Racketty-Packetty House

by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Book Overview

The owner of a tumble-down dollhouse neglects its shabby occupants for a more aristocratic dollhouse and tenants, until a princess comes to visit and likes Racketty-Packetty House better.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0397316429
• ISBN13: 9780397316427
• Release Date: January 1975
• Publisher: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins
• Length: 60 Pages
• Weight: 0.05 lbs.
• Age Range: 4 to 9 years
• Grade Range: Grades 2 to 4

Customer Reviews

Simply the best!

Our children love this. I love this. Gorgeous illustrations, wonderful story, great life lessons ... what more can I say? Appealing to both boys and s.

Timeless classic- but only part of the 4 part series!

My grandmother had the Queen Crosspatch/ Queen Silverbell storis at her home and I dearly loved Racketty Packetty House as a child. It's a timeless story, beautifully told by Frances Hodgeson Burnett, and now I'm reading it with my own daughter. I have seen the new edition, and the illustrations are pretty. However, they do not compare to the original breathtaking illustrations by Harrison Cady, a turn of the century master of children's illustrations. This is really the second in a series of 4 stories, and I wonder why the others have not been re-issued. The premise is that the fairy queen "Queen Silverbell" has lost her "temper". This is actually a tiny elf that should live inside a silver cage dangling from a belt. It seems that too many children do not believe in fairies- an upsetting situation for a fairy queen. When she got angry, the cage burst open, and she lost her temper- who then transformed to a black imp and ran away. A sad state for a fairy queen, and now she is known as Queen Crosspatch, or sometimes Queen Silverbell-patch. To regain her temper, the Fairy queen has a plan to tell 4 stories to convince children of the existence of fairies and the good works they do. The first story is How Winnie hatched the Little Rooks, the next is the Racketty Packetty house, the third is The Spring Cleaning (a fabulous tale of spring and garden fairies) and the last is The Cozy Lion. I truly hope that interest in Racketty Packetty House will eventually lead to the reintroduction of the other stories too. Read it, and enjoy the best of children's literature. If you love it, let the publisher know that this is only a fragment of the real series.

Fun Child's Story

I liked the message that nothing is disposable. When a child is given a new toy, she almost discards the used one, but it is not willing to give up. 1st grader can almost read it. Very English vocabulary!

High-spirited old doll family rolls with the punches

The doll family in the old dollhouse doesn't mind when Cynthia gets Tidy Castle as a present, even when she dismisses their house as Racketty-Packetty House and sticks it behind the door. They had fallen from the "gay and fashionable life" and become shabby over the years since Cynthia's Grandmamma first owned them, but it does not dampen their spirits one bit! They dance in circles until they're hysterical and all fall down laughing, and have much more fun than the lords and ladies in Tidy Castle. When Cynthia gives the Tidy Castle dolls scarlet fever, the old dolls are quite kind-hearted to their fancy neighbors and all manage to become friends. But when Cynthia expects an important visitor and wants the nurse to burn Racketty-Packetty house, things look quite serious, even for the ever-optimistic old doll family. Fortunately, Queen Crosspatch and her Fairies are quite fond of the Racketty-Packetty dolls, and they will find a way to save Racketty-Packetty House. This is one of the goofiest, most frenetic doll books ever, with spectacular illustrations by Harrison Cady.

The dolls are at play while you sleep

How many of us have awakened to find that our dolls were NOT where we left them the night before? A wonderful read aloud that piques the imagination and prompts great kid discussions of what exactly they DO all night(you are playing with them in the daytime!) Timeless.