The Story of the Amulet

The Psammead Trilogy #3

by E. Nesbit, Cate Barratt (Narrator), Charlotte Duckett (Narrator)

The Story of the Amulet by Edith Nesbit

Presented by the Online Stage

Narrated by Cate Barratt

This is final installment in Edith Nesbit's classic trilogy of time-traveling adventures by four enterprising children. The other volumes are Five Children and It and The Phoenix and the Carpet, both of which have also been recorded by The Online Stage. Cast: Jane - Charlotte Duckett., Anthea - Libby Stephenson, Cyril - Amanda Friday, Robert - Becca Maggie, The Psammead - John Burlinson. Additional roles performed by Jeff Moon, Carol Box, K.G.Cross, Leanne Yau, Elizabeth Chambers, Jennifer Fournier, Michele Eaton, Miranda Hodges. Ron Altman, Alan Weyman, tovarisch, David Prickett, Brett Downey, Chris Marcellus, Denis Daly and Peter Tucker.
Public Domain (P)2017 The Online Stage

Genres: Fantasy, Classics, Childrens, Fiction, Middle Grade, Young Adult, Adventure

Audible Audio

First published January 1, 1906

About the author

Edith Nesbit (married name Edith Bland; 15 August 1858 – 4 May 1924) was an English author and poet; she published her books for children under the name of E. Nesbit.
She wrote or collaborated on over 60 books of fiction for children, several of which have been adapted for film and television. She was also a political activist and co-founded the Fabian Society, a socialist organisation later connected to the Labour Party.

Edith Nesbit was born in Kennington, Surrey, the daughter of agricultural chemist and schoolmaster John Collis Nesbit. The death of her father when she was four and the continuing ill health of her sister meant that Nesbit had a transitory childhood, her family moving across Europe in search of healthy climates only to return to England for financial reasons. Nesbit therefore spent her childhood attaining an education from whatever sources were available—local grammars, the occasional boarding school but mainly through reading.

At 17 her family finally settled in London and aged 19, Nesbit met Hubert Bland, a political activist and writer. They became lovers and when Nesbit found she was pregnant they became engaged, marrying in April 1880. After this scandalous (for Victorian society) beginning, the marriage would be an unconventional one. Initially, the couple lived separately—Nesbit with her family and Bland with his mother and her live-in companion Maggie Doran.

Initially, Edith Nesbit books were novels meant for adults, including The Prophet's Mantle (1885) and The Marden Mystery (1896) about the early days of the socialist movement. Written under the pen name of her third child 'Fabian Bland', these books were not successful. Nesbit generated an income for the family by lecturing around the country on socialism and through her journalism (she was editor of the Fabian Society's journal, Today).

In 1899 she had published The Adventures of the Treasure Seekers to great acclaim.

Reviews

[Manny · Rating 4 out of 5]

London, 23rd November 1905

Dear Virginia,

The Story of the Amulet is at last finished, and I delivered it to the publishers yesterday! I must admit that I am not entirely satisfied, and maybe I should not have spent quite so much time discussing it with my dear friends at the Fabian Society. At first I was flattered by the keen interest they took, but after a while I almost began to feel that I was writing their book, rather than mine.

Mr. Wells, I am sorry to say, was the most egregious offender. I unwisely revealed to him at an early stage that Time Travel would feature largely in the plot - this topic, as you doubtlessly know, is close to his heart - and he gave me altogether more advice than I knew what to do with. I hold him in the very highest regard, but I have my own ideas on the subject, in particular on the curious paradoxes that would arise if a Time Machine could ever be constructed and we were able to visit the past. I am sure I have not presented these thoughts in the best possible way, but I feel they contain promise, and I shall not be altogether surprised if other authors continue where I have left off. At any rate, I was sufficiently irritated with Mr. Wells that I was unable to refrain from teasing him the tiniest amount in the chapter where my young heroes visit the Future. I do hope he will take it in good part!

The other person whose influence you will immediately notice is Doctor Budge of the British Museum, who has taken so many hours from his important duties to explain the mysteries of Archaeology and answer all my foolish questions. By including him in the story, I hoped I might find some little way to thank him. At first, I thought that what he lacked most in his life was the natural affection that comes so readily to young girls. I did my best to let my dear little Anthea give him what I could not; but in the end, I decided that this was not what he truly wanted. I hope I have given him a more suitable reward for the many kindnesses he has shown me, and it is with great trepidation that I await his judgement.

Alas, even if Doctor Budge declares himself well pleased, I must say again that I am not. I know what I want to say, and again I know that I have not quite said it. But I feel that next time I will succeed. I have started making notes; there will be some new children (I can already see Gerald and Mabel), and a Castle, and a Ring, and a love story. I will tell you more in my next letter!

Affectionately yours,

Edith

[Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you could be granted your heart's desire - what would you wish for?



A magical amulet takes the children from Victorian London to ancient civilizations far distant in time. (My favorite - Atlantis.)

How the Psammead came to London - a story with a bite!
'All right,' said the Psammead, in offended tones. 'I'm sure I don't want to tell you a long tale. A man caught me, and I bit him. And he put me in a bag with a dead hare and a dead rabbit. And he took me to his house and put me out of the bag into a basket with holes that I could see through. And I bit him again. And then he brought me to this city, which I am told is called the Modern Babylon—though it's not a bit like the old Babylon—and he sold me to the man you bought me from, and then I bit them both. Now, what's your news?'
'There's not quite so much biting in our story,' said Cyril regretfully; 'in fact, there isn't any.

The magic begins...
"Please we want to know where the other half of the charm is.'

'The part of the Amulet which is lost,' said the beautiful voice, 'was broken and ground into the dust of the shrine that held it. It and the pin that joined the two halves are themselves dust, and the dust is scattered over many lands and sunk in many seas.'

'Oh, I say!' murmured Robert, and a blank silence fell.

'Then it's all up?' said Cyril at last; 'it's no use our looking for a thing that's smashed into dust, and the dust scattered all over the place.'

'If you would find it,' said the voice, 'You must seek it where it still is, perfect as ever.'




The first adventure in time and space...
Here was a horrible position! Four English children, whose proper date was A.D. 1905, and whose proper address was London, set down in Egypt in the year 6000 B.C. with no means whatever of getting back into their own time and place.

The learned gentleman...
'I'll go to Babylon if you like,' said Jane abruptly, and the others hastened to say 'Done!' before she should have time to change her mind.

'Ah,' said the learned gentleman, smiling rather sadly, 'one can go so far in dreams, when one is young.' He sighed again, and then adding with a labored briskness, 'I hope you'll have a—a—jolly game,' he went into his room and shut the door.



Escaping from a Babylonian dungeon...
'UR HEKAU SETCHEH,' she cried in a fervent voice. 'Oh, Nisroch, servant of the Great Ones, come and help us!'

