Secret Water

infobox Book |
name = Secret Water
title_orig =
translator =


image_caption =
author = Arthur Ransome
cover_artist = Arthur Ransome
country = United Kingdom
language = English
series = Swallows and Amazons
genre = Children's books
publisher = Jonathan Cape
release_date = 1939
media_type = Print (Hardcover & Paperback)
pages =
isbn = ISBN 0-613-78966-0
preceded_by = We Didn't Mean To Go To Sea
followed_by = The Big Six

"Secret Water" is the eighth book in Arthur Ransome's Swallows and Amazons series of children's books. It was published in 1939.

This book is set in and around Hamford Water in Essex, close to the resort town of Walton-on-the-Naze. It brings the Swallows and the Amazons together and introduces a new group of characters, the Eels and the Mastodon. Ransome used to sail to Hamford Water, an area of salt marshes and low lying islands in his yacht "Nancy Blackett". He set the book in this tidal location which offered a new setting for his characters and opportunities to explore and map the area.

Plot summary

The Swallows intend to sail in the "Goblin" to Hamford Water and camp with their father, but he is called away on naval business. Instead he maroons them with a small dinghy on an island. Before he leaves, Father gives them an outline map of the area they decide to call Secret Water and suggests they survey and chart the area before he returns to pick them up. For a surprise, he has arranged for the Amazons to come down from the Lake District and join them with another dinghy.

They see some mysterious footprints which turn out to belong to the Mastodon, a local boy. He mistakes them for the Eels, another family who camp in the area regularly. Later the Eels arrive and are initially hostile before they settle down for a friendly war.

It seems that due to the distractions of war and being cut off by the tides, the chart will not be completed, but at the very last minute, it is.

ee also

Beaumont Cut