This was a great, easy going summer book about a boy and a girl (cousins) who go off exploring and discover a ghost town of houses on the edge of a swamp. They meet two elderly people who grew up spending their summers there, and explain to the children that the swamp used to be a beautiful lake before a dam was built a few miles away. The kids are so taken with the two older people (who they later call aunt and uncle) that they sneak off away daily to visit their secret place, which always provides new things to do and to discover. A great family summer story--very mellow, though, so I don't recommend it to people looking for any kind of adventure or fantasy; just a fun old fashioned story. ( )

From the description, I thought this was going to be a fantasy-type book, but it's not really. Gone-away Lake is a real place, a swamp that used to be a secluded lake, complete with a row of posh summer houses from days gone by. Now, they're old and falling apart, forgotten by all the local inhabitants. When two cousins happen upon the sole elderly inhabitants, they... have adventures. There is an atmosphere of whimsy and mystery, but really, there's no melodrama here. Still, the story is appealing, for the romance of finding and exploring a lost community (including a furnished house that has been boarded up for years and forgotten), and making friends with adults who are interesting and interested. It won't necessarily appeal to the thrill seeker, but it's a good story with some good moments.

Not much depth to this book. I found it to be a tedious story. My children, who normally beg me to read aloud to them, simply were bored with this book. ( )

Absolutely delightful. While visiting her family in the country, Portia and her cousin discover the site of a former lake, now a boggy swamp, complete with abandoned Victorian summer homes. The only inhabitants are an elderly brother and sister, who returned to live in their former childhood home. What could be better than having an entire summer to explore the natural wildlife of a swamp, listen to stories about the glory days of the lake, and make a clubhouse in an old attic? Enright is an amazing writer and this book manages to remain fresh-sounding and not at all dated (although I can't help doing all the math in order to appreciate just how old the houses would be now!)

I read this book during a summer reading program when I was a child. After all the years, I couldn't remember the name, and then I found it on a website, and immediately reserved them at my public library. My 10 year old LOVED them! ( )