Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

In The Exiles, we meet four sisters : Ruth, Naomi, Rachel and Phoebe (aged 13, 11, 8 and 6 respectively) who have been sent/exiled, against their wishes to spend the summer in Cumbria with their maternal grandmother, unceremoniously dubbed Big Grandma. The girls love to read but Big Grandma is determined that the four bookworms will work hard, do a lot of chores and rarely find time to sink their grubby little noses between the pages of a book.

You would think that what would follow, in the tradition of our beloved childhood reads, would be pages of adventure, mystery and crime which would be bravely handled by our young heroines.

But no.

Said heroines are daft, witless, prone to misadventure, mayhem, convoluted schemes that almost always backfire and a sense of completely innocent self-absorption. And therein lies the charm of The Exiles. The interactions between a sarcastic Big Grandma and her equally precocious granddaughters, the innocuous and often unexciting (by today’s standards) antics of the foursome, the way they nudge their quirky personalities into the hearts of the bewildered villagers, all while being innately decent children keeps you entertained from start to finish. The dialogues are hilarious and yet laced with a good degree of satirical flair. This is wry British humour at its best.

This story is an example of how a book can be written flawlessly without resorting to unnecessary drama and convoluted plotlines. I thoroughly enjoyed this return to childhood and the simple pleasures and follies that made that one scorching summer so much more memorable.