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#1: The Chalet School Wins the Trick Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 7:55 am
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The CS Wins the Trick is a bit of a departure from the standard formula, as much of the action is centred around children who weren't currently pupils.

Brief plot description: Five children from three different families are staying on the Platz with ill relatives, and declare war on the school after a less than stellar initial meeting. Various pranks are played on the school (including stink bombs and peppering the school lunch). Joey butts in, helping with the older girls' attitudes, while the youngest girl gets lost (twice!). Audrey, the eldest, becomes more mature, and eventually the feud is resolved and the girls discover they are to become Chalet students the next term. In other news, Verity's father dies during an operation and Mary-Lou faces putting off her career to care for Verity and her mother.

What do you you think of this book? Is the feud a realistic one? How does it compare to the feud in The New Chalet School? Is Audrey's transformation from petty rebellion to a more mature viewpoint reasonable? Any comments on Mary-Lou and Verity's situation?

#2: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 8:58 am
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Sorry to whinge, but this is one of my least favourite books - I just didn't find the stuff about the Everetts & co very interesting, and a lot of it seemed to be regurgitation of old plots (mainly from New).

I suppose the stuff about Mary-Lou and Verity was to keep OOAO in "the story", but the stuff about Verity being a broken reed annoyed me.

Er, will stop moaning now!

#3: Author: Emerence, Location: Australia

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 10:06 am
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It seems a little on the tame side as far as CS books go. I had a vague feeling we were supposed to like Win, but I just couldn't. And Audrey was a bit of a confusing character to me. She often came across as being too sensible and authoritative to be such a ... well, juvenile nuisance! I think EBD should have pushed her a bit more firmly in one direction or the other.

#4: Author: Katherine, Location: London, UK

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 10:27 am
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I quite liked Audrey and the way she matured although I did find the story a bit of a drag at times. And OOAO was not necessary!

One thing I did think was that it didn't feel very EBD; the opening line about Rosalie starting it all, some of the Audrey growing up stuff. Someone recently said that Phyllis Matthewman's writing (or the bits we think she might have written, i.e. Prefects) had a 'distant' quality and I felt that about this book. But it's quite a way earlier than Prefects. Is there any evidence that Phyllis Matthewman could have had an influence this early in the series? It's a while since I read most of the other later books so can't compare too well. Also, this theory wouldn't fit with the observation (see Anything Else) that Althea and Prefects don't really fit together and thus were they written by different people, i.e. EBD and PM respectively.
Is it just me or does anyone have any thoughts on this?

#5: Author: Mel, Location: UP NORTH

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 11:16 am
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Not a favourite of mine as I found the pranks tedious and unlikely. Win goes missing twice! The school at this time is 300+ but I think EBD forgets that. Could Anna's store of bottled fruit really feed that many? (Poor Anna!) However I think EBD was desperate for new story-lines by this time.

#6: Author: RroseSelavy, Location: Oxford, UK

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 1:22 pm
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I didn't like this book either. All in all, I felt that there was very little substance to it. I also got confused over Win's age - I assumed for most of the book that she was 8 or 9, and was suprised when I realised that she was actually a good few years older. EBD wrote her as completely childish compared with her CS contemporaries.

#7: Author: Kate, Location: Ireland

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 1:58 pm
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What age is Win supposed to be?! I thought she was about six!

#8: Author: LizB, Location: Oxon, England

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 2:03 pm
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Off the top of my head I thought she was five

#9: Author: Fatima, Location: Sunny Qatar

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 4:43 pm
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A little off topic, I know, but I find the illustrations make the characters look so much younger - in the GGBP edition of 'School' I can't get over how young Jo and Grizel look. The same is true of Win on both the hb and pb covers of 'Wins the Trick'.

#10: Author: Tan, Location: London via Newcastle Australia

Posted: Fri Sep 22, 2006 5:31 pm
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I can't say I really enjoyed this book either. This was partly because it reminded me so much of the Mystic M, but partly because I didn't think that the plotlines were realistic.

I also found the characterisation of Win to be very poor. Mind you, I think that of most of EBD's portrayals of young children and their speech.

#11: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 2:46 pm
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I don't like the way everyone talks about Doris Trelawney/Carey in this book. She's made out to be a totally feeble creature who's incapable of making a decision about her own life, and isn't going to be allowed a say in her future. I especially don't like it coming from Len - it seems disrespectful for a teenage girl to talk about a woman who is so much older than she is in that way. Makes me think Joey must have been talking indiscreetly for Len to know all this.

More when I've thought some more about the rest of the book.

Jay B.

