Reviewing Elizabeth Goudge's "The Rosemary Tree"

Harriet Smith is a former nanny, former housekeeper, and currently permanent invalid trapped in the upper story of a vicarage in an English village tucked away from the world.

John Wentworth is the priest, practically raised by Harriet, with war-shattered nerves and a chronic inferiority complex that makes him weak, forgetful, and inattentive.

Daphne is John’s wife, who married him on a rebound when she was humiliatingly left at the altar. Pragmatic, ambitious, energetic, Daphne has no patience for anyone who isn’t—especially her husband.

Reading Nostalgia: Peggy Parish's "The Key to the Treasure"

Peggy Parish is an author best recognized for her multitude of Amelia Bedelia books, wherein a cheerful and VERY literal-minded maid gets into all sorts of scrapes with her misunderstandings of common figures of speech. These books are great ways for children to learn how to read—and how to enjoy reading and wordplay.

The Key to the Treasure is the next step, being longer and more complex than the Amelia Bedelia Easy Readers, yet still retaining a sense of fun that helps transition young readers from “See Spot Run” to longer chapter books.

The story is about three siblings—Jed, Liza, and Bill—as they go spend the summer with their grandparents. Their planned adventure of building a tree house is continually put on hold due to rain throughout the story, causing them to pursue another, less conventional adventure. Just before the Civil War their great-great-great-grandfather created a mystery for his children to solve while he was at war, in order to distract them from worrying about him. The treasure hunt was to have led them to three artifacts that were part of a family collection of Indian relics, including a doll, a war mask, and a shield. The first clue, however, was mistakenly destroyed, and for generations the mystery remained unsolved and the treasure lost.

Reading Nostalgia: Marguerite de Angeli's "The Door in the Wall"

I remembered nothing about The Door in the Wall except it was set in the Middle Ages and its protagonist was a boy who lost the use of his legs—both things which can be determined by the front illustrations or the back cover.

Ten-year-old Robin is the son of a knight and a lady-in-waiting. When his father goes to war and his mother is called to serve the Queen, it’s arranged for Robin to become a page to Sir Robert de Lindsay. Unfortunately before a messenger can come to fetch Robin to begin his new life, Robin falls ill with a vague fever that claims the use of his legs. As if that weren’t bad enough, his home town is stricken with the plague, and Robin finds himself alone and helpless in his own home.