Really Useful Engines

Railway Series #27

by Christopher Awdry

From Christopher Awdry, whose father created Thomas and his friends, come four more classic tales of very helpful steam engines and their adventures on the cozy little Island of Sodor.

Genres: Childrens, Fiction

64 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1996

Reviews

[Sophie Crane · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is the 27th in the Railway Series. Eleven years after Rev. W. Awdry put down his pen (or whatever he used to write his stories) C. Awdry picked it up again. The stories by C. Awdry are more exciting to me because they've never been published in the Thomas Complete Collection. In this book, Thomas 'arrests' a thief, Percy helps a mailman, Duck gets a fishy surprise and after Thomas boasts to Gordon, he (Thomas), Duck and Percy prove him wrong after being a triple header.

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

We came to the end of the wonderful Thomas the Tank Engine Collection stories and my little Thomas wanted more. I wasn't ready to plunge right back into the collection again and start from the beginning, so I found this little book.

It only has four stories, and it is "based-on" The Railway Series by Rev. W. Awdry, but unlike most of the "based-on" Thomas book, the author did an excellent job of keeping the feel of the original -- probably because he was Rev. Awdry's son.

The illustrations are wonderful, and again, have the feel of the original without attempting to copy them.

All in all, it has been a really useful little book.