The Enchanted Wood recap

A brother and his two sisters move to a country cottage and discover the nearby Enchanted Wood, where the trees whisper and one enormous tree, the Faraway Tree, rises into the clouds. Climbing it, they befriend the folk of its trunk: the elf Silky, round-faced Moon-Face with his slippery-slip slide, the deaf Saucepan Man, the peevish Angry Pixie, and Dame Washalot with her cascading wash-water. A ladder at the top leads through a cloud into lands that change from time to time, some delightful and some dangerous, always to be left before they move on. After many trips through lands of toys, treats and surprises, the children help drive off an invasion of Red Goblins that threatens the wood, and the tree folk reward them with a birthday party in the Land of Birthdays. The children end safe at home, with a tree full of magical friends to return to.

A brother and his two sisters leave the town behind and settle with their parents in a cottage at the edge of the countryside. Exploring nearby, they come upon a thick wood whose trees seem to murmur and whisper among themselves, a sound they learn to recognise as the mark of an enchanted place. Pushing deeper in, they discover one colossal tree that towers above all the rest, its crown lost somewhere in the clouds and its branches bearing several different kinds of fruit at once. Small doors and windows are set into the vast trunk, and lights show behind some of them. The children realise that folk must live inside the tree and that this is nothing like the ordinary woods they knew. They resolve to come back and climb it to find out who lives there.

Climbing the great tree, the children get to know the folk who live along its trunk. There is the Angry Pixie, who hurls water or ink at anyone who peeps through his window; Silky, a small elf with golden hair who feeds them Pop Biscuits and Google Buns; the drowsy Mister Watzisname; and Dame Washalot, whose tipped-out washing water comes cascading down the branches, so that climbers must dodge it. Near the top lives Moon-Face, whose round house holds a slippery-slip slide spiralling down inside the trunk, ridden on a cushion that a red squirrel carries back up. They also meet the Saucepan Man, hung about with kettles and pans and so deaf that he mishears almost everything. At the very top a little ladder leads through a hole in a cloud into whatever land happens to be resting there, and the children learn that the land changes from time to time. Their early trips include a dizzying Roundabout Land, an encounter with a magic snowman, and a narrow escape from a land tied to the tale of the three bears.

The children keep climbing to sample the lands that settle at the top of the tree. Some are a treat - a land of toys, and the Land of Take-What-You-Want, from which they carry home useful and welcome things for their mother and father - while others turn dangerous with little warning. The hard rule of the tree is that a land only stays a while before moving on, so anyone who lingers too long risks being carried off to somewhere unknown when it goes. More than once a visit becomes a scramble to reach the ladder in time, and Moon-Face, Silky and the clanking Saucepan Man help the children out of the scrapes their curiosity leads them into. Between adventures the children come and go from the cottage, sharing the tree folk's treats and mishaps and keeping the whole thing a secret of their own.

The adventures build to trouble in the wood itself when a band of Red Goblins invades the Enchanted Wood and threatens the Faraway Tree and its folk. With the help of Moon-Face, Silky, the Saucepan Man and the other tree-dwellers, the children join in driving the goblins off, and the wood is made safe again. To celebrate, the folk take everyone up to the Land of Birthdays, where one of the sisters is given a birthday party by their new friends, complete with presents and a feast. The book closes with the children secure at their cottage, the goblin threat gone, a whole household of magical friends established in the tree, and the workings of its ever-changing lands well understood - ready to slip back into the wood whenever they can.

The book ends with the Enchanted Wood safe again after the children and the tree folk together drive off an invading band of Red Goblins that threatened the Faraway Tree. As a celebration, everyone climbs to the Land of Birthdays, where the folk throw a party for one of the sisters, with presents and a feast among their new friends. The children then return home to their cottage with the danger past. By the close they have a settled circle of magical companions living in the tree - Moon-Face, Silky, the Saucepan Man, the Angry Pixie, Mister Watzisname and Dame Washalot - and they understand how its lands come and go and how to visit them safely. Nothing forces the family to leave, so the secret of the tree remains theirs to enjoy, and the way is left open for their cousin to join the adventures in the next book.