#12: Author: Rowena, Location: NE England

Posted: Sat Sep 23, 2006 10:41 pm
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JayB wrote:

I don't like the way everyone talks about Doris Trelawney/Carey in this book. She's made out to be a totally feeble creature who's incapable of making a decision about her own life, and isn't going to be allowed a say in her future. I especially don't like it coming from Len - it seems disrespectful for a teenage girl to talk about a woman who is so much older than she is in that way. Makes me think Joey must have been talking indiscreetly for Len to know all this.
Jay B.

I so agree! OOAO (and everyone else i.e Joey) take it for granted the Mrs. Carey and Verity will be totally unable to cope without ML to do everything for them, Mrs. C was a widow (to all intents and purpose even before her husband was killed) for years before she married Commander Carey, and although she had her own mother, she must have made some of the decisions. For all anybody knows, the having to cope could be the making of her but no-one is prepared to let her even try - it's just taken for granted that *poor dear Mary-Lou* will abandon all her plans and run home to take charge. I'm getting all irate now lol and it's been ages since I read it Confused

but I do get annoyed by the assumptions.

#13: Author: KathrynW, Location: London

Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 1:41 pm
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I agree with most of the stuff said about this book although I do have a bit of a soft spot for it as it was one of the few Swiss books that I had before I started properly collecting. Like Katherine, I quite like Audrey and I think EBD is quite good at showing how difficult it was for her to be trapped somewhere between being a child and grown up and how she matures during the course of the book. Most of it does seem pretty repetitve though and the bottled fruit thing has always annoyed me!

#14: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 2:18 pm
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I quite like Audrey, and I think her change of attitude is believable, although EBD does seem to think fifteen is the magic age for acquiring some maturity - with Audrey it seems to happen immediately she's past her birthday!

I'd have liked to see more of school affairs and less focus on the five outsiders. I like reading about the day to day business of the mistresses with their forms, lessons, prep, etc. The long description of the tennis match, however, I could have done without. Sport wasn't really EBD's thing (it isn't mine) and when she writes about it, it always seems that it's because she feels she must include games in a school story, rather than because she's actually interested. I think she's actually better on the winter sports and boating than on normal school games.

There's more Joan Baker bashing. And yet what we actually learn about Joan in this book is that she has a clear idea of what she wants to do with her life, she's ambitious about wanting a good post, she's prepared to work to get it, and she wants to help her sister continue her education. Definitely a strong, helpful woman, not a spineless jellyfish, I would say.

One quibble I have - when the girls out painting hear Audrey and Co calling for Win, one of them speculates that Win is lost. Miss Yolland says 'Nonsense.' Why is it nonsense? Small children do get lost, and a few minutes later they find that that is in fact what has happened. It rather puts me off Miss Yolland.

Jay B.

#15: Author: Clare, Location: Liverpool

Posted: Sun Sep 24, 2006 7:08 pm
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oh this book....

Maybe I was put off by the fact my copy is in a three-in-one and I was confused with the jumping of characters and locations (the other books with it are Eustacia and Shocks).

I just don't like it. The characters irritate me, the plot is so bland, and I totally agree with the comments about Mrs Carey. We're supposed to feel sorry for ML dropping her career for her mother - I don't! Jennie's drabble (the Bully and the Broken Reed) dealt with that so well.

#16: Author: Cath V-P, Location: Newcastle NSW

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 12:30 am
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It's one of my least favourites too - there's so much that I find irritating about it: the whole Doris Carey thread, Win's extreme childishness, the pepper incident, the condemnation of Joan Baker.... and there's the unquestioned assumption that the Chalet School way is the right way, and that if you question it, you must be brought into line.
And yet somehow, it all seems rather perfunctory, as if EBD wasn't really convinced by what she was writing.

And the final really annoying thing is that for some reason the girls are wearing brown uniforms on the d/w illustration!

#17: Author: patmac, Location: Yorkshire England

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 7:53 am
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This is the first of the books that really went downhill. EBD seemed to have to write about every term from about 1947 onwards and I get the impression that most of them from Wins the Trick onwards were potboilers. I wonder if she was bored with the whole thing by then and searching for plots. The books only seem to come to life when she is writing about Joey and her life from then on.

Could it be that she was no longer in touch with young girls and, though she knew things were changing, couldn't get her head round it?

#18: Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 8:03 am
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This wasn't one of my favorite books, but I didn't dislike it particularly.

I found the Audrey shown in the first few encounters to be a spoiled, impudent, badly behaved brat, but more realistic and likeable in the last 2/3rds of the book where she's resentful, but not starting fires on other people's property.

