A Necklace of Raindrops and Other Stories

by Joan Aiken, Jan Pieńkowski (Illustrator)

Colección El barco de vapor.
Contiene los siguientes
- «El gato Mog»,
- «Un collar de gotas de lluvia»,
- «Un gato echado en la esterilla»,
- «Hay un poco de cielo en esta tarta»,
- «Los duendes en la estantería»,
- «Los tres viajeros»,
- «Una cama para pasar la noche» y
- «La colcha de retales»

Genres: Short Stories, Fantasy, Childrens, Fiction, Fairy Tales, Picture Books, Middle Grade

95 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Joan Aiken was a much loved English writer who received the MBE for services to Children's Literature. She was known as a writer of wild fantasy, Gothic novels and short stories.

She was born in Rye, East Sussex, into a family of writers, including her father, Conrad Aiken (who won a Pulitzer Prize for his poetry), and her sister, Jane Aiken Hodge. She worked for the United Nations Information Office during the second world war, and then as an editor and freelance on Argosy magazine before she started writing full time, mainly children's books and thrillers. For her books she received the Guardian Award (1969) and the Edgar Allan Poe Award (1972).

Her most popular series, the "Wolves Chronicles" which began with The Wolves of Willoughby Chase, was set in an elaborate alternate period of history in a Britain in which James II was never deposed in the Glorious Revolution,and so supporters of the House of Hanover continually plot to overthrow the Stuart Kings. These books also feature cockney urchin heroine Dido Twite and her adventures and travels all over the world.

Another series of children's books about Arabel and her raven Mortimer are illustrated by Quentin Blake, and have been shown on the BBC as Jackanory and drama series. Others including the much loved Necklace of Raindrops and award winning Kingdom Under the Sea are illustrated by Jan Pieńkowski.

Her many novels for adults include several that continue or complement novels by Jane Austen. These include Mansfield Revisited and Jane Fairfax.

Aiken was a lifelong fan of ghost stories. She set her adult supernatural novel The Haunting of Lamb House at Lamb House in Rye (now a National Trust property). This ghost story recounts in fictional form an alleged haunting experienced by two former residents of the house, Henry James and E. F. Benson, both of whom also wrote ghost stories. Aiken's father, Conrad Aiken, also authored a small number of notable ghost stories.

Reviews

[Orinoco Womble (tidy bag and all) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Joan Aiken is at her best with this collection of gentle fairytales and fantasy stories, beautifully illustrated by Kevin Hawkes. The pictures are like little jewels themselves, or tiny "raindrops" that reflect the people and events in the stories. An excellent, cosy, curl-up-in-your-favourite-quilt read. I started this book thinking I'd never read it before, but something about one of the stories rang a bell, so I must have done many years ago.

My "acid test" of a good children's book is: does it appeal to adults? If not, there's probably not much there at all. Witness the fact that many, many adults enjoy Beatrix Potter, Milne and other "children's books" all their lives long, while the "fad" books fade away to no one's regret. This is an enduring classic, and I actually think I got more out of it at fifty than at a younger age. That is not to say that it's "over the heads" of children, because it's not.

I enjoyed these short tales rather more than the proto-steampunk novels in the "Wolves of Willoughby Chase" series (after about vol. 3, anyway). They are much more in the line of the Armitage Family series. Read them with someone you love.

[Lauren · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ahhh, a trip down memory lane!

Review to come

[Manuel Alfonseca · Rating 3 out of 5]

ENGLISH: Eight semi-fairy stories by Joan Aiken. Two of them are about cats: "The cat sat on the mat" (and while there granted wishes) and "The baker's cat" (who was made to grow by a dosis of yeast).

"A bed for the night" is about The Weevils, a playing group, not too different from Brs. Grimm's Musicians of Bremen, except that they all are human, and the Baba Yaga takes a part in the plot. And "The elves in the shelves", where all the creatures in a little girl's books come out and play.