There was a waiting silence. Then a cold, blue light awoke in the corner where the straw was—and in the light they saw coming towards them a strange and terrible figure. I won't try to describe it, because the drawing shows it, exactly as it was, and exactly as the old Babylonians carved it on their stones, so that you can see it in our own British Museum at this day. I will just say that it had eagle's wings and an eagle's head and the body of a man.

It came towards them, strong and unspeakably horrible.



The Fall of Atlantis...
They could not bear to look down, for the wave had broken on the face of the town, sweeping over the quays and docks, overwhelming the great storehouses and factories, tearing gigantic stones from forts and bridges, and using them as battering rams against the temples. Great ships were swept over the roofs of the houses and dashed down halfway up the hill among ruined gardens and broken buildings. The water ground brown fishing–boats to powder on the golden roofs of Palaces.

Then the wave swept back towards the sea.

The hills around were black with people fleeing from the villages to the mountains. And even as they fled thin smoke broke from the great white peak, and then a faint flash of flame. Then the volcano began to throw up its mysterious fiery inside parts. The earth trembled; ashes and sulphur showered down; a rain of fine pumice–stone fell like snow on all the dry land. The elephants from the forest rushed up towards the peaks; great lizards thirty yards long broke from the mountain pools and rushed down towards the sea. The snows melted and rushed down, first in avalanches, then in roaring torrents. Great rocks cast up by the volcano fell splashing in the sea miles away.

Oh, this is horrible!' cried Anthea. 'Come home, come home!'

'The end of the dream,' gasped the learned gentleman.



Drama with Victorian/Edwardian accents...
There was an awful silence. Then Pharaoh spoke.'

Take the sacred house of the beast from them,' he said, 'and imprison all. Tonight after supper it may be our pleasure to see more magic. Guard them well, and do not torture them—yet!'

'Oh, dear!' sobbed Jane, as they were led away. 'I knew exactly what it would be! Oh, I wish you hadn't!'

'Shut up, silly,' said Cyril. 'You know you WOULD come to Egypt. It was your own idea entirely. Shut up. It'll be all right.'

'I thought we should play ball with queens,' sobbed Jane, 'and have no end of larks! And now everything's going to be perfectly horrid!'



How coinage was introduced to ancient Egypt...
'And here's twopence for yourself.'

The soldier looked at the twopence.'What's this?' he said.

Robert explained how much simpler it was to pay money for things than to exchange them as the people were doing in the market. Later on the soldier gave the coins to his captain, who, later still, showed them to Pharaoh, who of course kept them and was much struck with the idea. That was really how coins first came to be used in Egypt. You will not believe this, I daresay, but really, if you believe the rest of the story, I don't see why you shouldn't believe this as well.

Traveling into the far past...
'Where are we?' whispered Anthea.

'And when?' whispered Robert.

'This is some shrine near the beginnings of belief,' said the Egyptian shivering. 'Take the Amulet and come away. It is cold here in the morning of the world.'



Follow the four Victorian children as they explore the ancient past while seeking their "heart's delight".

Enjoy!

[Roger Brunyate · Rating 4 out of 5]

Childhood Archaeology

The Story of the Amulet is the third of Edith Nesbit's Psammead Trilogy, about four children in Edwardian England who find a sand-fairy (a cantankerous creature like a dilapidated monkey with bat ears and snail eyes) with the power to grant wishes. After the calamities that follow some ill-considered wishes in the first volume, Five Children and It, they agree that it will only grant the wishes of others, but will still advise the children on their other adventures. So at the start of this book, it tells them to buy an ancient amulet, or sacred pendant, spied in a London junkshop. Unfortunately, the charm is incomplete, but the remaining half does have the power to transport the children to any place where it had been in the past, so they may reunite the two halves.

+ + + + + +

I have a dilapidated (and thus worthless) first edition of this, bought for my father in 1906, the year of its publication. He read it to me as a child. Looking at it now makes me realize how much my imagination was shaped by our travels through its glowing arch to ancient Egypt, Babylon, Atlantis, and Tyre. And it gave me a taste for similar stories. My father, as I now see, adopted its structure to make up bedtime tales of his own, much as C. S. Lewis was famously to do later with his Narnia adventures. Unlike Lewis, though, Edith Nesbit has no religious overtones. But as a leading Fabian, she had strong socialist convictions which also appear in the book; I can only guess as to its influence on my own beliefs today.



For some reason, I never read the book to my own children. Perhaps I was afraid that it might seem too dated, and would appeal too little to their interests; children no longer learned Latin and Greek in school and seemed to be less interested in ancient cultures. But nowadays the datedness would be much of the attraction. Nesbit's books are now a double feat of archaeology, opening portals not only on the distant past, but also on the lives of children in Edwardian London and the social conditions that they would have taken for granted. As such, it is certainly worth revisiting by adults. I am even wondering whether I might try it on my grandchildren. If I do, I would absolutely want an edition like the present one, which retains the original illustrations by H. R. Millar. It is not that he brings the distant civilizations any more to life than in Nesbit's words, which weave a spell all on their own. But he perfectly captures qualities that were so obvious to the author that she did not even need to describe them: the four children, Cyril, Anthea, Robert, and Jane, looking absurdly overdressed in their Norfolk jackets or pinafores, their social attitudes as "emissaries from the empire where the sun never sets" coming through clearly from every sketch.



Not that Nesbit herself is a strong proponent of Empire; she is no Kipling, Rider Haggard, or Henty. Indeed, as so often in the book, she treats these matters with what seems to me a delicious touch of irony. Here is Cyril talking about missionaries:

Well, they always take the savages beads and brandy, and stays, and hats, and braces, and really useful things—things the savages haven't got and never heard about. And the savages love them for their kind generosity, and give them pearls and shells and ivory and cassowaries. [...] The great thing is to get people to love you by being generous.

But in Cyril's mouth, that last word is not ironic at all. We may scoff at the "generosity" of bringing corsets and suspenders to native peoples, but the way the four children treat one another and the world around them is politeness and generosity itself. There is one lovely little episode where they take pity on a disheveled orphan girl they meet in the park, and unite her with a bereaved mother in ancient Britain. And their encounters with the "poor learned gentleman" who occupies the top floor of their temporary lodgings near the British Museum are a perfect mixture of courtesy and friendship, adopting him as a kind of honorary playmate. This character, incidentally, is a tribute to the dedicatee of the book, Dr. Wallis Budge, an Egyptologist at the Museum and Nesbit's primary consultant.

