There can be a lot of unpleasantness on The Social Media these days and I understand why many sensibly minded folks are leaving it behind. I have done so with much of it, but do occasionally find some pleasures in the Facebook universe. The other month one of those ‘recommended’ pages cropped up, this time for ‘Old Torbay’ or suchlike. This particular post showed a ‘then and now’ split photograph of a garage site sitting, as they often did in their infancy, in the corner of a road junction. At the time I only vaguely noted that the garage in question was on the approach to the village of Marldon and that a pub called ‘Ye Olde Smokey House’ was pictured in the middle distance along one of the lanes. So far so unremarkable. However, in some kind of strange reversal of 21st Century normality, in which one’s experiences in the ‘real’ world become mirrored almost immediately with advertisements and ‘suggestions’ in the online one (evidence suggests that it is not paranoia to think that devices are literally listening to us and feeding the algorithms) a few weeks later I found myself reading a children’s book where both the village of Marldon and its pub took centre stage. Elizabeth Goudge’s ‘Smoky House’ was originally published in 1940 but has found itself reissued by the delightful Girls Gone By publishing venture and is a thoroughly charming read. Set in the early 19th Century, ‘Smoky House’ blends historical fiction with mild fantasy, and if the inclusion of fairy folks (‘The Good People’) might test the patience of our more cynical ages then I imagine it being remarkably appealing to youngsters reading it at the onset of WW2. The historical fiction elements involve the free-trading community (don’t call ‘em smugglers) of the fictional village of Faraway in Devon, and the action revolves around the village inn and the Treguddick family. At the time of her writing the book Goudge had recently moved to Marldon, and so the village and its surrounding landscape are as much the stars of the book as anything else. I believe that the inn in question (‘Ye Olde Smokey House’) was an inspiration at least in terms of name, but it was certainly not always called this, a map from the late 19th Century showing it as ‘The Ship Inn’. Perhaps too Goudge, whilst lifting the name from ‘Ye Olde Smokey House’, envisioned her fictional inn as being more like the Church House Inn at the centre of the old Marldon village. It is fun to play these games of reference, and whilst we have been recently enjoying watching Ben Robinson exploring ‘Villages By The Sea’ on the telly, it would be even more fun to see him make a series where he looks at the architectural and cultural history of inns, hotels and pubs around the country. The show might be called ‘Time At The Bar’, and the inns of Marldon would be a good place to start.

Goudge’s story then is certainly in part about the locale of Marldon and is certainly too about the historical context of the free-trading culture of the early 19th Century. As much as these, however, the story is one of values and identity, of the weird wobbly liminal space between childhood and young adulthood where questions of faith and belief are tested. It is an exciting and enormously pleasurable story with a charming innocence that is nevertheless still infused with just enough harsh reality to make the fun fairy presence acceptable. The magical fantasy element is just about at the limit of what I can stomach, but nevertheless I am intrigued by Elizabeth Goudge and there are many more of her books (both children’s and adults) that I would like to explore at some point.

Similarly republished by the Girls Gone By imprint is Mabel Esther Allan’s 1956 young adult novel ‘The Amber House’. Of course no-one used the term ‘Young Adult Fiction’ in 1956 so Allan’s book would have certainly been shelved in the Children’s Fiction section of the local library and bookshop. Like ‘Smoky House’, ‘The Amber House’ is as much about place as anything else, in this case the small town of Rye in Sussex. Anyone who has ever visited must surely have been charmed by its narrow streets and pleasing architecture and it is likely too that a certain number of those visitors would be unable to think of the place without also remembering E.F. Benson’s Mapp and Lucia characters. Benson, as many of you will know, resided in Lamb House whilst writing his stories and the house is Mapp’s ‘Mallards’ to Tilling’s Rye, complete with Garden Room of course. Prior to Benson, Lamb House was perhaps most famous as the dwelling place of Henry James, and it is certainly his association which is celebrated most by the National Trust which now looks after the property. Incidentally, as a slight aside, if you have been watching the recent BBC adaptation ‘Miss Austen’ you might have spotted Rye rather preposterously masquerading as Sidmouth, Jane and Cassandra Austen walking with their parents and Henry Hobday down West St and past Lamb House after attending church. These literary connections (with the exception of the Austen/Sidmouth deceit) are mentioned, along with a great deal more, in Samantha Littles’ introduction to the 2024 reissue of ‘The Amber House’ and her additional contextualisation of Rye’s free-trading past helps set the scene for Mabel Esther Allan’s marvellous piece of fiction.

The story revolves around Helen Brierley, a young woman just about to embark on a career in education (as a secretary, of course) but who is rather suddenly diverted into a job supporting her great aunt. This formidable lady (what great aunts in fiction are not formidable?) is writing a book about her home, the historic (and titular) Amber House. Situated on Mermaid Street in Rye, Amber House is modelled on what was once the Neptune Inn. This black and white timber framed building sits opposite the similarly styled Mermaid Inn, and much is made of the free-traders’ tunnels and hideyholes (existing and conjectured) within the architecture. Indeed it is arguably the architecture that is the real star of the book, for as nicely drawn characters as Helen, her great Aunt, the young, adventurous Derry Brown and the romantic interest of Peter Glynde are, it is the little towns of Rye, Winchelsea and the Amber House itself that steal the show. It must certainly have been a grand advertisement for the area in 1956 and I imagine a generation of youngsters must have grown up yearning to visit after reading ‘The Amber House’, no doubt dreaming of treasure hunts and hidden tunnels. That it still casts such a pull on this rather older reader in the 21st century is certainly testament to Mabel Esther Allan’s skills and I’m keen to try more of her books in the future.

