Five Children and It, Edith Nesbit
Five Children and It, Edith Nesbit
9 Rating(s)
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Five Children and It

Author: Edith Nesbit

Narrator: Michael Ward

Unabridged: 5 hr 9 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 04/09/2024

Synopsis

After moving into a house in kent, five children go exploring and in a gravel pit, find a Sand Fairy, known as a "Psammead" who says he will give them one wish each day. What follows are eleven misadventures where it is discovered that making a good wish is actually much harder than it first appears...
The first in E.Nesbit's "The Psammead" trilogy, published in the Strand Magazine from 1902.
Narrated by Michael

About Edith Nesbit

Edith Nesbit, the daughter of John Collis Nesbit, a schoolmaster, was born on August 19, 1858. Her father died when Edith was only six years old. Despite money problems, Edith's mother managed to educate her daughter in France.

At the age of nineteen, Edith met Hubert Bland, a young writer with radical political opinions. In 1879, Edith discovered she was pregnant; she married Hubert on April 22, 1880, and the baby was born two months later.

Edith and Hubert were both socialists, and on October 24, 1883, they decided to form a debating group with their Quaker friend Edward Pease, Havelock Ellis, and Frank Podmore. They decided to call themselves the Fabian Society and were later joined by other socialists. Edith and Hubert became joint editors of the society's journal, Today.

Edith was a regular lecturer and writer on socialism throughout the 1880s. However, she gave less time to these activities after she become a successful children's writer. Her most famous novels include The Story of the Treasure Seekers, The Wouldbegoods, Five Children and It, The Phoenix and the Carpet, The Railway Children, and The Enchanted Castle. A collection of her political poetry, Ballads and Lyrics of Socialism, was published in 1908.

After the death of her husband in 1914, Edith married Thomas Tucker, an engineer. Edith continued to write children's books and had published forty-four novels before her death on May 4, 1924.

Reviews

Goodreads review by Manny on April 25, 2010

Somehow I missed reading Five Children and It when I was a child myself, so when I saw a copy at a yard sale I had to buy it. It only cost 10p, and the little girl who sold it to me looked rather like an E. Nesbit heroine, very serious, with huge dark eyes. The plot is a variant on "be careful what......more

Goodreads review by Margaret on August 01, 2008

Nesbit is the great-grandma of pretty nearly all the children's fantasy books we love, the first author to write really wittily for kids and without condescending to them, and the originator of the basic structure that carries on through C.S. Lewis and Edward Eager and even in a way Jo Rowling: four......more

Goodreads review by Louie the Mustache on August 16, 2023

Five Children and It was a fantasy children's story published by Edith Nesbit in 1902. Clearly, a classic with moral and educational themes for children about wishes and avarice. The five children are left alone with a house full of servants while their parents must take care of one of the grandpare......more

Goodreads review by Jessica on August 01, 2015

I loved this book as a child, and read it over and over. The idea of having a wish every day is so appealing, but then seeing how it goes hilariously wrong day after day is great, too. I read this aloud to my kids (July 2015), and though my 10yo liked it, my 6yo was less engaged. I found myself havi......more

Goodreads review by Luisa on November 21, 2023

I’m on a roll this year! I am pretty stingy with my five star ratings so to give yet another six stars is something! This easily wins six stars. The premise and execution are positively clever. The children find a sand fairy, and when they learn that it grants wishes, they kind of make one on the sp......more

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