ESPAÑOL: Ocho semi-cuentos de hadas de Joan Aiken. Hay dos sobre gatos: "El gato se sentó en el felpudo" (y estando allí concedía deseos) y "El gato de la panadera" (al que hizo crecer una dosis de levadura).

"Una cama para pasar la noche" trata sobre Los Gorgojos, un grupo de músicos, no muy distintos los Músicos de Bremen de los Hermanos Grimm, salvo porqque todos son humanos y la Baba Yaga interviene en la trama. Y "Los duendes de las estanterías", donde todas las criaturas de los libros de una niña salen a jugar.

[Megan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A collection of short stories for children.

A Necklace of Raindrops - 5 stars. Actually this was the only short story in the book I remember reading as a little girl. Laura's godfather, the North Wind, gives Laura a necklace and each year on her birthday gives her a raindrop to put on that gives her certain powers (i.e. doesn't get wet when it rains, etc). However, the necklace keeps getting stolen and Laura has to find it.

The other short stories are:

The Cat Sat on the Mat

There's Some Sky in this Pie

The Elves in the Shelves

The Three Travelers

The Baker's Cat

A Bed for the Night

The Patchwork Quilt

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had never heard of this book, but my wife loved it as a kid, and we ended up with a copy. I just wanted to review it, because I think this is the best ever bedtime story book. The stories are just the right length, and (at least in the edition we have) the illustrations are great. There's not many of them but at least two per story and they are lovely. The stories are just so bizarre and creative. The title story is good, and I really like the one about Mog the cat, and the one about the three guys who work at a railway station in the middle of nowhere, and the one about the weird band of guys who need a place to sleep. Really, all of them are good. It always makes me happy when my son wants to read one or two from this book. I wish there were more kid short story collections that were this good.

[Mathew · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read it in one night, I loved it that much. Some very clever stuff going on beneath the words but, ultimately, a gorgeous collection of short stories that beg be to told rather than read. My personal favourite was The Elves on the Shelves but it has made me want to explore more of Aiken's short stories. A perfect class read for KS1 or even lower KS2. The rich language and clever repetition throughout make these sound more like fairy tales than some fairy tales do.

[Jazzy Lemon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Enchanting!

[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 4 out of 5]

A 1001 CBYMRBYGU. When I picked up my copy of this book from the library, I was initially very disappointed to find that it was a collection of short stories. Then I started the book. Mercy. It was fantastic. Literally and metaphorically. Wonderfully written fantasies. There is one story about a man who saves the North Wind, who then rewards the man with a gift of a necklace of raindrops. Another is the tale of an old woman who accidentally baked a bit of sky in her pie. Yet another tells of three men who work in a train station where no trains ever stop. Fantastic.



“You may think it odd that there were three men to look after one tiny station, but the people who ran the railway knew that if you left two men together in a lonely place they would quarrel, but if you left three men, two of them could always grumble to each other about the third, and then they would be quite happy.”

[Nicky · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this when I was a child, but more or less forgot about it until I came across it in my university library. Then I remembered the magic of it, and all the illustrations were familiar... I didn't remember all the stories, but the first and second in particular made an impression on me, and the one that basically included Baba Yaga. They're almost fairytales, and that's how I'll shelve them here.

Reading them now, I suppose they're smaller than imagination made them, and more saccharine. But there's fun, quirky moments, too, like hanging a girl and her dress out to dry on the line, and living in a bus...

[Mimi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful, funny, entertaining fairy tales. And i really liked the illustrations by Pienkowski.

[Chris · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eight magical modern fairytales by a doyenne of storytelling make up this enchanting collection, graced by the stunning silhouette drawings and colour plates by Jan Pieńkowski, his first but not his last collaboration with the author.

Asked to compose stories for young American readers utilising words from a given list of only two hundred, Joan Aiken came up with A Necklace of Raindrops which, when published with illustrations by the Polish-born Jan Pieńkowski, soon became an instant modern classic.

