Calf in the Cottage

Animal Ark [GB Order] #15

by Lucy Daniels

Helping Mr Matthews on his dairy farm is a dream job for Mandy and James - especially at milking time. But one of the cows is in trouble. She's about to give birth early - to twins. Will her calves survive?

Genres: Childrens, Animals, Juvenile, Fiction, Chapter Books

192 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published March 11, 1996

About the author

Lucy Daniels is the collective name for the writing team that created the bestselling children's book series Animal Ark, many of the books are also published under the name of the series creator, Ben M. Baglio.

Reviews

[A.R. Collins · Rating 2 out of 5]

This book is okay, but it's very unoriginal, with the (new?) ghost writer borrowing ideas from previous books in the series and using them to no great effect. I've long since got bored of Sam Western trying to expand his empire by bullying other farmers, and when the problems he causes are to be solved by an unseen son vaguely sorting out finances 'in Australia'... well, I call that lazy! The story is about the cattle farm as a whole, with no specific calf protagonist until the final chapters, which I personally think is the biggest mistake of all.

[Merry Christmas · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book

[Rena Sherwood · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was really written by Linda Kempton. Hopefully one day soon, publishers will stop using the fake author names on book series and just print the names of the real authors. Even kids are smart enough to find out who the real writers are.

I gave this four stars more out of sentiment than anything else. In May of 2022, after a failed suicide attempt, I finally decided to start reading again. I'd stopped for about a year when the excreble Blackface Stallion by Helen Griffiths killed my lifelong desire to read. This was the first book I read after my failed overdose.

It's a decent enough story, similar to Lamb in the Laundry. It has a touch of James Herriot about it, although the whole series, initially, was influenced by Herriot. It's not too happy of a story, but it's not a weepy. It's a good entry in the series. Why it was never published in America, I've no idea.

You don't absolutely have to read the previous books in the series, but reading at least a couple will help prepare you for the general tone of the story and give background on the key players. There are references to characters from the previous books, like the Spry twins and their cat Patch.

There is a bit of slapstick that was common in the early books. The names of the animals aren't very imaginative, such as a cat being named Moggy, but that's a small quibble. I've not liked this illustrator, Shelah McNicholas, since she doesn't bother to read the text closely. She draws the calfs as beef cattle, when they're supposed to be dairy calves.

[Jessie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Helping Mr Matthews on his dairy farm is a dream job for Mandy and James - especially at milking time. But one of the cows is in trouble. She's about to give birth early - to twins. Will her calves survive?

[Sammy]

I was completely obsessed with this series of books when I was a child and my aim was to read every single book. They are a really good children's series.

[Taylor Troncin]

Loved this series when I was younger. Still a huge animal lover and would like to read the rest of this series!