What Nesbit made of Budge's knowledge reads as something creative and fresh, even today. She has a lovely way of talking to her child readers, especially when airily glossing over the more unlikely parts of her story, and she can achieve real magic when she needs to. The scene when the amulet first comes alive and fills the room with its glowing light thrilled me all over again, even now. But she also has the sense to realize that eight or nine forays into the past would soon become repetitive, no matter how different the historical scenery. So she cleverly varies the pace. The children take the Learned Gentleman with them on their trip to Atlantis (he believes he is dreaming). They drop off the little orphan girl on their way to visit Julius Caesar. When they make friends with the Queen of Babylon, she expresses a wish to see their country, and soon she is walking around London, making wishes which the Psammead has to grant, despite the consequences. There is even a sequence when they journey into the future, a sort of William Morris Utopia of garden cities and perfectly behaved children, oddly prophetic of the theories of modern urban planning, if not the less salubrious results. Unfortunately, Nesbit uses these modern sections to expound her social views, and they do get a bit preachy. And when the children make a second visit to Egypt, they find themselves in the middle of a workers' riot that might almost be Petrograd in 1917. But that visit also introduces them to another time-traveler, Rekh-Mara, the priest of Amen-Ra, who returns to link several of the later episodes. The climax, in which the two halves of the amulet are rejoined and the Learned Gentleman becomes one with the Egyptian priest, is moving in its simplicity, bringing tears to my eyes.

[Judy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was one of my favorite books when I was growing up. I decided to re-read it as part of my research for the memoir I am writing. I have a tattered copy of the 1965 Puffin paperback edition, which came free with any purchase at a used bookstore. The pages are yellowed but they are all there as well as the perfect illustrations by H R Miller.

The Story of the Amulet is a sequel to The Five Children and It, which I also read long ago. But the Amulet always stands out in my memory because I "discovered" it on the shelves of our local library in Princeton, NJ, where our mom took us every two weeks. Upon reading it, I had my mind blown for perhaps the first time in my life. I wanted to see if I could figure out why and I did.

There are four English children in this story who find themselves spending their summer holidays in a dreary old house on Fitzroy Street, London (near the British Museum) in the care of their old Nurse. Father has gone to Manchuria to report on the war and Mother plus The Lamb (the new baby in the family) is in Madeira recovering from an illness. When I first read this book, probably at the age of nine, I had no idea about any of these places. But the writing is like a spell that just pulled me in to these children's lives, their relationships with each other and of course, their adventures. I am sure I had already read The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe at least once, so I was in a sense primed but Nesbit is a magician whereas C S Lewis only wished he was.

Because what entranced me back then and again now, was the magic. It is magic the way children do magic, fully ensconced in their imaginations. In fact, most grownups are at least annoyed by such a degree of imagination and some are truly alarmed. I recall being told as a child that something I said was "all in my imagination" and thinking, "Where else would it be?" Children know full well what is imagination and what is reality plus are able to move freely between the two. Such is the case with Anthea, Cyril, Robert and Jane, though Jane being the youngest, is the most easily frightened and sometimes protests when the magic gets to be too much. Yes! That is just the way it was in my life.

So there is an amulet, but the children only have half of it. The Psammead, a sand fairy who helplessly grants wishes and was the "It" of Five Children and It, reappears and though the children had promised the Psammead at the end of the previous summer not to ask for another wish as long as they lived, he does inform them that should they find the other half of the amulet, they can realize their hearts' desire.

After learning to use the amulet's magic they are off: to ancient Egypt, Babylon, Atlantis, etc. All these places are dangerous in the extreme but full of wondrous delights as well. Again, as a child, I knew virtually nothing about these places, yet they were so real to me back then as I read. I grew up to love books about Atlantis and Egypt and with a hunger to know the history of such ancient times. That is truly magic on many levels.

Since I began working at Once Upon A Time Bookstore, which serves a whole community of children, young mothers, teachers and grandparents, I have rediscovered children's literature and much of it is still great reading, but Nesbit is the inventor of the children's adventure story. She influenced C S Lewis, P L Travers (Mary Poppins), Diana Wynne Jones and J K Rowling, but being the originator, she is still the best.

[Emily · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read some E. Nesbit as a child, and felt that she was an author I should like, but somehow never really warmed to her. The writing style was a bit too stilted, even for my tastes, which were decidedly more old fashioned than those of my peers. I appreciate her now much more, now that I've learned of her place in the larger context of children's literature, and realize how radical and inventive she was for her time. Also, the subtle deadpan humor in the interactions between the children is something I've come to appreciate in my recent rereadings. Anyway, as far as this particular book is concerned, I know we had a copy of this Puffin edition in our household when I was a child (I remember that blue striped dress vividly), and I'm fairly sure that I at least made an attempt at reading it. The episode when the ancient queen arrives in modern London seemed so familiar. I have some doubts though -- maybe I know that scene because the queen's comment about the slaves being treated badly gets quoted so often, or maybe I'm remembering a very similar scene in The Magician's Nephew? I do know that whether I attempted The Amulet or not, I didn't finish it, so the ending of this book was quite new to me, and surprised me with a couple poignant moments that had me sniffing a little. I chose to read it now largely in preparation for a modern day addition to this series which I hope to read soon, Five Children on the Western Front by present day author Kate Saunders, which takes the children to adulthood and WWI. Of course, such a book has the potential to be disastrously bad, but I'm still quite curious to see what Saunders has done with Squirrel, Panther, the Lamb and the others.

[Chris Fellows · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this third volume of the series (following Five Children and It and The Phoenix and the Carpet), Nesbit finally succumbs to the temptation to get socialist and preachy. There is a revolt of the workers in Ancient Egypt where the rabble-rouser addressed the rabble with 'Comrades!', a visit to a socialist utopian London of the future where Boris Johnson is mayor Wells, as in 'H. G.' is considered a good boy's name, and some pithy observations from the Queen of Babylon when she magically trips through space and time to visit London:

"And now from the window of a four-wheeled cab the Queen of Babylon beheld the wonders of London. Buckingham Palace she thought uninteresting; Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament little better. But she liked the Tower, and the River, and the ships filled her with wonder and delight.
'But how badly you keep your slaves. How wretched and poor and neglected they seem,' she said, as the cab rattled along the Mile End Road.
'They aren't slaves; they're working-people,' said Jane.
'Of course they're working. That's what slaves are. Don't you tell me. Do you suppose I don't know a slave's face when I see it? Why don't their masters see that they're better fed and better clothed? Tell me in three words.'
No one answered. The wage-system of modern England is a little difficult to explain in three words even if you understand it—which the children didn't."

But I don't mind it when people wear their hearts on their sleeves. And my storm-the-Winter-Palace side (that's the pretty one) is in agreement with the QoB here anyhow.

C. S. Lewis obviously mined his childhood memories of this book extensively, with the King of Babylon (may He live forever) being a dead ringer for a Calormene and the Queen of Babylon's visit to modern London being, er, luckily unnoticed by any copyright lawyers by Jadis' time.

