Elsie Piddock Skips in Her Sleep is one of the great Eleanor Farjeon’s loveliest stories, and Charlotte Voake’s beautiful ink and watercolour illustrations capture all its magic. Elsie Piddock is a born skipper, starting at just 3 years old with her father’s braces. Given a skipping rope of her own, she’s soon so good that she comes to the attention to the fairies. On top of Mount Caburn their skipping master Andy-Spandy teaches her their special skips, and from then on Elsie amazes all her see her. When she’s an old, old lady, a greedy lord tries to build a factory on the mountain, but Elsie skips to save it. As lovely to read aloud as it is to look at, and with a timeless message about the strength of communities, this is an absolute delight.
Elsie Piddock is a born skipper. By the age of seven, news of her skipping talents has reached the fairies and they invite her to Mount Caburn for lessons. The High Skip, the Slow Skip, the Skip Double-Double, the Long Skip, the Strong Skip, the Skip Against Trouble...Elsie Piddock learns them all, and soon there's not a mortal or fairy to touch her. Many, many years later, a greedy Lord buys Mount Caburn and threatens to build factories on its land. Can Elsie Piddock save the skipping ground for the next generation?
Sparkling with charm and a liberal sprinkling of fairy dust, Elsie Piddock's story is one to be cherished.
Eleanor Farjeon (1881–1965) is regarded as one of this country’s finest writers of poems and stories for children. In 1956 she was awarded both the Carnegie Medal and the Hans Christian Andersen International Medal; her hymn “Morning Has Broken” is a favourite around the world. Eleanor lived for many years in a little village called Houghton. The children of the village used to gather outside her cottage to play their favourite skipping games, and one day Eleanor went and asked them to recite their rhymes for her. These rhymes, which have been passed down from generation to generation, can be found word-for-word in Elsie Piddock Skips in her Sleep.