Despite using such an apparently limited vocabulary Aiken capitalised on the knack traditional fairytales employ of repeating episodes and snatches of verse with additions or variations, which has always been perfect for capturing the audience’s attention, particularly young listeners. Here then, in the nicest possible way, are new tales for old.

The story that gives its title to the collection feels the most traditional of all. In return for rescuing the North Wind from being stuck in a tree Mr Jones’s daughter Laura becomes the North Wind’s goddaughter, his gift being a necklace that adds a new boon every year – staying dry in a rainstorm, the ability to swim the deepest river, the talent to stop the rain if she blows her nose and so on. But what will happen when the necklace gets stolen? Even when her search for it takes Laura to Arabia her kindness to all creatures allows them to help her follow the trail.

In amongst the theme of kindness to others we hear of cats, big and small. In ‘The Cat sat on the Mat’ we learn of Emma Pippin and her Aunt Lou who live in a bus because they’re so poor. (Before we think this a somewhat outlandish concept, this is exactly where the author, her husband and her young family of two, plus cat Taffy, lived for a year or so in 1951.)

Emma and her aunt are allowed to only use the bad apples in an adjacent orchard by their overbearing neighbour, but in return for kindly giving an old fairy some of their apple pie Emma receives the fairy’s cast-off dresses; unless Emma was hung out on the washing line wearing her own dress to dry it would shrink! One of these new dresses is used as a mat for Sam the cat, a mat moreover which turns out to have the power of granting wishes whenever Sam sleeps on it. What will Emma wish for when she discovers the secret?
In the second feline-related story, ‘The Baker’s Cat’, Mrs Jones’s puss Mog catches a cold and is given some warm milk with yeast in it because, we’re told, ‘Yeast is good for people when they are poorly.’ But will it work with cats sitting by the fire, or will the yeast keep rising and affect the size of the cat? Well, of course you know what the answer to that will be.

A different kind of big cat appears in ‘The Elves in the Shelves’ when birthday girl Janet’s parents are away and she wishes she had someone to talk to. The creatures and characters in her birthday books start emerging from the pages, and in a recurring refrain she witnesses

elves in the shelves,
mermaids in the bathtub,
penguins in the ice-box,
rabbits in the coal-bin,
peacocks on the table and
seals in the sink.

Lastly there emerges a Tiger who only wants to play, and mayhem – slightly reminiscent of Dr Seuss’s The Cat in the Hat – rapidly ensues until the sound of Janet’s engine driver father’s train is heard.

These tales demand to be read aloud, either by a beginner reader or as a bedtime story, otherwise some of the delights of the rhythms, the repeated incantation-like phrases or the witty wordplay could be lost. For example in 'A Bed for the Night' half the fun comes from the four musicians having names that sound like the Four Wise Monkeys who either see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil, or do no evil: to see what I mean try saying Spiqueneau Weevil with a French accent.

There’s equal charm and humour in the remaining tales – 'There’s some Sky in this Pie', 'The Patchwork Quilt', 'The Three Travellers' – but what I think distinguishes all these stories is how skilfully Aiken balances traditional elements and motifs from early modern fairytales and The Arabian Nights with more modern concepts. For instance we are introduced to a flying carpet and to dwellings similar to Baba Yaga’s huts on fowl’s legs, but also read of trains and an aircraft, with the latter interpreted in one of Jan Pieńkowski’s outstanding illustrations as a 1910 Bristol Boxkite, which had notably featured in the 1965 film Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines.

There’s little more I need to add except to say that this magnificent treasury of modern fairytales is full of delightful young heroines and plucky young men whose hearts are in the right places, and that your life will be the richer once you’ve read them and, better still, own a copy to read and read again.

