Product Description

Reunited for the summer, the Swallows and Amazons with Dick and Dorothea launch a prospecting expedition to find the lost gold mine of the high hills above the lake. But the mining camp runs into all sorts of trouble: not only the danger of fire in the drought ridden countryside but also scary encounters with unsafe tunnels. Worst of all is the sinister Squashy Hat, who appears to be a rival prospector and who's certainly a spy - how can they keep working without him discovering what they've found?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #227990 in Books
• Published on: 2001-10-01
• Released on: 2001-10-01
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 433 pages

Review
“He makes a tale of adventure a handbook to adventure.” –Observer

“There is plenty of excitement, a little danger, a quality of thinking, planning and fun which is delightful and stimulating.” –TLS

From the Back Cover
“He makes a tale of adventure a handbook to adventure.” –Observer

“There is plenty of excitement, a little danger, a quality of thinking, planning and fun which is delightful and stimulating.” –TLS

About the Author
Arthur Ransome was born in 1884. He was in Russia in 1917 and witnessed the Revolution, which he reported for the Manchester Guardian. After escaping to Scandinavia, he settled in the Lake District of England with his Russian wife where, in 1929, he wrote Swallows and Amazons. Thus began a writing career that has produced some of the best children’s literature of all time.

Customer Reviews

A book to fire the imagination of children of all ages
In this sixth 'S & A' adventure, summer has come once more, and the Swallows are back in the Lake District, together with the two D's, on another holiday with their boating friends, the Amazon pirates. This time, the children desert the lake and take instead to the High Topps, prospecting for gold.

While adult readers will be unable to do other than admire the children's enthusiasm (sufficiently infectious to draw most young readers into it wholesale), they will probably have a feeling of impending disaster from quite early on, in this book. The Amazons' impetuous natures, combined with the others' general inexperience and limited knowledge of mining and its chemistry, lead them all (except, perhaps, the more sensible Susan!) into more scrapes, as well as rather more dangerous situations, than usual.

This leads to a different (but no less absorbing) desire to keep reading this tale than that likely to affect the more naïve younger reader. Both young and old are, nevertheless, likely to spend much of the time on tenterhooks during this book, as the young prospectors explore old mine workings, try their hand at charcoal burning and build and operate a blast furnace in their camp, out on the tinder-dry fells! For once, one can only feel something of a sense of relief that times have changed since 1936, when this was written! One can't help feeling - and being grateful for the fact - that modern children would not be terribly interested in repeating some of the activities undertaken here.

In summary, then, "Pigeon Post" is every bit as exciting (and at times far more nerve-wracking) and educational as the other books in this series: another winner from Arthur Ransome.

Swallows and Amazons at their best!
Undoubtedly the best of Arthur Ransome's 10 book Swallows and Amazons series. Suspense, intruige and natural disasters keep children and adults alike on their toes throughout. The plausibility of the story adds an exciting dimension to the plot. Ransome's superb ability to develop distinct personalities for his characters is one of the most enjoyable aspects of his writing, and Pigeon Post is perhaps his best example of this.

Superb book for adventurous kids everywhere.
I read this fun book to my seven year old and had to restrain from reading ahead and finishing it on my own. The level of adventure and imagination the children in the book get into is inspiring for our children and us grown-ups alike. A good choice for any elementary aged child's library