I’m almost ashamed to admit that I’ve never read the Chronicles of Narnia. I’ve had the entire set of books on my shelf for as long as I can remember, and just checking the front of the book now, I can see that this edition was purchased for me more than 20 years ago, definitely the oldest book on my to-read shelf!

I seemed to remember reading this book halfway through quite a lot when I was younger, but having actually read the book now, I realise that I must only have ever read about 20 pages or so before I gave up. When I was younger, fantasy wasn’t really my thing and I don’t think I really got it, I was more into the typical girly books that were around like the sleepover club and Jacqueline Wilson.

But now I’ve read it, I’m very excited to read the rest of the series. I’ve not seen the films that have been made in the last few years, so although I know kind of the general idea of The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, I completely had no idea what to expect.

A couple of years ago I read Mere Christianity by Lewis, in which his faith is clearly apparent. I didn’t expect to get so much of that in the Narnia books, but the biblical connotations were quite clear. A world created in stages by a magical creature, a tree of whose fruit you’re not supposed to eat, the lion who refers to boys as ‘Sons of Adam’ and girls as ‘Daughters of Eve’. It’s hard not to see it, but unlike some Goodreads reviewers who seemed to be put off by this, I enjoyed it.

There were quite a few quotes that stood out to me, but this one stood out over the rest:

“The trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed.”

As I said before, I can’t wait now to move on with the rest of the series. They’re not exactly long books, so it shouldn’t take me long to whizz through them!