[Monica · Rating 4 out of 5]

"El gato Mog" es un libro infantil de RELATOS IMAGINATIVOS CON ELEMENTOS FANTÁSTICOS A LA PAR QUE REALIDADES crudas DE LA VIDA (Y DE LAS PERSONAS). A lo largo de sus ocho historias, NOS ENCONTRAREMOS CON DIVERSOS MENSAJES ACERCA DE LOS VALORES Y BENEFICIOS DE LAS BUENAS PERSONAS Y ANIMALES: la amistad, la bondad, el valor, la aceptación de los demás, sin prejuicios, sino por su manera de obrar, ADEMÁS DE, LO POSITIVO QUE APORTA LA CULTURA y LOS VIAJES.


1/ El Gato Mog:

Una anciana panadera vive con su revoltoso gato, semi atrigrado claro ( pues parte de su cuerpo está completamente blanco, debido a el jugueteo que se lleva con el agua y la harina de los bollos y otros pastelitos y panes). Un día su dueña lo echa fuera mientras trabaja, para que no lo revuelva todo...por un conjunto de acontecimientos y acciones, Mog crecerá, lo que le deparará un problema a la anciana dueña y al simpático gato.
ENCANTADOR, TIERNO E IMAGINATIVO RELATO ACERCA DE LA ACEPTACIÓN DE LOS DEMÁS, SIN PRE JUZGARLOS, Y DE LAS BUENAS ACCIONES.
ME HA GUSTADO MUCHO.

2/ Un collar de gotas de lluvia:
El señor Jones ayuda a el viento del norte (que es un ser y se ocupa que la tormenta vaya desplazándose) a desenredarse de las ramas de uno de los árboles enfrente de su casa. En agradecimiento, éste se hace padrino de su hijita, y le regala un collar muy especial y con poderes que irán aumentando cada año, con la llegada de su cumpleaños..
ALECCIONADOR E IMAGINATIVO CUENTO ACERCA DE LOS VALORES DE LAS BUENAS PERSONAS y LAS CONSECUENCIAS DE LAS ACCIONES DE LAS MALAS.
ME HA GUSTADO MUCHO.

3/ El gato echado en la esterilla:
Emma y su tía, Lou son muy pobres y viven en un viejo autobús, al lado de un campo de manzanas en el que la mujer recolecta los frutos para su avaro y mezquino dueño, que tan sólo le deja quedarse con las podridas para hacer comida. Un día una gentil hada, en agradecimiento a la hospitalidad de la chiquilla, le regala tres vestidos nuevos, el más oscuros lo hará servir de esterilla para su gato, que siempre anda sucio de las patitas...descubrirá que dicha combinación les ayudará a las desdichadas habitantes del autobús...y al fin podrán ser felices, lejos del tirano jefe de Lou.
OTRO CUENTO IMAGINATIVO, CON SU MORALEJA INCLUIDA, QUE NO DEJA DE SER UNA HISTORIA DURA.
ME HA GUSTADO MUCHO.

4/ Hay un poco de cielo en ésta tarta:
Un matrimonio anciano, que vive en un frío lugar, hace una tarta de manzana...qué dará sus frutos y resultará ser un auténtico ‘ placer divino’, ¡que les reconfortará del frío!

CURIOSA, ORIGINAL Y METAFÓRICA.
ME HA GUSTADO MUCHO.

5/ Los duendes en la estantería:
Una niña, de padre muy ocupados, verá en sus libros de cumpleaños ‘una gran compañía’ a las prolongadas ausencias de sus progenitores....
BONITO Y METAFÓRICO RELATO ACERCA DE LOS PLACERES Y RECOMPENSAS DE LA LECTURA.
“ - Leemos para saber que no estamos solos”..Como bien dicen en el magnífico film: ‘ Tierra de penumbras’.
ME HA GUSTADO.

6/ Los tres viajeros:
Tres empleados de una estación de tren en pleno desierto y sin actividad alguna, deciden emprender alternativamente y con sus ahorros, un viaje más allá de lo que hasta ahora conocen...el último de ellos descubrirá la solución a sus deseos de vivir en plenitud.
BONITO RELATO ACERCA DE LOS PLACERES DEL VIAJE, Y SOBRETODO, DE ADENTRARSE EN LA AVENTURA Y LO DESCONOCIDO, QUE PUEDEN PROPORCIONARNOS GRATOS E INESPERADOS RESULTADOS.
ESTÁ BIEN.

