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The Famous Five #1-2, #16

The Famous Five Adventure Collection

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Includes:
Five On A Treasure Island
Five Go Adventuring Again
Five Go To Billycock Hill

512 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1994

12 people are currently reading
474 people want to read

About the author

Enid Blyton

5,132 books6,298 followers
See also:
Ένιντ Μπλάιτον (Greek)
Enida Blaitona (Latvian)
Энид Блайтон (Russian)
Inid Blajton (Serbian)
Інід Блайтон (Ukrainian)

Enid Mary Blyton (1897–1968) was an English author of children's books.

Born in South London, Blyton was the eldest of three children, and showed an early interest in music and reading. She was educated at St. Christopher's School, Beckenham, and - having decided not to pursue her music - at Ipswich High School, where she trained as a kindergarten teacher. She taught for five years before her 1924 marriage to editor Hugh Pollock, with whom she had two daughters. This marriage ended in divorce, and Blyton remarried in 1943, to surgeon Kenneth Fraser Darrell Waters. She died in 1968, one year after her second husband.

Blyton was a prolific author of children's books, who penned an estimated 800 books over about 40 years. Her stories were often either children's adventure and mystery stories, or fantasies involving magic. Notable series include: The Famous Five, The Secret Seven, The Five Find-Outers, Noddy, The Wishing Chair, Mallory Towers, and St. Clare's.

According to the Index Translationum, Blyton was the fifth most popular author in the world in 2007, coming after Lenin but ahead of Shakespeare.

See also her pen name Mary Pollock

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5 stars
370 (48%)
4 stars
253 (33%)
3 stars
117 (15%)
2 stars
16 (2%)
1 star
7 (<1%)
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
Profile Image for Sarala.
35 reviews4 followers
November 30, 2011
Famous Five!!! My foray into reading began with them! How can I not love them, they took me along for every one of their adventures after all :) The writing is so great that I always ended being the hungry during their breakfast/lunch/dinners!! And don't even get me started on their picnics!! :)

Absolutely love love love them! My first love :)
Profile Image for Katja Labonté.
Author 31 books340 followers
July 6, 2021
Five On A Treasure Island
4 stars & 4/10 hearts. I really enjoyed this story. It’s so vintage and British, and I have nostalgic feelings concerning it since I read it many times as a child and copied large parts as an early writer. ;) George doesn’t have a very good attitude at first, but she does improve as the story goes on—and in book 3 she is much better. I don’t agree with all her wanting to be a boy rather than a girl, of course, or her and Anne’s wanting to wear pants. There were a few euphemisms I wouldn’t use, too. But Julian is wonderful <3 <3 and I love the excitement!! And the castle and island and wreck and Kirrin Cottage—I love them too!

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Five Go Adventuring Again
2 stars & 2/10 hearts. This is a hard book to review because while I enjoy the excitement and mystery, George’s attitude is very bad (although its not all her fault) and the other children back her up against the parents a couple times. But as I said, she does have some things on her side—Mr. Roland wasn’t kind to her and her father wasn’t fair several times. This is my least favourite Famous Five book so far, but the third one is really good. And if you’d rather skip this one (I probably won’t read it again, now that I’ve reviewed it), you needn’t worry about not understanding the next book—there’s no reference to this one at all.

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Five Go To Billycock Hill
5 stars & 5/10 hearts. This book is far better than Books 1 & 2. George has greatly improved (and her whole wanting-to-be-a-boy-rather-than-a-girl mindset is barely mentioned), and Julian, Dick, and Anne are as good as ever. (Julian’s even better, in fact. ^_^). There were a few euphemisms I wouldn’t use, and a few mentions that children think a certain old woman is a witch, but that idea disappears very soon. The story is v e r y exciting and deals with RAF pilots, vintage England, and a certain wonderful Lieutenant ;) ;). I very, very much enjoyed it!!

A Favourite Humorous Quote: “‘Uncle Quentin’s a bit on the warpath, Aunt Fanny,’ said Dick. ‘He wants to know who’s been tidying his desk.[’]
“‘Oh dear—I’d better go and find out what papers he’s lost *now,*’ said his aunt. ‘I expect he forgot that he had a tidying fit last night, and tidied his desk himself. He probably put a lot of his most precious papers into the waste-paper basket!’”
35 reviews2 followers
September 12, 2019
List of all the naughty things the children do in this book:
Steal from the kitchen, running away to an island, stealing a box from their uncle's study, climbing down a broken ladder, nearly breaking their neck while attempting to climb broken stairs, imprisoning a child, go into someone's room and locking it from the inside, stealing large amounts of food from the larder and putting it in a ship, messing with people who kidnapped a millionare's daughter, messing with people who have revolvers, misleading people to think they are going on a train when they are going on a very small boat to an island, sailing through dangerous rocks, making people break down doors, trapping people inside caves, stealing furniture from other people, stealing important papers from other people, spying, going on an unstable ship which may collapse into the ocean, climbing up ropes without any support, trying to smash open a box by throwing it on the ground and hitting it very hard with small stones and knowing there might be important things in there, drinking beer, Ordering food when they should be getting their food, buying 7 pieces of bread for 4 people and a dog staying on the island for a week, buying methylated spirits, one of the children trying to run away and getting caught by one of the other children in the middle of the night.
Profile Image for Jana.
1,122 reviews506 followers
September 21, 2015
Sweet memories of my first proper summers and first proper sittings under the trees and reading, always reading. They were always drinking ginger ale and George was so feisty constantly, my god, I seriously adored these books.
341 reviews3 followers
December 3, 2024
It’s really good and I love the idea of the book and I love the way it is written but it’s a little too much to much to process but overal it is a good book with the first to the 3rd books of the famous 5 it’s a good book for adventure lovers
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for Hannah.
96 reviews
July 1, 2018
I did enjoy the adventures in the three stories but although I am aware that they were written at a different time I can't deny the fact that the sexism in the book did bother me a lot.
Profile Image for Esha Bakht.
9 reviews
Want to read
January 3, 2021
The Famous Five is my all time favorite. This novel is so fascinating and mind gripping, I just cannot have enough of it.
13 reviews
August 2, 2022
I adore the book and l think it is really interesting
Profile Image for Upasana Saraf.
45 reviews1 follower
May 16, 2014
These books are pure joy. I think I spend every vacation with the famous five, and loved being part of their adventures. If a parent wants to engage their child in reading, this would be the perfect way to start them off!
Profile Image for Deb Sharp.
434 reviews15 followers
September 22, 2012
I love these books with a few books all in the one big book :)
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews

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