[Rosh ~catching up slowly~ · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Psammead returns in the life of the children and helps them locate a magical time-traveling Amulet. With this new gift, they travel back in the past to historical places like Babylon, Atlantis, Egypt, etc. and even travel to the future.

Nesbit's research into past cultures is clearly visible in the book. But I didn't enjoy this book as much as the former two. Though this story involves time travel, it is the most dated of the three books and the English "We are superior" mentality of the time reveals itself too strongly. I know it was written in 1906 so I shouldn't really judge it by today's standards but somehow, for this book, I couldn't get past this. There were just too many stereotypes in this book and after a point, it just becomes irritating. Rating: 2/5




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[Tiuri · Rating 3 out of 5]

Now I’ve finally finished the 3rd book in the Five Children and It series. By this time, I’m almost ashamed to say, I was wearying somewhat of the episodic stories. I still enjoyed it, and it was interesting to notice parts that seem to have inspired C. S. Lewis in his Narnia books (saying ‘May he live forever’ about a ruler in Babylon and the Queen of Babylon ending up in London—reminiscent of when Jadis ended up in England in The Magician’s Nephew.)
As always, I’ve collected little tidbits for your enjoyment. I hope they will be amusing.

“The book about all this is called Five Children and It, and it ends up in a most tiresome way by saying—
“The children did see the Psammead again, but it was not in the sandpit; it was—but I must say no more—”
The reason that nothing more could be said was that I had not then been able to find out exactly when and where the children met the Psammead again. Of course I knew they would meet it, because it was a beast of its word, and when it said a thing would happen, that thing happened without fail. How different from the people who tell us about what weather it is going to be on Thursday next, in London, the South Coast, and Channel!”

And:

“I hope you notice that they were not cowardly enough to cry till their Father had gone; they knew he had quite enough to upset him without that. But when he was gone everyone felt as if it had been trying not to cry all its life, and that it must cry now, if it died for it. So they cried.

And:

“After tea Anthea went up to the room that had been Father’s, and when she saw how dreadfully he wasn’t there, and remembered how every minute was taking him further and further from her, and nearer and nearer to the guns of the Russians, she cried a little more. Then she thought of Mother, ill and alone, and perhaps at that very moment wanting a little girl to put eau-de-cologne on her head, and make her sudden cups of tea, and she cried more than ever. And then she remembered what Mother had said, the night before she went away, about Anthea being the eldest girl, and about trying to make the others happy, and things like that. So she stopped crying, and thought instead. And when she had thought as long as she could bear she washed her face and combed her hair, and went down to the others, trying her best to look as though crying were an exercise she had never even heard of.”

And:

“her rooms were furnished “for letting.” Now it is a very odd thing that no one ever seems to furnish a room “for letting” in a bit the same way as one would furnish it for living in. This room had heavy dark red stuff curtains—the colour that blood would not make a stain on—with coarse lace curtains inside. The carpet was yellow, and violet, with bits of grey and brown oilcloth in odd places. The fireplace had shavings and tinsel in it. There was a very varnished mahogany chiffonier, or sideboard, with a lock that wouldn’t act. There were hard chairs—far too many of them—with crochet antimacassars slipping off their seats, all of which sloped
the wrong way. The table wore a cloth of a cruel green colour with a yellow chain-stitch pattern round it. Over the fireplace was a looking-glass that made you look much uglier than you really were, however plain you might be to begin with. Then there was a mantelboard with maroon plush and wool fringe that did not match the plush; a dreary clock like a black marble tomb—it was silent as the grave too, for it had long since forgotten how to tick. And there were painted glass vases that never had any flowers in, and a painted tambourine that no one ever played, and painted brackets with nothing on them.”

And:

“Presently, by some wonderful chance turn of Robert’s (who had been voted Captain because the girls thought it would be good for him—and indeed he thought so himself—and of course Cyril couldn’t vote against him because it would have looked like a mean jealousy)”

And:

“Wake the boys and this dormouse of a Jane, and when you’ve had your breakfasts we’ll have a talk.”

And:

“Never mind,” said Anthea kindly; “we’ll take you anywhere you like if you want us to. What was it you were going to say upstairs when I said the others wouldn’t like it if I stayed talking to you without them?”
It looked keenly at her, and she blushed.
“Don’t be silly,” it said sharply. “Of course, it’s quite natural that you should like your brothers and sisters to know exactly how good and unselfish you were.”

And:

“No,” said the Psammead, “I seem to remember that about you. Well, sit down and listen with all your ears. Eight, are there? Right—I am glad you know arithmetic. Now pay attention, because I don’t intend to tell you everything twice over.”

And:

“a sudden cold pain caught at Anthea’s heart. Father—Mother—the darling Lamb—all far away. (If you don’t know what a cold pain is, I am glad for your sakes, and I hope you never may.)”

And:

“The learned gentleman had let his dinner get quite cold. It was mutton chop, and as it lay on the plate it looked like a brown island in the middle of a frozen pond, because the grease of the gravy had become cold, and consequently white. It looked very nasty, and it was the first thing the children saw when, after knocking three times and receiving no reply, one of them ventured to turn the handle and softly to open the door. The chop was on the end of a long table that ran down one side of the room. ”

And:

“The gentleman started when Anthea put her hand on his arm.
“I hope you won’t be cross and say it’s not my business,” she said, “but do look at your chop! Don’t you think you ought to eat it? Father forgets his dinner sometimes when he’s writing, and Mother always says I ought to remind him if she’s not at home to do it herself, because it’s so bad to miss your regular meals. So I thought perhaps you wouldn’t mind my reminding you, because you don’t seem to have anyone else to do it.”
The learned gentleman looked at her for a moment before he said—
“Thank you, my dear. It was a kindly thought. No, I haven’t anyone to remind me about things like that.”
He sighed, and looked at the chop.
“It looks very nasty,” said Anthea.
“Yes,” he said, “it does. I’ll eat it immediately, before I forget.”
As he ate it he sighed more than once. Perhaps because the chop was nasty, perhaps because he longed for the charm which the children did not want to sell, perhaps because it was so long since anyone cared whether he ate his chops or forgot them.”

And:

“It is no use to pretend that the children did not feel a good deal of agitation at the thought of going through the charm into the Past. That idea, that perhaps they might stay in the Past and never get back again, was anything but pleasing. Yet no one would have dared to suggest that the charm should not be used; and though each was in its heart very frightened indeed, they would all have joined in jeering at the cowardice of any one of them who should have uttered the timid but natural suggestion, “Don’t let’s!”

