The Story of Topsy.

The Story of Topsy: Little Lonely of Central Asia by Mildred Cable and Francesca French.  Hardcover published in 1937 by Hodder and Stoughton.

Whenever I see the words “Mildred”, “Cable”, “Francesca” and “French” in very quick succession, I get a little excited (not Tom Cruise jumping up and down on the couch excited… just a little excited).  These two lovely ladies were Christian missionaries in China in the early 20^th century.  They wrote various books about their travels, some books about religion/missionary work in China and even managed to scribble out a few childrens books.  It’s the travel books that are of interest to me and are the reason for my excitement.  I have actually read one of their books (Through Jade Gate And Central Asia) and despite it being a few years ago, I remember very clearly that it was a great read and despite their stopping off to pray a little too often for my tastes, they were very interesting women having a very interesting time at a very interesting time in Central Asia.  

This book unfortunately, appears to not be as interesting as the book I read.  When I write “not be as interesting” I am of course giving my humble uninformed opinionated opinion and I’m willing to admit that I may be wrong (go on tell me I’m wrong).  I haven’t read the book and to be honest, if I had read the blurb a little more closely, I possibly would not have picked this book up… Topsy was a Mongolian girl adopted by Mildred and the book according to the dust jacket is a sequel to another book about Topsy entitled “Something Happened”.  Topsy… somehow I don’t think that it’s a name of Mongolian origin and why you would name someone after a rabbit, I don’t know (sounds like a rabbit name to me) ...again I may be wrong, Topsy may be a very traditional Mongolian name.  Skimming very quickly through the book, it appears to be written for children.  So I made a judgement call when I found it and in hindsight I think it was a mistake.  Travel books... good, religious conversion of Mongolian girls written for younger readers… not so good.  I will still list it on ebay and it will be cheap… you never know something may happen.