I do like the portrayal of Mrs Everett - she's trying to keep the kids in line, but is pre-occupied with her seriously ill husband and struggling with finances, so she can't do as well as she could - it's a nice change from the extremes of perfect parents vs total idiots.

The whole feud against the school was a repeat, but I liked this version better than the Mystic-M - Val and Celia's pranks are mischeviously motivated and bratty, but not deliberately malicious, although destroying the food was over the top. Maria and Mario Balbini, on the other hand, were a nasty piece of work - they started with physically injuring unfamiliar adults and worked their way through sabatoging the school's electrical systems and then to kidnapping, with the professed desire of hurting Madge.

I did want to smack Mary-Lou out of her self importance (and the others as well). It's really presumptuous of an 18 year old to assume that her mother and sister will fall to pieces and be unable to handle basic tasks without constant supervision. It's even worse in later books when they kill off Doris and marry off Verity so that Mary-Lou can go and be an archaeologist.

Verity was planning on teaching music in England, so a much more reasonable plan would be for Verity and Doris to share a place in England while Mary-Lou is off travelling - they could offer each other support.

Is it just me, or is this the only case where the school can't take a student at short notice. A couple of books down the line they take in a whole school at last minute notice with no space issues, but here, conveniently, it is impossible for them to take four girls who could even manage as day girls.

#19: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 9:45 am
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Quote:

Verity was planning on teaching music in England

At one moment they're saying how wet and useless Verity is, the next she's planning to be a teacher! How would she cope? Even the Chalet School had its share of disruptive pupils and disciplinary problems, and the mistresses had to have authority.

Jay B.

#20: Author: JackieP, Location: Kingston upon Hull

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 12:52 pm
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Perhaps EBD was thinking of Verity more as a private music tutor - who would only take pupils who were wanting to learn, and therefore wouldn't be as disruptive.

JackieP

#21: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 3:08 pm
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But then she'd have to deal with the parents! I have a friend who teaches the violin privately. She says she has to deal with parents who don't accept the need for daily practice, the ones with unrealistic expectations, the ones who are determined Little Johnny will learn the violin, even though he doesn't want to and it will be a waste of her time and their money, the ones she has to chase for payment...

I can't think of any career 'broken reed Verity' is suited for - even marriage and motherhood. Without ML to sort her out, her husband will probably arrive home in the evening to find Verity not dressed, the bed not made, housework not done, meal not started.

Jay B.

#22: Author: Lesley, Location: Allhallows, Kent

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 5:54 pm
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But I think the whole point was that Verity wasn't a broken reed. Yes she was slower than some, but in the earlier books her relationship with Mary Lou is on a far more equal footing - with Verity being able to rein in Mary Lou and keep her centred. It only seems in the last year at School and after she's left that Verity becomes this weak object who requires nursemaiding - this from someone who, when a child of 10 defied every mistress in the School including Miss Annersley and Joey as well over the speaking German business - nothing broken reedish there!

Quote:

Without ML to sort her out, her husband will probably arrive home in the evening to find Verity not dressed, the bed not made, housework not done, meal not started.

Ah yes, and about this - maybe I need a Mary Lou on occasion too! Wink

#23: Author: jennifer, Location: Taiwan

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 6:37 pm
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It could be a self fulfilling prophecy too - after several years of everyone telling her that she's weak and slow and incompetent and needs looking after, she may have started to believe it.

The same thing happens to Con, I think. Everyone keeps harping on about how she's moony and distracted and off in her own world, but no one ever seems to emphasise the fact that she's very perceptive and has a gift for seeing into the feelings and motivations of others. Instead, she's chastised for being too outspoken about what she does notice.

#24: Author: Kate, Location: Ireland

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 6:57 pm
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*agrees with Jennifer*

If you only correct a child when she's misbehaving and never encourage her when she does something right, she'll never learn.

#25: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Mon Sep 25, 2006 8:25 pm
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jennifer wrote:

The same thing happens to Con, I think.... no one ever seems to emphasise the fact that she's very perceptive and has a gift for seeing into the feelings and motivations of others. Instead, she's chastised for being too outspoken about what she does notice.

Yet Con's tactlessness is no worse than Joey's, but Joey is still getting away with it even as an adult. In this book, when she lets slip that Audrey & Co will be going to the CS, she laughs it off. And instead of being justifiably annoyed, Mrs Everett says she's glad she doesn't have to tell Audrey herself. Another instance of a character being made to appear weak so that Joey or ML can appear in a good light.

Jay B.