And:

“Now, once for all, I am not going to be bothered to tell you how it was that the girl could understand Anthea and Anthea could understand the girl. You, at any rate, would not understand me, if I tried to explain it, any more than you can understand about time and space being only forms of thought. You may think what you like. Perhaps the children had found out the universal language which everyone can understand, and which wise men so far have not found. You will have noticed long ago that they were singularly lucky children, and they may have had this piece of luck as well as others. Or it may have been that … but why pursue the question further? The fact remains that in all their adventures the muddleheaded inventions which we call foreign languages never bothered them in the least. They could always understand and be understood. If you can explain this, please do. I daresay I could understand your explanation, though you could never understand mine.”

And:

“Seeing Jane so frightened, made the others feel quite brave. They said they were certain they ought to go.
“It’s so ungrateful to the Psammead not to,” Anthea added, a little primly.
Jane stood up. She was desperate.
“I won’t!” she cried; “I won’t, I won’t, I won’t! If you make me I’ll scream and I’ll scream, and I’ll tell old Nurse, and I’ll get her to burn the charm in the kitchen fire. So now, then!”
You can imagine how furious everyone was with Jane for feeling what each of them had felt all the morning. In each breast the same thought arose, “No one can say it’s our fault.” And they at once began to show Jane how angry they all felt that all the fault was hers. This made them feel quite brave.”

And:

“I’m certain there’s nothing to be frightened of here,” said Anthea.
“I don’t know,” said Jane. “I suppose the fruit-trees go on just the same even when people are killing each other. I didn’t half like what the learned gentleman said about the hanging gardens. I suppose they have gardens on purpose to hang people in. I do hope this isn’t one.”

And:

“Cyril, who was fond of gardening—which meant that he liked to “watch the gardener at work—was able to command the respect of the others by telling them the names of a good many trees. There were nut-trees and almond-trees, and apricots, and fig-trees with their big five-fingered leaves. And every now and then the children had to cross another brook.
“It’s like between the squares in Through the Looking-Glass,” said Anthea.
At last they came to an orchard which was quite different from the other orchards. It had a low building in one corner.
“These are vines,” said Cyril superiorly, “and I know this is a vineyard.”

And:

“Shouts of applause greeted the ending of the verse, and the King would not be satisfied till they had sung all their part-songs (they only knew three) twice over, and ended up with “Men of Harlech” in unison. ”

And:

“Robert’s heart sank right into those really reliable boots of his. Anthea and Cyril each had a private struggle with that inside disagreeableness which is part of all of us, and which is sometimes called the Old Adam—and both were victors. Neither of them said to Robert (and both tried hard not even to think it), “This is your doing.” Anthea had the additional temptation to add, “I told you so.” And she resisted it successfully.

And:

“But,” it added, “what possessed you to tell that Queen that I could give wishes? I sometimes think you were born without even the most rudimentary imitation of brains.”
The children did not know the meaning of rudimentary, but it sounded a rude, insulting word.”

And:

“Let’s put on our best things, then,” urged Jane. “You know what people say about progress and the world growing better and brighter. I expect people will be awfully smart in the future.”

And:

“There is no company so little pleasing as that of people who do not believe you.”

And:

“Now you’re grown up you’re not like you used to be.”
“Grown up?” said Anthea.
The learned gentleman pointed to a frame with four photographs in it.
“There you are,” he said.
The children saw four grown-up people’s portraits—two ladies, two gentlemen—and looked on them with loathing.
“Shall we grow up like that?” whispered Jane. “How perfectly horrid!”
“If we’re ever like that, we shan’t know it’s horrid, I expect,” Anthea with some insight whispered back. “You see, you get used to yourself while you’re changing. It’s—it’s being so sudden makes it seem so frightful now.”

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

One summer holiday in the country four London siblings Cyril, Anthea, Robert and Jane discovered a strange creature, a Psammead or sand-fairy who granted wishes – a mixed blessing as they soon found out. The Christmas that followed found them lumbered with a Persian carpet and a Phoenix which got them into further scrapes.

Now it’s the next summer and they are staying in a London house owned by their old Nurse; left to their own devices, the heart’s desire of all four is to have their parents return home from abroad, one from reporting from the Russo-Japanese war in Manchuria, the other recuperating in Madeira. When the bored children start visiting shops selling caged animals they come across an old friend in dire straits who needs rescuing.

It is the Psammead, of course. And he has a plan to help each and every child achieve their heart’s desire.

When I first read this it felt very episodic – not surprising given that many of Nesbit’s books were first published in magazines in serial form – and thus slightly disjointed, rather like an incomplete tale told by Scheherade. A second read however revealed The Story of the Amulet to be a more cohesive narrative than expected, a quest for the other half of an ornamental object imbued with ancient magic and activated by speaking the name inscribed on it. This talisman, a thet or tyet amulet also called the knot of Isis, is now believed to represent a sacred cloth folded in a distinctive way and somehow a symbolic representation of life. Its symmetrical appearance also seems to imply a mystical union, an aspect that in fact comes to be in the course of the telling.

But the core of the narrative describes the close relationship between the siblings and their befriending of a learned gentleman lodging with their Nurse. He believes that the tales the children tell and his experiences when he joins them in their travels are all part of vivid waking dreams he’s experiencing. So when he sees the Queen of Babylon in London or Britain on the eve of the Caesar’s invasion, and meets an Egyptian priest from millennia before or is present at the fall of Atlantis, he is convinced that it is all simply unreal and due to some kind of hallucination.

The children know otherwise, having experienced similar madcap adventures in Five Children and It and, later, The Phoenix and the Carpet. Nesbit, having done her research, is able to bring the adventures to life with unforced descriptions of what was then supposed to be authentic recreations of past cultures, from prehistoric Britain to Babylon, Atlantis to Gaul, Egypt to a future Britain, and ancient Phoenicia to Syria (when they visit the Phoenix of the second book).

But however much she re-envisions historic places it’s how she recreates the life of close siblings at the turn of the 20th century that most delights, and how they try to appease the grumpy but grateful Psammead. Cyril the putative leader who parades his own learning, Robert the impulsive brother, and Jane the youngest who’s also the most timid and squeamish – they all come over as believable. But it is Anthea, the elder sister, who’s most impressive, sensitive to the Psammead’s moods, pouring oil on troubled waters, coming up with sensible solutions; can we credit her with being Nesbit’s alter ego in this novel?

It’s the undercurrent of humour that most impresses me this time round – the asides (either from characters or in commentary by the author), the misunderstandings and mishaps, the wordplay that somehow effects change, and so on. How does time travel work, and how do the children understand and speak with denizens of the past? It’s all explained, and if it’s not clear then either the Psammead or Nesbit will say it’s too difficult to clarify, and we have to just accept it. Along with the humour I also acknowledge Nesbit’s use of language which, more than a century on, is virtually as comprehensible to us as serious adult fiction of the time is often not so. Any unfamiliar word is easily understood from its context.

