangeness there—an evil presence, almost.

His life changes for the better when he meets Ronnie Peters, a student at Searly House, a girl who is quite content to be what Miss Spencer calls “an odd child.” Ronnie takes an immediate interest in Andrew and his problems. Together they become involved in a strange search for Andrew’s identity and for the meaning of experiences beyond their comprehension—a search in which they are guided by some who wish them well and hindered by others who wish them ill.

Genres: Childrens, Fiction, Fantasy

192 pages, Hardcover

Published January 1, 1965

Reviews

[Hilary · Rating 5 out of 5]

A reread-aloud, read over a couple of days and enjoyed even more the third time round. I would put this in the top 20 books we have read together.

Andrew is an orphan who has been adopted by Mrs Badger who is the matron in a girls school. Not only does Andrew have to live at the school and walk to a day school he is not allowed to mix with others, he feels lonely and isolated. Ronnie who boards at the school enjoys her solitary life and likes nothing more than to bury imaginary maps and avoid PE by laying under her bed, reading and eating secret supplies of food. When the two meet a mystery starts to unfold involving the eerie Annerlie Hall, a missing ring fabled to have belonged one of the three kings, a mysterious other worldly cloud forest, and a disreputable leader practising a type of mind control.

There are some wonderful characters in this story. We loved the character of Ronnie who is, funny, imaginative, self reliant and doesn't care what anyone thinks. The rector is lovely too and has kind philosophical advice for them. I like to imagine the rector as Richard Coles from the Communards.

This is a very special book. I'm surprised so few people have read it. When I looked online to see if I could get a copy of Joan North's first book ' The Emperor of the Moon ' not only could I not find one but I found a message from Joan North's daughter who is also searching for a copy, how sad, I really hopes she finds one. I think this would make an amazing film, it contains some impressive imagery and imaginative scenes.

The last page seems to be suggesting that the (disreputable) headmistress is based on a famous person, lots of clues are given to who this is, it made me want to research who this could be! If anyone has any ideas I would love to know!

Readers who enjoyed 'The Box of Delights' 'The Midnight Folk ' or the 'The Children of Green Knowe ' might appreciate this book, it has a subtle sort of magic.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a British fantasy about a lonely boy, Andrew, mysteriously adopted by the matron of a girls' boarding school (mysteriously, because she doesn't like children, and it's a great inconvenience to have him there), and his discovery of a magic ring, which gives him mystical visions and puts him in the path of danger from those who would like to control the ring's powers. Published in the 1960s, it reminded me of works by Joan Aiken, and to a lesser extent Elizabeth Goudge (in that religion and fantasy co-exist, and even complement each other). The character of Ronnie, the sardonic boarder at the school who befriends Andrew gives the book a slight flavor of snark, which is a pleasing contrast to a lot of the dreamy mysticism that predominates. I enjoyed it a lot, and find it surprising that Joan North is not better known.

[Capn · Rating 5 out of 5]

The Cloud Forest
Joan North
Andrew was a very downtrodden sort of boy. Miss Badger, who had adopted him, was Matron in a large Girls School and did not like boys. He sometimes wondered why she had adopted him. He led a depressed sort of life, and he particularly disliked being sent on errands to Annerlie Hall, though Sir Rachet Annerlie was very pleasant to him - the pleasanter, certainly, than Quadling the silent manservant. But this was before Andrew went into the Cloud Forest, and before he met Ronnie, a strong-minded pupil at Scarly House. Ronnie, who had no opinion whatever of Sir Rachet, or of her smart head-mistress, Miss Spencer-Cherell, either, could hearten the most downtrodden and depressed of boys, and together, with the help of Mr Arbuthnot, the Rector, who really took them seriously, they managed to turn the table on some peculiarly nasty Forces of Evil.
Jacket design and illustrations by Carol Everest
15s net

My copy is ex-library from the "Bendigo Regional Library Service Children's Section" (Victoria, AUS). Article 4 of the Notice to Borrowers states:

4 - Library Books must be immediately returned in the event of an outbreak of any infectious disease in the house in which the borrower is dwelling.

This book was published in 1965. So why exactly did people lose their minds over Covid again?! I mean, this overlapped easily with the lives of a large number of people alive today... and the Spanish Flu was just a century earlier. It boggles the mind that people today have no perspective on even recent human medical history.... ;)

So onto the book. I LOVED it. It was exactly the sort of juvenile fantasy you want to find in a scarce, out-of-print, forgotten vintage hardcover. It is among the very best I have read of the genre, and I read quite a lot of it.