#26: Author: wheelchairprincess, Location: Oxfordshire, UK

Posted: Sat Oct 21, 2006 3:53 pm
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I haven't read this book yet, what I've heard of it has put me off. But I was wondering, what are the good parts/points of this book?

#27: Author: KB, Location: Melbourne, Australia

Posted: Sun Oct 22, 2006 7:03 am
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I have to say that one thing I do like about it is seeing the school from the point of view of outsiders, much more so than in any other book of the series. Solly (Solange) is a rather lovely character and it's nice to see her beginnings and the way she changes her attitudes towards the school. I have always found Len's first meeting with the five girls very funny. You also get a very good couple of glimpses at the staff off-duty. Finally I'm one of the people who likes Sales and I do enjoy the description of the Arabian Nights Sale.

#28: Author: Miriam, Location: Jerusalem, Israel

Posted: Mon Oct 23, 2006 10:41 am
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Kate wrote:

What age is Win supposed to be?! I thought she was about six!

Her exact age isn't given, but Len judges that she looks around the same age as Felix and Felicity. Unless there are ant quirks in their ages that I have forgotten they are almost six in this book - so at a maximum Win would be seven. She certainly considers herself far older than Cecil when she is at Freudesheim.

Quote:

Is it just me, or is this the only case where the school can't take a student at short notice.

No - they also don't have room for Maria Balbini! Wink

#29: Author: Hannah-Lou, Location: Glasgow

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:03 pm
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The bit about Win being 14 is in a "flash-forward" at the end, when it says that Audrey looks out for her so well that she's totally fed up with it when she's old enough to look after herself. Also possibly not EBD's style; she doesn't usually show you how things turned out.

#30: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:36 pm
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Val plays quite a large part in some of the later books - she takes over the Prudence Dawbarn/Francie Wilford role of Tiresome Middle - so it might be worth reading the book to see how she is intodruced.

Jay B.

#31: Author: Mia, Location: London

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 12:53 pm
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I always get confused between Tiresome Middle Val Gardiner and Tiresome Middle Val Pertwee and I so wish EBD had pitched on another name.

#32: Author: JayB, Location: SE England

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 1:02 pm
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Mia wrote:

I always get confused between Tiresome Middle Val Gardiner and Tiresome Middle Val Pertwee and I so wish EBD had pitched on another name.

Oh yes, so do I! I'm never quite sure which one I'm reading about at any time.

Jay B.

#33: Author: Katherine, Location: London, UK

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 1:32 pm
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Hannah-Lou wrote:

The bit about Win being 14 is in a "flash-forward" at the end, when it says that Audrey looks out for her so well that she's totally fed up with it when she's old enough to look after herself. Also possibly not EBD's style; she doesn't usually show you how things turned out.

I don't remember that bit. What was said apart from that?

#34: Author: macyrose, Location: Great White North (Canada)

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 2:34 pm
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There's another "flash-forward" in Theodora, one of the hints that Margot will become a nun:

Quote:

So Margot was allowed to keep it and it was in her bedroom at Freudesheim. But the Head was quite right. It would be many a long day before the girl could rejoice in it again, and it served as a reminder to her of all that had happened at the time, but Margot was changing and changing fast. Her feet were on the right road and she would do her best to keep them there. When the day came that it was her turn to leave school and fare forth into grown-up life, she admitted to Miss Annersley that the little clock had helped her time and again to stop short when she had been going to go wrong.
“And I’ll have it with me while I’m at college,” she added. “After that, it must go to someone else—Phyll, perhaps. You know what I told you I hoped for. I know I don’t deserve to have my heart’s desire, but I have tried these past four years.”
“And succeeded,” Miss Annersley said with a smile. “You must wait for it, Margot, but I am sure you will get it in the end.”
But all that was four years ahead. In these days, Margot was a girl who was truly repentant and doing her best to make good, as the Head believed.

#35: Author: Kate, Location: Ireland

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 2:41 pm
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Wins the Trick:

Quote:

She did not feel quite so pleased about it after breakfast when her mother took her off for a serious talking-to about running off like that. She had to promise that she would never do it again. Not that she had much chance. Having forgotten her small sister once, Audrey took good care not to do it again – not, in fact, until she herself was grown-up and Win, with all the dignity of thirteen years, asked her to stop running round after her.
"There's no need. I can quite well look after myself!" Miss Win said with a toss of the fair hair that still curled riotously over her head.

F+F are six, so Win must be thereabouts. Seven years would be enough for Audrey to be "grown-up".

