Despite suffering from tuberculosis Tom is playful and fun but Sarah is more elusive, only appearing at night, being very shy and keeping her face covered. Thankfully, after that (and the titles) we're back in normality to catch our breaths and pray that the opening was nothing more than a traumatic misstep by the director.

Moondial - Helen Cresswell - Google Books

Carefully wrought and evanescent as a ghost story should be, this will be enjoyed by any admirer of Tom’s Midnight Garden. It’s sort of a literal way of coming to terms with the past which also reflects how you come to terms with your own life: no simple answers, but growth; no magic bullets, but a complex untangling of past traumas. D uring the 1970s and 1980s, children’s television drama was arguably at its height with both original and adapted material being brought to the screens during weekly tea-time on a consistent basis by both the BBC and ITV networks. The first episodic release didn't land until 2009 when it had a limited DVD release through Reader's Digest, a much more widely available DVD finally came in 2015.Minty might have felt like she was a ghost and, indeed, upon first meeting Tom there was much playful debate between the two over such matters but, unlike Tom and Sarah, she certainly was not one. There were attempts to revive it, some successful (Tom’s Midnight Garden and a couple of the Nesbit Five Children adaptations), some not (Archer’s Goon) and Century Falls (which as a child I recognised immediately as a cynical attempt to emulate this era and hated with a passion. I spoke to one school child who went on the ‘Below stairs’ tour and experienced life as a kitchen boy. This story follows the saga of Araminta (or Minty for short), who has discovered she has a strange talent for seeing ghosts.

Moondial by Helen Cresswell | Waterstones

Actually this comes over as a cross between 'Tom's Midnight Garden' and 'The Amazing Mr Blunden', both definite childhood favourites and, I have to say better than this. Sadly, Ferguson passed away in just his mid-50s, so listeners were denied hearing any more of his excellent, talented work.Following Moondial, she went on to appear in a number minor roles in other television series and could have been a much bigger star than she ultimately became as her potential clearly stands out here. Tom may not yet know it, but his destiny is instead to free another child trapped in the shrouded blackness of night another century away at Belton House and will need Minty’s guidance to help him.

Moondial by Helen Cresswell book review | Yakbooks Moondial by Helen Cresswell book review | Yakbooks

There are around twelve line drawings which are evocative of the mood of the story and add an air of mystery to the book. so that should her reflection cast upon any of them then they would crack, ruin and the devil will come and get her. As this unearthly symphony unfolds, a young girl in white sets off from a set of church gates, making her way across a moonlit lawn and towards a moondial where she pauses. However, Minty's quest has an unexpected obstacle in its way in the form of darkly enigmatic ghost hunter Miss Raven (Jacqueline Pearce), who Minty soon discovers has a disturbing connection to Belton House's ghostly past.I would highly recommend this not just to adults interested in similar stories but also to young readers. Okay, there's a brief discussion between Minty and World about 'moontime', which attempts to broach the subject but this is sadly smothered by vague notions. In line with other children’s drama of this era, this adaptation tackles, head-on, themes of death, bereavement, isolation and displacement alongside physical and mental child abuse with strong undercurrents of the supernatural and creeping threat. She’s hauntingly attractive and exactly the right sort of actress for this part, doing a terrific job in what was her first professional acting role. Helen Cresswell, a BAFTA award winning children’s author, was passionate about developing the imagination and creativity of youngsters.