Summer is here! Let's grab the suntan lotion and ice cream and head to the... book about summer term at a boarding school! That's right. We're all just putting the books away and here I am dragging everyone back to school. The book I chose is about a Muggle boarding school for girls, Malory Towers. Upper Fourth at Malory Towers focuses on Darrell Rivers, the central character, and the summer term of her fourth year at the school.
We first meet Darrell's younger sister, Felicity, in earlier books whining about how she wants to go to the school her sister is at. Now we get to witness the excitement at her finally being able to go to the same school as her sister. Both girls are excited to be going to school together, and it makes me realise just how much I missed out on that feeling of going to school with siblings. None of mine are close in age to me, so I was never able to have those memories as others, like Darrell and Felicity, have.
Anyway back to the book! Darrell has a dormmate, Alicia, and she's not exactly everyone's cup of tea. She's the prankster of the group (sounds like a couple of the SOUP Staff) and has those quick brains that can make some people jealous. Alicia's cousin, June, is also starting at the school and instantly takes Felicity under her wing. This is despite Darrell telling Felicity that she would show her around with such excitement about being able to show her sister everything. However, June starts to do tiny bits of manipulation herself and begins to make Felicity do as she says. That includes Felicity spending less time with Darrell because, according to June, "the older ones don't want the younger ones depending on them so much". I feel that this is a lie because Darrell is so excited to show Felicity everything and appears to be as excited about it as her younger sister is at finally showing Felicity around and bonding.
Meanwhile, another one of Darrell's dormmates, the spoilt Gwendoline, tries to latch onto a new girl. Gwen is always a source of amusement and I'm glad that she gets rid of some of her ways, but that's a story for another book! Gwen is the only one who doesn't have a special friend and I can relate to her so much as I never had a special friend when I was at school, and it is rather a lonely world. She thinks by latching onto the Honorable Clarissa Carter she might be able to gain a friend of her own finally. Of course, this never works out and Gwen is on her own again. In some ways, it's a lesson that Gwen will not admit she learns.
Darrell is also made Head Girl of the Fourth Form and it is a very important term for her and her classmates as they have to take the School Certificate, a very important exam, which is a bit like the OWLS we have to take at Hogwarts. This means that the week of the exams is the central part of the story until they are over, and then everything is chilled. I can totally imagine what it must have been like for the girls wanting to play tennis and go swimming and do all the lovely summer things that were on offer at Malory Towers. But, instead, they had to be glued to their books for a while so they can do well in their exams.
There's a midnight feast at one point, and these feature throughout the series and opens a whole trail that ends up with June and Felicity's friendship ending and Darrell losing Head Girl for a few chapters of the book. That must have been such a horrible thing to happen for Darrell! She'd finally managed to get her temper under control, then June decides to get even with Cousin Alicia and poor Darrell is the one who loses her position. Felicity discovers what happened and promptly ends her friendship with June and only then does the First Former realise that she'd forgotten Darrell was Felicity's sister.
Darrell turns into Nancy Drew at one point, as there's twin trouble. Connie and Ruth are twins, and also new to the school, but Connie is the dominate twin over Ruth. It must be so horrible not to be able to answer for yourself as your twin talks over you and controls what you do. I bet Ruth was so saddened and upset sometimes that she wished she wasn't a twin, even though she loves Connie. Thus, when things of Connie's start getting damaged, Darrell instantly suspects that Ruth is behind it all. After learning that Connie wanted Ruth to do bad in her School Certificate, Darrell doesn't call out Connie. She makes a very level-headed decision and goes to her form tutor and it is swiftly dealt with, and Darrell is reinstated as Head Girl. I admire Darrell so much for staying calm and handling it the way she did. Some people would publicly shame someone for behaving the way Connie did, but Darrell handled it well and redeemed herself after the June Affair.
I just love that there can be similarities between magical and wizarding boarding schools and differences too. What I love about Malory Towers is that I can pick up a book and read it in a couple of hours because it's such a short book.
I have two questions for you, so don't forget to answer them for a shot at the raffle prizes!
Question 1 - Do you have any specific book that you would like to see featured in the Book Club?
Question 2 - What is one of your favourite books to read over and over?
Anyway that's all for now.
Until next month,
Adele x