The Fairy Bell Sisters: Rosie and the Secret Friend
Do you believe in fairies? Join Tinker Bell’s sisters in their second magical adventure.Inspired by Tinker Bell, from the book Peter Pan, by J. M. BarrieBefore Tinker Bell flew to Never Land and met Peter Pan she lived on Sheepskerry Island with her fairy sisters – Clara, Lily, Rosie, Silver and Squeak the baby. The young fairies go to fairy school and love tea parties, dressing up and exciting adventures.It’s summer time on Sheepskerry Island, which means the Summer People will arrive for their holidays. That’s when the fairies must take great care not to be discovered by humans. But when Rosie the fairy meets a little girl called Louisa it’s hard to stay hidden. Louisa really needs a friend and Rosie trusts her. It’s fun having a human friend, but how can Rosie keep a secret from her own sisters, and what will they do when they discover the truth?Young readers will love the enchanting stories and beautiful illustrations in this charming new series.
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For Louisa and Laura
Contents
Sheepskerry Island is a fairy’s paradise in autumn and winter and spring, but not in summer. That’s when the cottages are taken over by the Summer People. Tinker Bell’s little sisters must spend the long sunny days in hiding. But this year Rosie can’t help making a secret friend…
All the fairies in the Wide World love summer – except the Fairy Bell sisters and their friends on Sheepskerry Island. Sheepskerry is a fairies’ paradise in autumn and winter and spring, and summer should be the best season of all. And for a while, it is.
In June, fairies start doing the things they’ve been meaning to do all the rest of the year: the Stitch sisters sew costumes for dress-up games; the Cobwebs crochet delicate fairy shawls; the Flower sisters take out their watercolours and paint under the pale-blue sky.
In July, it’s time to throw off fairy wings and jump in Lupine Pond and splash in the cool water.
Then there are berries for the picking, all over the island – pinkberries first and most delicate; then raspberries, blueberries, mulberries, boysenberries and finally blackberries when the days are hottest. The Bakewell sisters make pies and muffins with the freshest of the pick, and the older Jellicoe sisters swiftly store up jams and jellies for the winter months if the berry bushes are especially bountiful.
At the end of the day, the fireflies light up and the summer sun goes down; the fairies are ready to lay their heads on thistledown pillows and dream fairy dreams. But first they watch the sunset on West Shore, which every night paints the sky lavender, purple, gold and scarlet, and needs no fairy magic to be beautiful.
Summer on Sheepskerry Island would be perfect, except for the month of August. In August, the Summer People come.
Summer People are just that. They’re people. Human beings. Mothers and fathers. Girls and boys. Most of them mean well, of course, but still they are immense, bumbling creatures who trample fairy gardens and unleash barking dogs and circle the island in stinky boats and altogether make a fairy paradise into a dreadful place. So fairies stay in their houses under the Cathedral Pines and only come out safely at night.
The Fairy Bell sisters love the summer weather and the fruits and flowers of the garden, but they don’t love hiding from the Summer People. Yet hide they must.
Don’t tell me you are one of the very few children who don’t know about the Fairy Bell sisters! You are in for a treat, for you can meet them now. Allow me to introduce you to:
(They are Tinker Bell’s little sisters, by the way.)
If you are anything like me, you’d never suspect that one of the Fairy Bell sisters would end up keeping a secret from her sisters – a very big secret indeed. But just last summer, Rosie Bell did something that she hoped her sisters would never find out. It was an act of kindness, of course, an act of very great and courageous kindness, but it led Rosie into trouble and the fairies of Sheepskerry Island into danger – perhaps the gravest danger those fairies had ever known.
I’d better get this said right now: if your idea of a good book is one where everyone does everything right all the time, then you’re not going to enjoy this one very much.
If, though, you can bear to read about Rosie’s kindness to a little sick girl and how it makes her sisters ashamed of her – even though they know Rosie has done the right thing – then take a deep breath and turn the page.
You turned the page! What a good choice you’ve made!
“It’s the Summer People!”
Rosie heard Silver Bell’s cry and her heart sank. She tried not to think bad thoughts about anyone in the world, but even Rosie could not think too kindly about the Summer People.
“Now we’ll have to stay in the house all day as they unpack and unload.” Lily sighed deeply. “What a bore.”
“We could play Go Fish in the Fairy Pond,” said Rosie, “just to pass the time.” Go Fish in the Fairy Pond is very much like our card game called Go Fish, but there are no kings or jacks in the pack and the jokers are trolls. Rosie started to deal.
Last year’s crop of Summer People had not discovered the fairies’ lovely houses, for their eyes did not know how to see magic and their ears could not hear the music of fairy voices, and that was a blessing.
“How long has our house stood here, Clara?” Silver asked. “Lily, do you have any… sevens?”
“A long time, Silver, longer than anyone can remember. Houses are terribly hard to build as young fairy magic does not extend to architecture.”
“Architecture?” asked Silver.
“House building,” said Lily. “No sevens. Go fish in the fairy pond.”
“In fact,” Clara continued, “a long time ago, before any of us popped into the world, the fairies of Sheepskerry Island lived under toadstools.”
