Five Go to Billycock Hill

Enid Blyton’s Five Go To Billycock Hill is another delightful instalment in the beloved Famous Five series, packed with adventure, friendship, and just the right amount of mischief. This time, Julian, Dick, Anne, George, and Timmy the dog set up camp on Billycock Hill, where they meet Toby—a fun-loving farm boy with a knack for pranks. The story quickly takes a thrilling turn when two RAF pilots, including Toby’s cousin Jeff, are accused of defecting and stealing top-secret planes!

What Makes This Book Great:

Engaging Mystery: The plot keeps you guessing—are the pilots really traitors, or is there something more sinister at play? Blyton does a fantastic job of weaving suspense with the Five’s trademark cleverness.

Fun Camping show more Vibes: The setting on Billycock Hill is quintessential Blyton—rolling countryside, hidden caves, and plenty of picnics (with lashings of ginger beer, of course!). The camping scenes make you wish you were right there with them.

Toby’s Pranks Add Humour: Toby’s playful jokes and mischievous personality bring a light-hearted balance to the more serious mystery. His dynamic with the Five is a highlight!

Loyalty & Bravery: As always, the Five’s teamwork and courage shine—especially when Timmy (the best dog in fiction) gets to save the day (again!).

Final Thoughts:

This book is a fantastic mix of excitement, humour, and old-fashioned adventure. While some aspects may feel dated (as is the case with many Blyton classics), the charm of the Five never gets old. If you love mystery, camaraderie, and a good old-fashioned British countryside romp, Five Go To Billycock Hill won’t disappoint!

A must-read for Famous Five fans and anyone craving a nostalgic, fun-filled adventure!

Would definitely recommend picking it up for a cosy, exciting read—whether you're revisiting childhood favourites or discovering Blyton for the first time. Happy adventuring! show less

Five Go to Billycock Hill

Brief Summary by Poppy Hutchinson (from http://www.enidblytonsociety.co.uk/): Whilst camping on Billycock Hill, the Famous Five, accompanied by Toby, a friend from a local farmhouse, encounter a mystery surrounding a Secret airfield nearby, and the mysterious disappearance of two planes. Toby's Cousin: Jeff, who is a Flight-Lieutenant at the airfield is also missing, and it seems as if he and an accomplice have made off with the planes. Can the children clear his name and discover the true culprits?


Random thoughts:

A very classic beginning, with the children planning a camping trip on their own, Uncle Quentin being Uncle Quentin, Aunt Fanny patiently dealing with him... The book does all the right things and it show more works, although it has less impact at this point, after having just listened to other similar beginnings in Go Off in a Caravan and several others.

This time there's no train trip. They go by bike, like they did in Get into Trouble. This time, of course, the bike trip is not the main dish of the vacation, but it reminded me of that book, with its bucolic feeling, stops at little villages to buy ice creams for everyone and complain that Timmy doesn't even taste his since he eats them in a gulp... Yeah, familiar, but in a good way.

So unlike the previous book, this one introduces a new location, Billycock Hill. There's Billicock Farm, where a schoolmate of Dick and Julian lives, there's lonely nature, there's caves, a butterfly farm, a small air force base used to test secret prototypes... Everything a group of adventurous children desire.

Toby, the boys' schoolmate, was a pleasant but standard ally. His main distinctive trait is that he is a joker. That creates some entertainment when he clashes with George, although sometimes he lets things get too far and Julian has to put him in his place. Ah, and he also really looks up to his aviator cousin. But I loved his little brother Benny and his pigling Curly. They are so incredibly cute! I like how Benny went wherever he wanted and always blamed his pigling who "runned away" so that he had to follow. And of course their farm, being a farm, it's a source of unlimited food for the always hungry Five, and also lends them tents so that they did not need to carry too much weight from home.

We see the airfield of the base from afar and meet Toby's cousin, who is a flight-lieutenant at the base. When he is suspected of being a spy and thief later, the children can't believe it because he seemed so honest (that has been changed from the original where he seemed so British).

The two butterfly-crazy breeders from the butterfly farm reminded me of Mr. Luffy from Go Off to Camp, although Mr. Luffy was more genial and understood children better.

In the butterfly-farm there's an old woman servant who reminded me of a similarly scared character in Get into Trouble, who was moved when the children were kind to her and gave her some money, and would more than repay them later, in this case with some information. She was also scared of her son, like the deaf old lady in Five on a Hike Together.

I quite enjoyed the pre-adventure part, although it was all rather familiar one way or the other. But it was done well.

The main novelty of the book is that it's a spy story. Well, I guess we have had those when people try to steal Uncle Quentin's secrets and it's implied they may be working for foreign governments. But here it feels even more like a spy story, with the secret military base and all.

I enjoyed the scene where Toby takes them to a pool for a swim and they are scolded and chased away by a uniformed official from the airfield. Julian has to do his thing and placate the officer with his good adult manners. But it serves to create a sensation of mystery, with so much security. Those military guys keep themselves informed of any strangers who come to the area. It's not enough to detect the bad guys, though.

The children brought a radio to listen to their favorite programs and the news. They had never expressed any interest in radios during previous adventures, and you know it's going to play a role in the adventure, although it's mostly to keep them informed of the news regarding the base.

Then there's a storm, the children visit the caves as an activity they can do with bad weather (although, isn't it dangerous to get into caves after strong rains?... I guess it depends on the type of cave), there are strange going-ons and the adventure is under way.

By now I'm not shocked at how meekly George accepts being left out of the dangerous parts, along with Anne. :( I like you fiery and determined, George!

So the book does a lot of things right, although without breaking new ground. The adventure, however, is a bit lightweight, without much sense of real danger, and sometimes it feels like the children don't do that much, that a lot of it just happens around them. The bad guys who stole the planes die on their own in plane accidents because of the storm, the other two foreign bad guys run away, the local bad guy is arrested by the police on an unrelated charge and it's already in police custody shortly after his role in this matter is discovered, the two kidnapped aviators are found by chance more than anything...

So, an enjoyable enough entry in the series, better than the previous book (Five on a Secret Trail), but not at the level of the very best.


Next up: Five Get into a Fix show less

Eh ...
I just finished the Adventure Series by this same author and I really enjoyed those. The kids in this series are clearly older -- Julian being the eldest -- and the girls continuing to be the youngest.

Most interesting, I thought, was the fact that George is actually a girl. Her name is Georgina. She goes by George. And she prefers for people to think she is a boy. She was actually insulted when she was told she couldn't join the boys because she is a girl. The book was written in the 1940s so I just thought it was interesting ... this type of thing happened on the 40's too but we didn't make as big a deal about it -- tomboys, etc.

Adrianne

Enid Blyton remains -and after this book, stays - as one of my favorite authors. This book made for a good merry tale of adventure and innocence, and the pages flew by in one day. I needed this book after a few mismatched and false starts and hiccups. I needed the silky and fluid narrative that this book provided. If there had been a clever enough ending instead of the dumb one provided then it would be one of the best ever. This book is about the Famous Five going off to a Hill bracketed by a proper Farm and a Butterfly Farm. It's about two airmen that needed rescuing from the Caves(of course).

La primera parte un poco pesada porque ya llevan muchas excursiones seguidas y tampoco estaba pasando nada en esta. En cuanto aparece el primo Jeff se anima la cosa, aunque el pobre apenas sale.

Se nota el cambio de traductor (ya desde el anterior libro) porque está lleno de comillas fuera de lugar y hay más faltas que antes. Yo supongo que estas cosas en ediciones posteriores no pasan.

They go off butterfly chasing with some strange folk

Red