Non pony works and more

I finally found Josephine's They Died In The Spring, so that means that I should be able to do it. I badly behind. My original plan was to do all of Josephine's at the end of the year, but it looks unlikely. This blog is very time consuming - the main problem is that I have to read the books.

A couple of weeks ago I lost my cat, and that messed things up. Mainly to do with concentration.

I have also decided (at some point, I need to do the pony books) to do the non pony books. Josephine I have already covered: she only wrote one, which is A Place With Two Faces. Christine was (not surprisingly) the most prolific: she wrote 30 non pony books. There is a possibility of her writing another: amazon list one, which is not listed on the British Library's catalogue. Certainly none have shown up to date. Diana wrote 9 books (three under her married name of Diana Farr), though I had only 7 on my want list. This is because two of them are political related (one of those is an autobiography) and frankly it bores me to tears. Even worse than The Pennyfields, I think.

I have 17 of Christine's books on my want list (excluding the one that may not exist) and 6 of Diana's. The majority of Christine's seem to be written in the 1960s and the same goes for Diana.

One of (Christine's) I got was this week: No-One At Home. It was written in the 1960s, though I got an 1976 reprint. Nothing wrong with that: except it clearly states that it was made from recycled paper. I thought that recycled paper books began in the 1990s: clearly not. Obviously Hamish Hamilton started to be environmentally aware, which was quite remarkable for the time, as all their (the PT's I mean) other pony works did not come from recycled paper which date from around the same time. I have seen on pony books "war economy standard" on books dating from WW2, but I thought that meant it was from lesser quality paper, and lower print runs.

Anyway, that turned out rather interesting. Generally, CPT's non pony work tend to be for an younger age, I have 3 in front of me. No-One At Home states it is for "about six to about nine years of age" and Giles And The Greyhound states it is "ideal for the 7- to 10-year-old". The Boys From the Cafe has no age range stated, though I suspect (though not having read it) it is for the 7 to 10 years range. I have no idea about Diana's works, though I suspect Choosing (published under her married name) is for adults.