#36: Author: Katherine, Location: London, UK

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 2:50 pm
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Thanks Kate, that was going to bug me.
I'm sure there is another instance of a short flash forward where EDB says something like, 'a whole lot of trouble was to come from this but she couldn't have seen it then'.

#37: Author: Kate, Location: Ireland

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 2:56 pm
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Katherine wrote:

I'm sure there is another instance of a short flash forward where EDB says something like, 'a whole lot of trouble was to come from this but she couldn't have seen it then'.

She says that in one of the later books - I think Adrienne? - and no trouble comes from it at all, which is rather amusing.

#38: Author: Katherine, Location: London, UK

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 3:01 pm
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Ah yes, that well known phenomenon in EBD where she sets something up and then forgets all about it. Well, it provides material for a fair few drabbles.

#39: Author: Ray, Location: Bristol, England

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 3:02 pm
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Kate wrote:

Katherine wrote:

I'm sure there is another instance of a short flash forward where EDB says something like, 'a whole lot of trouble was to come from this but she couldn't have seen it then'.

She says that in one of the later books - I think Adrienne? - and no trouble comes from it at all, which is rather amusing.

EBD actually does that sort of flash forward thing quite frequently. There's on in Exile, early on, where Joey says something along the lines of "Well if this is the worst you ever see me look, you'll be doing well."; there's another at the end of Ruey about Francie and Ruey becoming girls to credit any school; there are several along the lines of the one Katherine mentions - MOST of which do actually pay off! So it's not a unique thing to Wins the Trick by any stretch of the imagination.

Ray * Smile

#40: Author: Hannah-Lou, Location: Glasgow

Posted: Wed Oct 25, 2006 3:39 pm
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I think the flash-forward in Wins the Trick is a bit different because it is an actual (very short) scene from the future, not just a warning that something is going to happen. We see what Win looks like as well as what she says. Also, it's not telling you about something that's going to happen in the books. The "a whole lot of trouble was going to result from it" sort is a warning about something that is going to appear in the story, and I'm glad EBD doesn't do it too often; it's a style I particularly hate. "Little did she know it would be the last time she saw her friend alive..." You spend the whole time afraid to look at the book because you know something bad is going to happen, and you don't get to enjoy the happy bits for worrying when it's all going to go wrong Evil or Very Mad

Sorry, rant over! Embarassed

#41: The Chalet school Wins the trick Author: Fiona Mc, Location: Bendigo, Australia

Posted: Thu Oct 26, 2006 8:36 am
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Just to add to the rant, she does the same with Grizel in Carola, by saying that the Grizel who left was to return in 5 years a very different person. The only difference I saw in Grizel was that she was extremely depressed and not much better when she made an appearance in Reunion.

#42: Author: Loryat,

Posted: Thu Oct 26, 2006 1:39 pm
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Katherine wrote:

I'm sure there is another instance of a short flash forward where EDB says something like, 'a whole lot of trouble was to come from this but she couldn't have seen it then'.

She says it in Challenge when the new girl looks upon Jane Carew as someone who should be friendly with her. Then there's no trouble whatsoever! EBD's editors need a good whack over the head for such carelessness.

I quite like this book, probably because it was one of the few I read as a kid. I like Audrey and Solange and find their developing attitudes and Audrey's incresing maturity quite realistic. It is quite believable for Audrey, after realising how sick her dad is, to grow up a lot in a short time.

The Doris/Verity thing didn't bother me too much. IMO, EBD is just using Len for exposition though it would have been better if she had used someone of a more suitable age. I always saw Doris as a bit of a sap so I'm not surprised by everyone's attitudes to her, and I think I can understand where they're coming from with Verity. However, I think she could probably have stood on her own two feet if circumstances had demanded.

Mary-Lou's appearance in here is annoying as there's no real need for it. Or rather, not her appearance but her butting in. However, I think EBD was writing to a popular formula and maybe didn't expect people to read every one of her books. Mary Lou never used to bother me until I realised how consistently she pops up.

As regards EBD's style in this one, I don't know if anyone else would agree with me but I think sometimes she tries out a different style for an opening as a sort of experiment. She does it in Feud too, I think, and the opening of Eustacia is very Frances Hodgeson Burnett.

#43: Author: Alison H, Location: Manchester

Posted: Thu Oct 26, 2006 1:55 pm
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I don't mind the opening of Wins The Trick, but I hate the opening of Eustacia - the "arrant little prig" line Twisted Evil

#44: Author: Kate, Location: Ireland

Posted: Thu Oct 26, 2006 2:02 pm
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And the opening of Peggy - which confused me for a long time.

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