The characters! Oh, the characters! Memorable, complex, realistic (sometimes too realistic - the abusive Aunt Badger is very hard to tolerate as an adult, once you know people like her and the damage they cause to children), I could see them so clearly in my mind's eye. The illustrations by Carol Everest certainly helped. I will confess to not being so fond of the faces, both on the cover and in the book, until I got into the story. Afterwards, I thought they fit it perfectly, and wouldn't have them any other way. That's Ronnie on the cover, presumably in her Sunday church-going hat:

The hats they wore to church were very peculiar and a decided affliction. Navy blue, heavily swathed in satin ribbon, they looked something like tea-cosies. Pinch and push as one would, nothing altered their basic shape.

with Andrew, naturally, in his worn and too-small overcoat, which also doubles as his housecoat and lays across his bed to help keep him warm in a barely-heated room with meagre bedding. The sword just makes me smile. I love Ronnie so much...!

Eleven year old Ronnie (Veronica), who daily steals up to her cubicle (against school rules) during sports, and rolls under the bed to eat cheddar cheese and to draw aimless treasure maps, absolutely steals the show, and the rector William Arbuthnot largely acts as her foil - the dialogue between them made me smile (it's largely because of their interactions that I was prevented from putting down this book and going to bed on time - it was a one-sitting binge situation!).

"I suppose it's idle to inquire whether your mother knows you're out?"
"It would be much better not to inquire," said Ronnie. "Then you won't feel implicated in any way. Do you mind if I finish up this piece of fruit cake you've left? Danger always makes me hungry."
"I'm afraid you'll have my figure when you grow up."
"People like their clergymen tubby," said Ronnie with her mouth full. "It's more cosy. Like Father Brown."

and

Ronnie thought she might as well go and see the rector. She pushed her way past his expostulating housekeeper and put her head round the dining-room door where Mr Arbuthnot sat at his heavy Victorian desk starting at the piece of paper in front of him.
"Go away," he said when he saw her. "I have to get my Sunday sermon written."
Ronnie helped herself from the plate of ginger biscuits which stood beside his cold cup of tea.
"Do you have to write your own? There must be lots of very good ones printed."
"There are, but I prefer to preach my own words and thoughts - inadequate as they are."
"I don't call that very humble of you. And the other week you preached about humility."
"I'm surprised you listened. I was always under the impression that you had better things to think about."
"Well, I tried not to, because humility's not a thing I'm exactly wild about - but what I really wanted to say is that this is one week when you should use a book sermon and concentrate on Andrew's affairs. .... Mother said, would you come and have coffee this morning? You might as well. Elsie makes good coffee and your tea looks revolting."

Andrew, our central character, is somewhat underdeveloped, due to a lifetime of deprivation (social and otherwise). Then we have the feckless History teacher Miss Winkleman, wearing 'from choice a dirty cooked-cabbage green cardigan with a mud-coloured scarf', who is decidedly unattractive and unhappy about it - she's a great example of the many multi-faceted supporting characters in this story. I personally loved Ronnie's very practical but 'fussing' mother, too, seemingly obsessed with wanting to wrap the entire population in cozy knits. No one was especially beautiful or shapely or graceful, either, except for the Headmistress, Miss Spencer-Cherell. All of the adults are all delightfully (and identifiably) flawed.

There's an epilogue of sorts, and it just made me laugh. Especially this bit, which I'll edit heavily to keep from spoilers, even with spoiler tags: ...a year later, backed by one of Sir Rachet's tame millionaires she opened up a school in the North of England which was very successful. She also became a very well-known figure on a Television Education Panel and distressed parents often write to her about their teenage daughters - and get back very calm, sensible, uplifting replies. She changed her name; I'd better not tell you what it is.. I loved the characters so much, I didn't want it to end. I wish there was a sequel, but then again, you know how sequels often are.

There's just all sorts of good stuff going on in this book - I don't want to spoil any of it. I know this book is hard to obtain (but is so worth tracking down, if you can), and it's going to go straight to the top of my "Top 10 Books in Need of Reprinting" in the Forgotten Vintage Children's Lit We Want Republished group (https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/... - please join us!). I honestly think this book would appeal to a very wide audience. I can't believe it isn't better known and hasn't been reissued outside of its decade.

[Annie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book so much when I read it as a child that I've never forgotten it. I remember it as creepy and kind of scary and just great--like A Wrinkle in Time but less wordy and abstract, & with more emotion. Looking back, I think it was extremely profound the way the characters used the power of their minds to affect reality, and I think it taught me a lot about the power of the mind.

[Krista the Krazy Kataloguer · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book best of all the books by this author that I've read, partly because it took place in a girl's boarding school, which was interesting. The eerie, waiting-for-something-to-happen atmosphere of the story kept me wanting to read, and I could picture this very easily being made into a children's film like John Masefield's The Box of Delights. My only complaint about the book is that the author never said what happened to the kitten at the end. I highly recommend this as a delightfully chilling read on a winter day.

[Linda Kathryn · Rating 5 out of 5]

The three Joan North books aren't a series, but are ones I discovered in high school, and they struck a chord. Out of print, and known only to few, alas.