5.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 20/04/2009

I was given this book when I was ten years old.

I read before that time, but this really set me on the avid reader path!

I purchased this copy to give to my son's girlfriend, after we had lunched at a place called "The Secret Garden".

She had only seen the most recent movie, so I felt it was time she was educated!

I so love the book, and it is still listed as my favourite book, even though it is essentially written for children.

I read my old battered copy yet again, last year, and found I love it still.

OK, it is realism, it is based on outdated concepts of patriarchy and class.

All, the same, it is a wonderful read!

:-)

4.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 24/05/2011

The Secret Garden is an amazing book. It is a model of construction and language, character (both of children and adults), behaviour, suspense and humour. Of course, it is about a time which, although just 100 years ago, is as far from us today as the Grecian Wars. But the author gives us a picture of a time without computers and mobile phones when a garden was a place to be simply enjoyed not forgotten in a rush for something ever more popular and a time when being active was a way of life. As you may gather I enjoy this book every time I read it and although it was meant for children of that time, it reverberates for modern day adults too.

4.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 07/03/2007

Upon finding an old key, a little girl then finds the door that takes her into her secret garden. This is her private place which she reluctantly shares - and watches her garden bloom. During this time she finds out more about why the garden has been closed up for all this time - and also goes on a journey of discovery.

5.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 16/02/2007

The Secret Garden is a gorgeous classic about an obnoxious spoilt but neglected little girl whose entire outlook on life and character begin to change after she discovers the enchanted Secret Garden of the title where everything seems just perfect and wonderful. It is a beautiful story that is still fresh.

4.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 14/01/2007

Mary Lennox is so contrary that she could have inspired the children's ryme "Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary" She is a spoilt English child, raised in India by her black slaves and never is never paid any attention by her parents. When they die of plague, Mary must move to England and stay with her uncle, a forbidding man who's wife dies many years ago. Mary discovers family secrets that no one wants revealed and her heaart is not the only one that opens during this novel. A classic that a I forced to read at school, I know find myself loving this beautiful story.

4.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 29/10/2006

An enjoyable, though old fashioned, kids' story. Mary Lennox is, at the beginning of the book, an obnoxious child who it is very hard to like - though, having learned how she has been brought up, it is hardly surprising that she is like that! Gradually, though, as the book unfolds and Mary interacts with other children (especially down to earth country boy, Dickon), she becomes more likeable and even manages to help her cousin learn to walk again - a minor miracle, in the eyes of his servants.

1.0 out of 5 based on 7 reviews. – Customer review on 06/12/2006

The Secret Garden is a kids book that is probably going to appeal a lot more to young girls. Yet another story where a child is relocated from one country to another to be with an uncle type.

The girl's family has money, but she makes friends with an ordinary kid and go and hide in a garden. Adventurous they aren't.