Of course Rye and its environs was a favourite too of Malcolm Saville. Born just along the coast in Hastings, Saville used the area in several of his Lone Pine Club adventure stories, including 1964’s ‘Treasure at Amorys’ and 1969’s ‘Rye Royal’. As noted last year when I was writing about Enid Blyton and Saville, it is possible that Blyton was at least inspired by conversations with Saville when writing ‘Five Go To Smugglers Top’, for that book was published almost simultaneously with Saville’s ‘The Gay Dolphin Adventure’. The third instalment of the Lone Pine Club series, this remains one of my favourites, as does the 1951 outing ‘The Elusive Grasshopper’ which also features what is perhaps my favourite of many marvellous covers to Saville’s books. It is tempting to suggest that one reason the Rye instalments in the Lone Pine Club series are my favourites is to do with the descriptions of the town and surrounding landscape but I suspect too that a bigger reason for the enjoyment is that the terrible (in more ways that one) Morton twins tend to be less prominent in these stories. In ‘Treasure at Amorys’ and ‘Rye Royal’ they are, thankfully, a minor annoyance, and Saville instead focuses more on the development of the relationship between cousins Jon and Penny Warrander. This exploration of blooming romance, including the ones between the other ‘couples’ in the Lone Pine Club does eventually rather pull the later Lone Pine stories down, but in ‘Rye Royal’ it just about works. That said, it is perhaps the first obvious moment where Saville struggles to square contemporary youth cultural trends with his rather more traditional notions. There is a struggle too, I think, with simply resolving the entire thirty five year lifespan of the series, in which the characters age just a few years. In retrospect I wonder if Saville might have been better simply ‘doing a Blyton’ and ignoring the tiresome effects of time’s passing both in terms of the age of his characters and the time period of his books’ setting. Of course he rather digs a hole for himself from the off in this latter respect by pulling in references to the war and soldiers in the series’ 1943 debut ‘Mystery At Witchend’, and utilising the Blytonesque trick of setting everything in a kind of idealised and non-specific era might well have jarred with a desire to use very specific places as his settings. Regardless, the Lone Pine Club series does seem to stagger somewhat resignedly into the 1970s and there does feel like something of a rushed necessity to tie up all of the romantic threads that were so delightfully suggested in the earlier books. It is this desire for some kind of resolution that, to my mind, makes the final few books so relatively disappointing. There are still some moments of excitement and Saville’s flair for capturing place (as opposed to period) remains in place. Yet by acknowledging the aging process and the development of, ahem, ‘feelings’ these books lose some of the charm that made the majority of the preceding instalments so appealing. As in ‘The Smoky House’ and ‘The Amber House’ this appeal was to a large extent to do with conjuring that peculiar liminal space between childhood and adulthood, that fleeting period of delicious uncertainty. So whilst it is all very pleasant to see Jon and Penny, Tom and Jenny and, finally, AT LAST, David and Petronella cementing their devotion to each other as couples it is also peculiarly disappointing. One cannot help but wish they could have stayed in that space of thrilling uncertainty forever. Anticipation is so much better, after all.

This explains perhaps why, on current reflection, I have a preference for Saville’s six book series featuring the Jillion family over the Lone Pine Club books. Published in a six year period between 1948 and 1953, the compact time period sees none of the characters grow up/older, allowing the tremor of romantic suggestion between Mandy Jillion and Guy Standing to stay at just the right level of will they/won’t they throughout. Only the third book, 1950’s ‘The Sign Of The Alpine Rose’ is a minor disappointment, given that Guy and Mark Standing do not appear and that Saville allows a degree of tiresome English exceptionalism to creep into the otherwise exciting Eric Ambler style thriller. The other five books in the series are pretty much all equally enjoyable, although the 1948 season opener ‘Redshank’s Warning’ and the following year’s ‘Strangers at Snowfell’ just edge ahead as favourites. ‘Strangers at Snowfell’ is notable for its excellent depictions of railways and trains as well as its typically evocative capturing of place, in this case the landscape around Shap summit in Westmorland. The snowbound train and the trek cross-country to a farmhouse in the book recall J.Jefferson Farjeon’s 1937 creepy detective novel ‘Mystery In White’ and I wonder if Saville had it in mind when he was writing? Similarly, I wonder if Ian Samson was thinking about either or both these books when writing his tremendous ‘Westmorland Alone’ from 2016? One rather hopes so.

‘Redshank’s Warning’ really must be the pick of the crop, however, not least for its utterly charming cover illustration showing a windswept Mandy Jillion on a blustery Norfolk shore. Once again, watchers of Ben Robinson’s tremendous ‘Villages By The Sea’ show will have seen this landscape during the episode focusing on Cley-next-the-sea, for ‘Redshank’s Warning’ is set in nearby Blakeney, its church’s beacon tower playing a prominent role in the story’s climax. This is another fine example of Malcolm Saville at arguably the peak of his powers and it is no surprise that in a poll of Malcolm Saville Society members it ranked as the third favourite of all his books, with only ‘The Gay Dolphin Adventure’ and ‘Mystery At Witchend’ being rated higher. All six of the ‘Jillies’ books have been reissued by the Girls Gone By imprint, although even now the first three of these are almost as hard (and expensive!) to come by as the first edition hardbacks. All, needless to say, are pieces of treasure more than worth hunting down.