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E. Nesbit's Five Children and It is a magical adventure for 11 year olds about five children who dig up a very grumpy sand-fairy.
Cyril, Anthea, Robert and Jane have just moved out of London to a white house in the country, along with the baby of the family, known as the Lamb. With both parents called away, they grab their spades and decide to dig a hole to Australia in the gravel-pit.
What they find instead is the Psammead. He has eyes on stalks like a snail, ears like a bat and a fat furry body like a spider. He's thousands of years old and VERY easily offended. And he grants wishes, one a day, which only last until sunset.
Sounds brilliant, doesn't it? Except every single wish goes wrong in a new way.
They wish to be as beautiful as the day, and their own baby brother screams at the sight of them. The maid shuts the door in their faces, so they spend a hungry afternoon in a ditch waiting for the sun to go down. They wish for gold and get a whole gravel-pit full of old coins that no shop in Rochester will take. (Grabbing buns in a bakery and biting them before anyone can stop you turns out to be one answer.)
Reading it is like being told a story by someone a bit mischievous. The narrator keeps stopping to chat to you, with little asides about grown-ups and why town children are so naughty. And the children bicker just like real brothers and sisters do.
The Psammead is the star, though. He's rude and sulky and worried about his whiskers getting wet, and somehow you end up very fond of him.
This is an old book and it sounds like one. There are hired carriages, pinafores and a nursemaid, and some attitudes have dated. The maid shouts an insult about Italians at Robert, and the narrator makes a crack about girls believing things more easily than boys. It might be worth a quick chat if your reader notices.
Because of the old-fashioned language, it's also a lovely one to share. If your reader has ever daydreamed about three wishes and been sure they'd choose better, they'll have a great time watching this lot get it wrong!
If they like the idea of city children let loose in the country with the grown-ups out of the way, try The Return of the Railway Children. Edie is sent out of wartime London to an aunt she has never met, at a house right beside the railway line.
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