The Marlows and their Maker by Anne Heazlewood

Author: Anne Heazlewood

The Marlows and their Maker is a companion to the Marlows series by AntoniaForest. Newly published by Girls Gone By Publishers, it includes over 200 pages of material devoted to her popular and acclaimed series. 

This excellent book presents a study of the stories – the plots, the characters, the real and fictional geography – putting them into the context of the different times at which they were created, and incorporates all Forest’s comments on and criticisms of the original work.

Sue Sims, Antonia's literary executor, has written the Introduction, at the end of which she says: 'Perhaps the greatest compliment I can pay this book is that, reading it before publication, I kept thinking: "Oh-why didn't I think of that?" Insight, wit and love - they make for a fascinating volume.'Forest

Anne Heazlewood was one of the discriminating readers who persisted in admiring the Forest books throughout the era of 'kitchen-sink realism' when they were banned by some libraries for being politically incorrect. She had discovered the earlier books in her youth and went on to collect the rest of the Forest canon as it appeared.

Later, and by then herself an established author of children's and other books, she conducted a lengthy correspondence with Antonia in which they discussed not only the latter's books but also many other topics. Anne wrote and subsequently sent to the author a study of her Marlow books, and, although she was careful to say that she did not expect any answer, she was delighted when in due course ForestAntonia replied in great detail. However, the book was never published commercially. Forest

The Marlows and their Maker: a companion to the series by Antonia is a completely revised and expanded edition of that original work. Anne presents a study of the books-the plots, the characters, the real and fictional geography-putting them into the context of the different times at which they were created, and incorporates all AF's comments on and criticisms of the original work. Forest

She has also provided a fascinating survey of the books which the Marlows themselves read, and extremely detailed cast lists of both the modern and the historical characters (not forgetting the animals!). The appendices include a farewell tribute, updated from the one which Anne wrote for Folly when Antonia Forest died, and a revised version of Margot Louis's article 'Stars, Sharpened by the Coming Frost: The Marlow Series and the Forest Chill' which also originally appeared in that journal and which Professor Louis has expanded for this book.

Most of the book's copious illustrations have been specially commissioned; they include photographs of many of the real places mentioned in the Marlow series, together with those known or thought to have inspired the fictional ones, and a map giving the known geography of all the books. There are also portraits of the historical figures who feature in the two Elizabethan titles, and a map of the London of that era.

The book includes:

• An introduction by Sue Sims, AntoniaForest’s literary executor
• Six specially created maps and charts
• Over 30 illustrations, one taken by AntoniaForest herself and most of the others commissioned for the book; the six colour pages include a spread showing the covers of the various editions of all Forest’s books
• A transcript of one of AF’s letters to the author, plus a facsimile of the first page
• Detailed ‘cast lists’

This is a real must for the keen AntoniaForest reader and has been produced to the very high standards readers have come to expect from Girls Gone By.