Dedicated to the scholar Wallis Budge, who helped her with the historical minutiae, The Story of the Amulet wears its learning relatively lightly on its sleeve. I loved it and would recommend it; but don’t take my word for it – the fact that C S Lewis’s The Magician’s Nephew, Edgar Eager’s Half Magic and Diana Wynne Jones’s The Homeward Bounders all owe something to this novel should alert the reader to the fact that its magic is only partly to do with the amulet and the sand-fairy.

[Drew · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not good.

The kids and I really enjoyed Nesbit's first two books with these characters. They were essentially a series of "corrupted wish" stories, moral tales, but with a bit of cheeky subversiveness and plenty of satirical commentary for us grown-ups.

This third book revisits the Psammead who the children find for sale in a pet store; but he no longer grants them wishes (he does, however, feel the obligation to grant wishes to anyone within earshot who might give voice to a wish, and this does lend some amusement). Instead, the central object of the story -- a half-amulet discovered by the children -- becomes a sort of time-travel device, sending the children across the world (and history) as they search for the other half.

While this should make for as many amusing adventures as the first two books, instead the book feels more weighed down by its premise than buoyed up. It also seemed that Nesbit never could quite nail down the mechanics of the amulet. For example once the other half is found, it turns out to be the same half, which somehow creates a whole, but then there's a third half (yeah, you read that right) somewhere along the way, too.

There is still some fun to be had, for example, when the children bring a Babylonian queen back to London and much chaos ensues. In fact, I would not be surprised to learn that this portion inspired a smiliar sequence in C.S. Lewis's The Magician's Nephew, given that Lewis references Nesbit's Bastable children in the very first lines of that book. The upstairs neighbor who gets dragged along on several travels might even be where Lewis ultimately got the inspiration for Uncle Andrew. (Except "Jimmy" is pleasant and kind.)

Other elements suggest a bit more sophistication in regard to the depiction of time-travel than one might expect from a century-old book. A chapter where the children decide to explore a futuristic London is particularly fascinating as it gives us a glimpse of how Nesbit saw what the future might hold.

Those portions aside, this book is still not nearly as good as the two which preceded it. Much of the humor, charm and satire of the first two books, which played out in the interactions between the children and the Psammead or Phoenix, is missing here, and the resolution is the sort of freaky-weird mysticism that was popular in Nesbit's day.

Unless you're set on reading all three books, this one can be skipped without really missing out.

[Kathryn · Rating 4 out of 5]

E. Nesbit wrote a ton of great children’s books that are sadly neglected, though Puffin Classics appears to be reprinting them. I generally don’t find them in large bookstores, but have had several lucky finds in local resale bookstores. (And of course there's always Project Gutenberg.)

The Story of the Amulet is about Cyril, Anthea, Robert, and Jane, the same four children who are featured in Five Children and It (the fifth child was their baby brother) and The Phoenix and the Carpet. In this book, their old friend the Psammead (the “It” of the first book mentioned) turns up in a pet shop in London. The kids rescue it, and it points them toward an Amulet for sale in a nearby curiosity shop. The Amulet is, in fact, a magic amulet from ancient times, and it has the power to give the children their heart’s desire.

Alas, what they have purchased is only half the Amulet. However, even the half has powers, one of which is transportation through space and time. So the children embark on a quest to find the other half and the connecting pin, so that they may have their hearts’ desire, which is the safe return of their parents and baby brother. Their mother has been ill and is off recuperating, and their father is a war correspondent. Meanwhile, they are living in London with their old nurse. I think I am not giving anything away when I say that the children have several exciting adventures and finally recover the Amulet and their family members.

Nesbit is always an entertaining read, sometimes more so as an adult. I’d recommend her to anyone who is looking for something relaxing and amusing.

[Melissa McShane · Rating 3 out of 5]

Definitely my least favorite of the three (the first books being Five Children and It and The Phoenix and the Carpet). By the internal chronology, the kids are maybe a year and a half older than when the trilogy started, but they haven't matured even a little bit, and Jane, the youngest, seems to have regressed. Or maybe she really is eight and Nesbit finally figured out how eight-year-olds talk and act. (Hint: They're just learning to be rational.) Her fear of going into strange and potentially dangerous societies seems extreme not because she exaggerates the dangers, but because she's handled other crises far more calmly. What I like about this book is the subplot with the learned gentleman, Jimmy, whose association with the children saves him from his isolation and reminds him of what it was like to be a child. Unlike the other adults in the series, Jimmy has no problem playing their "games" and envies their imagination rather than telling them to grow up, even though his belief that it's all a strange dream nearly gets everyone killed when he insists on staying to see the drowning of Atlantis. If I were making a movie of this book, I'd beef up his role to provide more of a connection between the actual time-travel the Amulet allows and the belief in the miraculous that is the heritage of any human being who chooses to take it.

[blake · Rating 5 out of 5]

Have you ever heard the question "Do you have the other half of this amulet?" I had, and it bugged me, as it was always as a tongue-in-cheek reference to something else—but I never knew what. I searched for the phrase and turned up this delightful 1905 children's book by Edith Nesbit, who happens to be a co-founder of the selfsame Evil Organization (the Fabian society) plaguing Mr. Schuyler in his autobiography Black and Conservative.

Nonetheless, this is a charming story of four children who have many adventures in history via their recalcitrant sand-fairy and a magical amulet that takes them to Egypt, Babylon, Tyre and Atlantis in their heydays.

One thing the writers of the era seem to do very well (none better than Frances Hodgson Burnett) is create a sense of wonder in their books. They do this despite (or maybe due to?) a great many cute asides and commentary on the characters. This would certainly be a good book to read to the kids, with some caveats.

Having not-too-long ago read The Secret Glory and some of Blavatsky Helena Petrovna's work on Atlantis, I was up on theosophy, which is referenced here mostly tongue-in-cheek in ways that will go over modern adults' heads much less children's. The ending, too, is very theosophical as is, really, the whole framework of the story which holds that time is just a mode of thought.

A less obscure reference concerns the children venturing forward into the future to find the other half of their amulet, wherein they find a utopic London and a young boy lamenting being suspended from school for day for littering. The boy's name is Wells, after the Wells from the dark ages who imagined the utopia they live in. (I'm curious to read more of Wells' socialist stuff now, because what was depicted here bore no resemblance to any form of socialism that I am aware of.)

I did enjoy the fact that this future world replaced noisy, nasty-smelling horses with clean, quiet automobiles. Take a moment to consider that, won't you? Gasoline and cars have been such a boon to a clean, disease-free environment, and we do nothing these days but criticize them. Well, for someone who had to live in a city full of horsesh*t, they were a boon.

Anyway, the story is well-constructed, the characters strong (though not detailed, particularly) and the writing is fun.

