I was definitely a voracious reader as a kid, my parents would vouch for that. (And my husband would confirm that it’s no different today). When I was a child, I remember reading at night in bed before I went to sleep, and I even had a notebook where I’d write down words I didn’t know, and my parents would explain the definitions to me when they came to turn out the light.

Thanks to the influence (and book collection) of my mother, I was a mad keen fan of Enid Blyton books – and I know she gets some bad press these days, but I’ve still got a shelf full of both my own Enid Blyton books and those I inherited from my mother, and I’ll be reading them to my children. Her Secret Seven and Famous Five series were high on my favourites list and I remember adoring The Magic Faraway Tree in particular. (I hope you’ll confess in the comments if you also read a tonne of Enid Blyton books as a child …)

As I got a little older, so Australia also got a little less British, and the influence of American authors like Judy Blume seemed to grow. By far my favourite and most often re-read Judy Blume book was Tiger Eyes. I swooned, and felt so grown up when I read it. It’s still on my shelf too and I should re-read it now, I think, as I’m wondering what it’ll seem like to a real grown-up!

Finally, I have a really strong memory of a book I used to borrow from the local library over and over again. It was a novel by Mabel Esther Allan called The Night Wind (I’d forgotten, but thanks to Google I know again) with a main character named Tafline. I really have no idea at all what drew me to this story, but I read it many times and I can even picture exactly where it could be found on the library shelf.

Over to you: what were your childhood favourites? Do you think you’d still like them today, or want your children to read them?