Lying awake at night, Tom hears the old grandfather clock downstairs strike . . . eleven . . . twelve . . . thirteen . . . Thirteen! When Tom gets up to investigate, he discovers a magical garden. A garden that everyone told him doesn’t exist. A garden that only he can enter . . .

About this Author

Philippa Pearce was one of the twentieth century’s greatest children’s writers. Her books include Tom’s Midnight Garden, winner of the Carnegie Medal; The Squirrel Wife, illustrated by Wayne Anderson; and A Finder’s Magic, created for her two grandsons and illustrated by their other grandmother, Helen Craig. Philippa Pearce died in 2006.

Review

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‘A beautiful and haunting story’ loved by kids and adults alike

The one thing about book club is that you never know what you might find. LBCPuffins is all about the little people’s books, one’s that have stayed with us for years that we want to reread and recently one’s we haven’t heard which has led us to discover some little gems.

Tom’s midnight garden is all about a young boy who gets sent away to his Aunt’s and Uncle’s to prevent him from catching measles. He has to stay indoors all the time in case he develops it, but at midnight after hearing the Grandfather clock strike 13, goes downstairs to discover a garden no one told him about. In entering this garden after midnight he meets a young girl called Hatty and after a while becomes really close friends. On later occasions to the garden he finds it’s not always the same, sometimes it’s summer, sometimes it’s winter, sometimes he meets a younger Hatty and then an older one.

The whole story sweeps you along on Tom’s adventures in the garden, meeting Hatty, finding out her story, Tom’s investigation of why Hatty was dressed the way she was, as the group pointed out, not being able to use the internet and digging out the encyclopaedia’s, yet again another book we have read where modern technology is not involved and wonder what we would do without it at the touch of our fingertips even though it’s still quite new age thing, using the internet and such.

‘Nothing stands still, except in our memory’

This was a story loved by everyone. the friendship of the two children, from playing int he garden to Tom’s idea for hatty to hide the skates and for him, and to later find them in the floorboards made him realise she wasn’t a ghost. Previous to this the group enjoyed the little argument the children had about who was the ghost. As the children were from different time periods, it could be said both were. But it was such a sweet scene.

The whole story was beautifully written and captivated the group, with its secret adventures into the garden. The story was also loved for covering years and not weeks when Tom visited the garden, and the fact that he always saw Hatty as the same age until nearly the end when Peter appears and points out Hatty is nearly a woman. The book brought adventure, friendship, and at the end, brought a lot of us to tears when Tom meets the older Hatty.

One question I raised to the group, was had they seen the TV adaption, and some after reading this as a book on its own mentioned that they would be deeply suspicious of any film adaption as it would try to fill in the gaps. It was also mentioned that this book is a world of imagination and with most adapted to screen it makes you lose the characters you created in your head and how you perceived them. I think it might work as a play in the theatre, as the theatre creates magic itself and you feel apart of it. Something I didn’t mention on the night, but film and TV will always be a shady area when it comes to book adaption

In the end the story unfolds that it was all through Hatty’s dreams, similar to a programme once or twice mentioned named Sunset Beach where everything happens and the lead character wakes up and it is all a dream, but this was far better, so find a copy, grab a cuppa and let yourself delve in to Tom’s Midnight Garden.

SCORE

8/10