The Railway Children

5/10

Wholesome, heart-warming, simple, charming, and full-to-the-brim with goodness.

Surprisingly, this novel was quite funny, with the interactions and quarrels between the children providing the greatest source of amusement. I strongly suspected that the children were vegan on the basis of this event. “That was a wonderful breakfast. It is unusual to begin the day with cold apple pie, but the children all said they would rather have it than meat.” What I particularly enjoyed about the novel is that it presented, often complex emotions, in a manner that could be understood and appreciated by children. I’m thinking of, for example, when Bobbie intrudes on Mother when she is upset and quietly leaves without alerting her to her presence or when the children inadvertently offend Perks by giving him donated gifts for his birthday. The first of these incidents has the purpose of illustrating that Bobbie is the most emotionally intelligent of the children and the second provides a lesson on charity and pride, comprehensible to young people. When Mother was ill, I had an awful feeling she was not long for this world. Thankfully, I misjudged the novel’s willingness to kill her off. My major criticism of the novel is that it does not really have a coherent story. Essentially, it is a series of unrelated anecdotes that have very little meaningful impact on the main plot, Daddy is absent/in prison, and this makes the novel feel unfocused or rudderless at times. The storyline that involved the Russian writer, for instance, felt like a redundant digression and its inclusion raised many questions for me. If Daddy is accused of being a spy, why have unnecessary interactions and friendships with actors from outside the state? Why include this at all? I would wager Peter is glad that the novel is not set in 2021 as the cancel culture would be after him for the following faux pas. “Everyone thought Peter was carrying things a little too far when he blacked his face all over with coal-dust and struck a spidery attitude”. Finally, I thought that Perks was hysterical. In my head he was an older man in his 40s or 50s. I really had a hearty chuckle when he reveals about mid-way through the book that he is 32.