[Rylan Barker · Rating 3 out of 5]

"'There's not quite so much biting in our story,' said Cyril regretfully; 'in fact, there isn't any. Father's gone to Manchuria, and Mother and the Lamb have gone to Madeira because Mother was ill, and don't I just wish that they were both safe home again.'"

Edith Nesbit, this was your worst book yet I feel. Why? I shall explain...

(1) The Plot:
Basically, because the Psammead can't grant them anymore wishes, they go in search of a magic Amulet that can apparently give them their hearts desire. It's all about their trips to different time periods and countries - Babylon, Egypt, South America etc. But the trouble with this is that they don't do anything there, until right at the very end, when they just pop somewhere, take the amulet, and apparently that's it. Then there's about 5 more pages, and they give it to a weird old man.
For me, thats a rubbish story.

(2) The Characters:
Robert and Cyril: For some reason these were really annoying in this book - they remind me of my own brothers. But I suppose, they have everybody's best interests at heart.

Anthea and Jane: They are kind of the nicest, but seriously, Jane needs to grow up! She's getting really quite annoying....

The Psammead: As always, a weird and rude, yet unusually kind and charming alien, who loves nothing more than sand...that's it.

The Learned Gentleman or Jimmy: Seriously needs a better imagination and needs to stop thinking everything is a dream.

(3) The Ratings:

How many stars? 3, unfortunately.
Would I reccommend it? No probably not.. unless you really want to read it....


Apologies for any grammar or spelling mistakes in advance :)

[Emma]

I read this for a class on children's literature. The book is structured with each chapter being a sort of mini-adventure with a loose plot that connects all of the adventures together. I don't really like that structure typically because they always read more like short stories to me, which I'm not a fan of. Overall, I found this book a bit hard to get through, especially because the children are not given many distinctive features and it was difficult to remember who they were.

[Brian · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is definitely the best of the Five Children trilogy. Nesbit didn't make any of the individual children really distinct (Jane and Anthea, Cyril and Robert--they're interchangeable in my mind), but whereas the other books are kind of farces, this one had a little more adventure to it. I think it's partially because "plotting" plays a bigger role in this book, and because they spend the whole book trying to get back home, instead of just going on adventure after adventure.

There is still Nesbit's trademark humor, and it's really great. You also can tell that C.S. Lewis took Nesbit's children and used their style in Narnia. For instance,
“I don’t care,” [Jane] said; “I won’t, so there! It’s just silly going to places when you don’t want to, and when you don’t know what they’re going to be like! You can laugh at me as much as you like. You’re beasts—and I hate you all!” (Chapter 6)
"I don't care what you think, and I don't care what you say. You can tell the Professor or you can write to Mother or you can do anything you like. I know I've met a Faun in there and—I wish I'd stayed there and you are all beasts, beasts." (LWW, chapter 5)
“I thought we should play ball with queens,” sobbed Jane, “and have no end of larks! And now everything’s going to be perfectly horrid!” (Chapter 11)
"Oh dear, oh dear," said Lucy. "And I was so pleased at finding you again. And I thought you'd let me stay. And I thought you'd come roaring in and frighten all the enemies away—like last time. And now everything is going to be horrid." (PC, 10)

The other central thing that Lewis stole from this book was the idea that you can go to a magical place and it not take up any of our time: "Nonsense—as long as he’s with us we’ve got some chance of the Amulet. We can always fly if anything goes wrong.”
"I can always get back if anything goes wrong," thought Lucy. (LWW, Chapter 1)

Anyway, good stuff. The two parts of this book that bear commenting on, esepcially, are the Wellsian Utopia at the end and the ending. Near the end of this book, the children go to the future instead of the past and find that the world has basically become heaven: everyone loves school, nobody is poor, everybody shares everything, and even children's rooms are padded so that children cannot hurt themselves. The Wellsian utopia has probably had the most unlucky aging imaginable. Curtis Yarvin says that you cannot imagine how sexy and fresh socialism was in the 1920s: leftist ideology was a heroin addiction. What's kind insaner than insane is that Nesbit actually seems to have believed that Brave New World would be a good place to be. It's a real shame, but since communism has swallowed up its millions (more than any other evil in the 20th century minus abortion) this world rings, oh so hollow. Well, at least her poem says "I must not steal and I must learn, Nothing is mine that I do not earn." If only we could have stuck to that.

Now, as far as the ending goes, it's definitely aiming high, which I like. I really like how at the end of the book, the Egyptian priest is kind of ambivalent. We don't really know whether he is good or bad and it's kind of cool that he turns out to have some good. However, when he gets swallowed up and joined into the old scholar, Nesbit bit off more than she could chew. It might creep certain readers out, but Nesbit probably didn't have the ending in mind from the beginning--other than that she wanted to get the children back to their parents. The magic of the ending is pretty great, and I like that Nesbit is trying to pull out all the stops. I also like the suddenness with which the children come back from vacation and it all ends. It left me with a kind of lovely sense of awe and adventure past. Anyway, I read the other two books almost a decade ago. Glad I finally finished the trilogy.

[Cynthia Egbert · Rating 4 out of 5]

The psammead is at it again and, as always, it is a delightful romp. It is, as Jane Yolen discussed in her afterward to this edition, a different thing to read Nesbit as an adult, knowing certain things about Nesbit herself and about her society. But that can be okay as well. It is intriguing to the extreme to read Nesbit's vision of what the London of our time would look like. It was a dream for her and her friends that has not and will never come to be, but it was interesting. For any of you who love a good time travel story, this one is for you!

Here are some fun quotes:

"If you come to think of it, there must be some language that everyone could understand, if we only knew what it was."

"The great, soft, rustling sound of London, which is like some vast beast turning over in its sleep."

"We come from the world where the sun never sets. And peace with honor is what we want. We are the great Anglo-Saxon or conquering race. Not that we want to conquer you."

"They began to see how very few of the things they had always thought they could not do without were really at all necessary to life."

"You would have thought, to see these people, that a child was something to make a fuss about, not a bit of rubbish to be hustled about the streets and hidden away in the workhouse."

"I must not steal and I must learn,
Nothing is mine that I do not earn.
I must try in work and play
To make things beautiful every day.
I must be kind to everyone,
And never let cruel things be done.
I must be brave, and I must try
When I am hurt never to cry.
And always laugh as much as I can,
And be glad that I'm going to be a man.
To work for my living and help the rest,
And never do less than my very best."
(This is the citizenship poem that Nesbit offered from her London of the future.)

