Flambards is a novel for children or young adults by K. M. Peyton, first published by Oxford University Press in 1967 with illustrations by Victor Ambrus. Alternatively, "Flambards" is the trilogy (1967–1969) or series (1967–1981) named after its first book. The series is set in England just before, during, and after World War I.

The novel Flambards (book one) features a teenage orphan and heiress Christina Parsons, who comes to live at Flambards, the impoverished Essex estate owned by her crippled and tyrannical uncle, William Russell, and his two sons, Mark and Will.

Novel summary

Christina Parsons, who has been shunted around the family since she was orphaned at the age of five years in 1901, is sent to live at Flambards with her mother's half-brother, the crippled Russell. Her Aunt Grace speculates that Russell plans for Christina to marry his son Mark to restore Flambards to its former glory using the money that she will inherit on her twenty-first birthday. Mark is as brutish as his father, with a great love for hunting, whereas the younger son William is terrified of horses after a hunting accident and aspires to be an aviator. Christina soon develops a love for horses and hunting. She also finds friendship with the injured William, who challenges her ideas on class boundaries. William and Christina eventually fall in love and run away from the hunt ball to London, hoping to marry.

Series

The fourth book controversially reversed the ending of the original trilogy, twelve years later and following the television series.

  • Flambards (Oxford, 1967)
  • The Edge of the Cloud (Oxford, 1969)
  • Flambards in Summer (Oxford, 1969)
  • Flambards Divided (1981)

For The Edge of the Cloud, Peyton won the annual Carnegie Medal from the Library Association, recognising the year's best children's book by a British subject.

References

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  • —immediately, first US edition
  • a Flambards forum
  • Flying Dreams – a Flambards fan page
  • a Flambards fan page