7/ Una cama para pasar la noche:
Cuatro músicos amigos, que viajan por el mundo y alegran a las personas con su arte, ven como su coche se hunde en un río. Desesperados, buscarán refugio en varios hogares. Tras varias negativas, encontrarán en un insólito hogar un curiosa petición a cambio de cobijo...
RELATO MUY FANTÁSTICO Y SURREALISTA, ACERCA DE LOS PODERES DE LA MÚSICA.
ME HA GUSTADO.

8/ La colcha de retales:
Una anciana de un país nórdico le está tejiendo a su nieto una colcha con mucho amor..dicha colcha, pues, resulta ser mágica. Mientras tanto, en un desierto muy lejano, un tirado y avaro mago ve como sus pobres y hambrientos camellos se comen su alfombra mágica. Entonces decide robar la colcha de retales...
TIERNO RELATO ACERCA DE LAS BUENAS Y MALAS PERSONAS, Y LAS CONSECUENCIA DE SUS ACCIONES.
ME HA GUSTADO.

RECOMENDADO TANTO A MAYORES COMO A PEQUEÑOS, QUE DISFRUTARÁN DE UNA SENCILLA, PERO MUY IMAGINATIVA NARRACIÓN LLENA DE VALORES.

[pepip · Rating 2 out of 5]

Pensé que era la historia del gato mog nomás y no cuentos cortos. Mi favorita fue esa. También me gusto mucho
E igual
Y no podemos olvidar

[Becky · Rating 4 out of 5]

First sentence: A man called Mr. Jones and his wife lived near the sea.

Premise/plot: A Necklace of Raindrops and Other Stories is a collection of short stories by Joan Aiken. Most--if not all--of the stories have a fantastic fairy-tale feel to them. The stories include "A Necklace of Raindrops," "The Cat Sat on the Mat," "There's Some Sky In This Pie," "The Elves in the Shelves," "The Three Travellers," "The Baker's Cat,""A Bed for the Night," and "The Patchwork Quilt."

In "A Necklace of Raindrops," the North Wind becomes godfather to a newborn baby. He gifts her with a necklace of three raindrops. Each year on her birthday he visits her and gives another raindrop. Each year the necklace becomes more magical.

"The Three Travellers" stars three men who work for the Railway and live in the desert. One is a signalman, one is a ticket-collector, and the third is a porter. No one ever, ever, ever, ever stops at their station. Their lives are relatively boring...until....they decide to do something.

"The Patchwork Quilt" is a fun story about a grandmother making a magical quilt for her grandson.

My thoughts: I enjoyed this collection. Some stories I absolutely loved, loved, loved. Other stories I merely liked. But here's the thing--I don't usually like story collections at all. So the fact that I found stories that excited and thrilled me so much is really saying something.

[Narmeen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Whimsical set of stories that will win your heart with their rhythmic charm! These are the kind of stories that satisfy those craving tales of magical realism.

A fellow Robin Hobb lover gave me this book after we shared our mutual awe for The Realm of the Elderlings series, in a conversation that soon turned into discussions about magical realism books. Even though, Robin Hobb books are not particularly written in the magical realism genre there is something whimsical about them and this is why this book came up.

Will definitely be checking Joan Aiken's other work out!

[Nicke Pearson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I just love these type of fairytales! It reminds me of my childhood! The little ditty’s repeated throughout the short story and the absurd imagination that a cat can grow as big as a house, or a pie can fly in the sky, so wonderful and magical! Highly recommend to read out loud x

[Zoë · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved this book as a kid and it has lost none of its magic.