[Christine · Rating 3 out of 5]

Edith Nesbit was one of my first favourite writers, though of course I called her "E. Nesbit" because which child reads the bio at the front or back? (not this one, apparently)

The Story of the Amulet is the third and final installment in the "Cyril, Robert, Anthea, and Jane" or "Psammead" trilogy. Quite honestly, I do not think it was the best, but it did surprise me a number of times with the children actually reacting to... some rather violent and shocking things. The Atlantis chapter and the Queen of Babylon in London scenes come to mind. Someone protect these children from death and tragedy, please. But then everything is better, so... ? I guess it turned out alright?

Ok, so this definitely wasn't the best of the books, but the characters pull you through. They interact like real siblings, they squabble, they have inside jokes, nicknames, they get petty and then they try to pull everyone together because hey, maybe we should shield our youngest sibling from the terrors of Babylonian jail. You know, normal sibling stuff.

There should have been more of the Psammead, and everything wrapped up rather suddenly, especially with a recurring character who suddenly... recurred? Because? I don't know. There was clearly a lot of good in this mess. But it was also nice to meet the gang again. Maybe Nesbit should have taken more time to work on this (did authors get pressured to write faster in Edwardian England?), but I do recommend this book to anyone who loved "Five Children and It" and "The Phoenix and the Carpet," if only because there is some gold in this last volume, though you may have to dig a little bit. Also there isn't that much gold. Just a bit.

Still recommend.

[Ioanna · Rating 2 out of 5]

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Robert, Anthea, Cyril, and Jane are four siblings that have already been in adventures before. While roaming around London one day, they bump across an old 'friend': the magic creature Psammead. The children decide to help the creature escape from the pet shop it has been kept a prisoner, and ask for its help - their mother is ill, and they will do anything to help her get well again. And that's how a new adventure begins for all of them. In search for the amulet, the story will guide them to new adventures.

The Story of the Amulet was a very interesting idea. Unfortunately, it was poorly executed. The text is too dry, and filled with a lot of unnecessary details in parts of the plot that are really not important. Some things are explained too much. Children are smart, they really do not need too many explanations, especially in obvious things.

The dialogue feels unnatural, and there is hardly any realism in the way these children live. The Psammead is a very peculiar character: sometimes it wants to help the children, and other times it seems very rude. This was a little confusing, as if the author hadn't made up their mind about their character's behavior.

[Redbird · Rating 1 out of 5]

I abandoned this book after the fifth chapter. The style is similar to other and much older children's books that served to entertain and educate. This one takes the five children on adventures around the world and back in time, so they learn about what other cultures were like along the way. At least, that's how it seemed to be going.

Like the other Five Children books, the language the children use with one another is cloying sweet. I've been willing to look past it in other books, but when the story itself is not enjoyable, it's time to let it go.

Maybe the story doesn't hold up in today's information laden world or perhaps the pace was too slow, I can't say. Just not one of Nesbit's better books for today's reader.

As a Librivox recording, the narrator does a very good job. She has to sing and sob, and at one point do both, and she does them well, without sounding ridiculous. She's lovely to listen to; I wouldn't have lasted as long as I did if the narrator weren't so good.

[George Fowles · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 ⭐ I felt really unmotivated to pick this up to start with but after a while I found the writing really charming. (Its made me really want to read The Railway Children which is one of my favourite films.) The plot wasn't gripping and I usually find the pacing odd in children's books because I'm a slow burn and lots of character development kind of person. One of the reviews on the back compared Nesbit to the TARDIS and as im a massive Whovian, nothing is going to ever live up to that. I don't like not being given explanations for how things work although this book brushes them off in a cute way. I also found it really hard to imagine the Psammead.

[Charles Streams · Rating 2 out of 5]

The third book in the Five Children series, is much the same as the others. The idea is very unique and has great potential, but the way it's carried out just isn't as good as it could be. Having the different attitudes and personalities of each of Cyril, Robert, Anthea, and Jane was very well-written in my opinion, but the whole time travel stories could have been so much more exciting.

[Laurel Hicks · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this final book is my favorite in the Psamead trilogy. I can certainly see that Nesbit was an inspiration to C.S. Lewis's creativity.

[Marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fantastic and fun read!

[Felix Zilich · Rating 4 out of 5]

В третьем романе про песчаную Саммиаду сюжет уже целиком крутится вокруг путешествий во времени. Для книги, написанной в дремучем 1906 году, здесь подозрительно много толково продуманных фишек типа “что случится если один и тот же предмет (или человек), но только из разных временных периодов, внезапно окажется в одном месте”.

Не буду больше спойлерить, расскажу лучше о забавном. Итак, Эдит Несбит была женщиной крайне прогрессивной. Говорят, она была первой из англичан, кто начал убедительно писать про современных для неё подростков, пусть и в фантастическом формате. К тому же, девочки в книгах Несбит всегда были боевыми и смелыми. Пацанам ни в чем не уступали.

Но у любой прогрессивности есть предел. Если полистать отзывы на Goodreads, то можно быстро найти рецензии, где с первых строк гремят слова СЕКСИЗМ, РАСИЗМ, КЛАССОВОЕ НЕРАВЕНСТВО. Эдит Несбит была крайне прогрессивным автором…. но только для представительницы среднего класса времен правления Эдуарда VII. Для современного читателя всего, написанного чуть выше капслоком, в самом деле, чересчур многовато. Особенно в третьей книге, где маленькие белые супремацисты разносят свою высокомерную имперскую вату по всей истории — от Древнего Египта до Атлантиды. При этом известно, что особо суровые фразочки (например, антисемитские) из всех современных переизданий трилогии давно вымарали.

К счастью, испортить впечатление подобные анахронизмы не могут. Трилогия Эдит Несбит — уверенный must read для любого любителя британской фантастики.

(c) https://redrumers.com/2018/05/23/nesb...

[Karna · Rating 2 out of 5]

I really didn't care for this. I found the children shallow and annoying and the story pointless. I realize that this is the third book in a series, so maybe I would have reacted differently if I had read the previous books, but what a dull read.

[Cant Read · Rating 2 out of 5]

It was just strange , four siblings found a cthulhulike amulet which granted them for whatever reason their wishes and Cthulhu and everyone else was fine with it.
The children especially Jane became more and more annoying

[Cleopatra Pullen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Not quite up there with The Phoenix and the Carpet but still a good read that I remember fondly from my childhood

[Tabitha · Rating 3 out of 5]

Time travel stories are not my favorite, but this had some redeeming twists. I know CS Lewis was a big Nesbit fan, and several elements of this story reminded me of The Magician's Nephew... I wonder if it provided some of his inspiration?

[Kirsten · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a good time to reread something light, since the real world feels heavy right now. Like with the first two books in this trilogy, the children have a series of adventures, but this time there's a common thread connecting them all - a quest to find the missing half of a magical amulet. I think I enjoyed this one just a bit more than The Phoenix and the Carpet, although the ending is a bit anticlimactic.