Seacrow Island

Astrid Lindgren's Seacrow Island is a slow, sunny adventure for 8 year olds about a father who rents a holiday cottage without ever going to look at it.

What happens

Melker Melkerson liked the name. That was the whole reason. He is nearly fifty, he writes books, and his nineteen year old daughter Malin says he is more irresponsible than his own sons.

There are three sons. Johan, Niklas, and Pelle, who is seven and loves every living creature he comes across.

The little steamer takes most of a day to get there. Pelle explores every corner of it, gets chased out of the pilot's room, and finds a girl with a raven in a cage.

By the time they reach the island it is pouring. One child is standing on the quay in the rain, not moving, with the biggest St Bernard Malin has ever seen. Her name is Tjorven and she is about seven. Malin writes in her diary that she has never felt so small.

And the cottage? Old man Söderman has already warned Pelle. Either you like it when the rain comes in through the roof or you don't.

Reading it is the pleasure of very little happening, slowly. A stove that has not been lit since the turn of the century. A blackbird in the whitebeam tree. Waves against the jetty. Melker swinging from horrified to delighted inside a minute, which is just what he does.

The children are wonderful company. Tjorven answers a grown-up's question with a question of her own and gets away with it. Pelle decides a five year old is worth putting up with if she owns a raven.

Worth knowing before you hand it over

The children's mother died the day Pelle was born, and Malin has been mothering all of them since, including Melker. It is background rather than something that happens, and it is told plainly in a page. But the ache of it sits under the whole family, and Pelle worries in a quiet way about Malin marrying and leaving them. For a child who has lost someone, that might land hard. For most it just explains why this family holds on to each other so tightly.

If your reader likes a book where the place does most of the work, this is a lovely one. Nothing needs saving. Nobody is in danger.

What to read next

There is a similar summer in Caterpillar Summer, with another older sister quietly holding everyone together. Cat is the one who knows what her little brother needs, and three weeks away from home is her first chance in years to just be a kid.