[Deb (Readerbuzz) Nance · Rating 4 out of 5]

A 1001 CBYMRBYGU. When I picked up my copy of this book from the library, I was initially very disappointed to find that it was a collection of short stories. Then I started the book. Mercy. It was fantastic. Literally and metaphorically. Wonderfully written fantasies. There is one story about a man who saves the North Wind, who then rewards the man with a gift of a necklace of raindrops. Another is the tale of an old woman who accidentally baked a bit of sky in her pie. Yet another tells of three men who work in a train station where no trains ever stop. Fantastic.

“You may think it odd that there were three men to look after one tiny station, but the people who ran the railway knew that if you left two men together in a lonely place they would quarrel, but if you left three men, two of them could always grumble to each other about the third, and then they would be quite happy.”

[Sarah Leavesley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just finished re reading these to my son who loved them as much as I did when I was little.
Jan Pienkowski's gorgeous illustrations perfectly complement Joan Aiken's words and each story feels almost like a much older story that you remember reading in a book of fairy tales.
Stand outs for me have always been the eponymous Necklace of Raindrops, The Baker's Cat and my favorite The Patchwork Quilt. My son's favourite was The Baker's Cat and he also loved The Elves in the Shelves with the tiger who runs "faster than the wind, faster than the weather, faster than the fastest clouds that cross the sky together."
This is a lovely little book of stories to share with a child or simply re read as an adult.

[Josie · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an amazing read-a-loud! I highly recommend this book to anyone with children. It was a book of 8 short stories that were very creative and fun. Our favorite was the first story in the book, Necklace of Raindrops. It was about a lucky little girl who got to have the North Wind as her godfather. That was the only story my girls wanted me to read over again. The story about the men in the desert was pretty boring but the rest were fun.

[Abi Reynolds · Rating 5 out of 5]

I recalled reading this book as a child and how much I enjoyed it - my favourite was A necklace of raindrops but the image from The Cat sat on the Mat of Emma hanging on the line to dry always made me laugh.

[Derelict Space Sheep · Rating 3 out of 5]

A collection of short stories for very young children. Aiken employs the same sort of text repetitions often seen in picture books, and structures her tales around wondrous impossibilities strung from matter-of-fact child logic. Lizza Aiken’s narration captures the dreamy storytelling essence.

[Rebecca · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used to pine for the eponymous necklace. Now I pine for my childhood copy. *sniffs*

[drowningmermaid · Rating 3 out of 5]

Re-read aloud to Charlotte, 2021.

[Overbooked ✎ · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

[Burçak Sultan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Denizin dibindeki krallık kitabını daha çok sevmiştim. Burdaki masallara pek ısınamadım 😛

[Michael Fitzgerald · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent stories of magic, nice and short and all quite different. The Pieńkowski silhouette illustrations are superb.

[osqhe · Rating 4 out of 5]

İçerisinde 8 ayrı masal bulunan, illüstrasyonlu bir kitap. En sevdiğim masalları kitaba adını veren Yağmur Damlalarından Kolye, Mindere Oturan Kedi ve Raflardaki Elfler oldu.

[Ellie L · Rating 4 out of 5]

From floating pies to animals being brought to life from books, this is an excellent collection of magical stories which hold something for every child. Bordering more into the surreal than fantasy, Aiken’s tales have a dream like quality that is almost not of this world, and yet still pulled on conventions and felt traditional in their telling. There was an odd familiarity whilst reading these stories, despite their eccentricity and having no recollection of ever having heard them. I cannot put my finger on it, but Aiken’s words had a certain timelessness, the narrative really conjured a sense of being crafted by generations of retelling- regardless of it being new to me. Perhaps just a sign of rich writing and a testament to Aiken’s voice.

[Tippy · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book almost made it! Almost! It was almost five stars, but the last story has a hook-nosed cruel Arab person that steals and is mean to animals and he steals from the poor hard working white family and his camels revolt and throw him from a magic carpet and he dies. This racist stereotype is hard for me personally to get over so... 3 stars. There's no reason he couldn't have stolen from a hard working Arab family or no reason he couldn't have been a cruel white thief. But as a child, if this is one of your only representations of Arab people, I worry what you come away with. #representationmatters