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Ntime the real culprits are still at large There’s no choice but to form a crime busting team The Big Six As the evidence stacks against them can they solve the mystery and trap the real criminalsIncludes exclusive material In ‘The Backstory’ find out about birds boats and fish and put your own detective skills to the. When I was a child books by Arthur Ransome were the kind of children's books that adults thought that children ought to read but which I found rather boring Our school library was well stocked with them so I read a few but if I'd been on Good Reads back then I'd have given them two stars three at the most I can remember little of what I read and perhaps I read Coot Club of which this is a kind of seuel and I suppose my main memory is knowing what the Norfolk Broads were the kind of knowledge that comes in useful when watching TV uiz shoes like Pointless until you've seen them so many times that you stop trying to work out the answers and rather try to remember which uestion is going to come up next and which of the very familiar contestants gets the right answer I also read Missee Lee from which I learned that typhus was a serious disease but when I grew up I found that its cousin typhoid was common Arthur Ransome's books were great for children who liked messing about in boats but the closest thing we got to that was paying an exorbitant fee for half an hour rowing round the island in Joburg's Zoo Lake or the slightly less crowded Germiston Lake The Big Six has boats lots of them But it is also a whodunit and that adds to the interest I don't remember reading it as a child I do remember reading a couple of Enid Blyton's Secret Seven series where a group of children outwit the criminals that have the local police foxed In this one it is not difficult to guess the culprit but the child detectives are themselves accused of the crime and so in order to exonerate themselves they have to find the real culprits The crime is casting off moored boats and stealing some euipment not major crimes worthy of Interpol but serious enough in a small village where the children's fathers are boatbuilders and a bad reputation could harm their livelihood Though it takes a long time for the children to identify the suspects that is not the main problem The main problem is to collect evidence that points unambiguously to the perpetrator because so much of the evidence they do manage to collect is open to different interpretations So as a children's whodunit this one is uite sophisticated Finding a suspect is one problem getting enough evidence to convict is another In addition to being a whodunit there is an undercurrent of environmental concern perhaps of wider concern now than when Ransome wrote it in the 1930s One is conscious of such concerns throughout the book that and the price of things The idea of a lawyer's fee being 66c makes the mind boggleI don't think I read this one as a child but if I had I wonder if I would have been able to grasp that point at the age of 9 or 10 But as an adult I thoroughly enjoyed it

Arthur Ransome Á 5 Read

The Big Six‘Why shouldn’t we be detectives too’When Dick and Dorothea arrive in the Norfolk Broads all set for a blissful summer on the river they find their friends the Death and Glories in a very bad situation Accused of setting boats adrift sabotage and theft the boys are under suspicion by everyone on the river And in the mea. This is probably my least favourite Ransome and I've never previously been able to work out why But I think it's for two reasons1 uite a lot of it is actually uite miserable It's no fun being hounded when you're innocent and even when Dick and Dot turn up it's still uite hard going for the Death and Glories2 There is stuff Dot isn't allowed to do just because she's a girl I can't seriously believe for a second that the creator of Nancy Blackett thought this was correct it's Mrs Barrable's attitude not Ransome's and the writer's intention is not to put girls in their place but to provide a credible reason for Pete to be the one that is in charge of the camera at the critical moment and therefore rack up the tension a bit But probably because it's so out of place in Ransome's books I think this sidelining of Dot has always slightly annoyed meIt's a shame really because in other respects it's a Ransome so therefore it's brlliant The plot is excellent a really good whodunnit with a suitably tense climax The sub plot of the enormous pike is also one of the best tales Ransome ever tells Port and Starboard are away from home so there are fewer characters for Ransome to keep organised And he captures perfectly what people say and how they feel and what they do I particularly love it when the Death and Glories find themselves rich beyond their wildest dreams Definitely worth reading as are all Ransome's books even if it's not my favourite