The Folk of the Faraway Tree recap

A stuck-up, disbelieving girl named Connie comes to stay with the children while her mother is unwell, and scoffs at the idea of a magic tree - until the folk of the Faraway Tree, from the ink-throwing Angry Pixie to Dame Washalot's wash-water, show her otherwise. Climbing to the lands at the top, the group visit a Land of Giants, a Nursery Rhyme Land and the school of the strict Dame Slap, and have to search for Connie when she vanishes in the Land of Marvels. Later Connie loses her voice for eavesdropping in the Land of Secrets and has it restored only in the perilous Land of Enchantments, where several of the friends are nearly lost. When the Faraway Tree itself begins to wither, its folk work together to save it. By the end Connie has been humbled and grown fond of the tree, and after a last visit to a Land of Treats the children bid the tree and its folk a fond farewell, closing the series.

Across the first two books, a brother and his two sisters found the Enchanted Wood and the great Faraway Tree that rises through the clouds, its top opening by a ladder onto lands that change from time to time. They befriended the folk of the trunk - Moon-Face and his slippery-slip, the golden-haired elf Silky, the half-deaf Saucepan Man, the peevish Angry Pixie, the sleepy Mister Watzisname and Dame Washalot with her cascading wash-water - and learned that each land could be a treat or a trap and had to be left before it moved on. In the second book a cousin came to stay and was won over to the tree, and when the children's mother fell ill they fetched a cure from the Land of Magic Medicines. Every visit follows the same pattern: climb the tree, go up into whatever land is resting there, and come safely down again before it swings away.

A girl named Connie comes to stay with the children while her own mother is unwell and away for a long rest. Connie is bossy and pleased with herself, and she flatly refuses to believe there is anything magic about the wood or the tree. The children take her in among the folk of the Faraway Tree, where her airs get short shrift: the Angry Pixie flings ink at her through his window and Dame Washalot's wash-water catches her on the way up. The children introduce her to Moon-Face and the others, and tea with Moon-Face begins to shake her disbelief. Around this time the Saucepan Man's mother gives up her place as a baker in Dame Slap's land and comes to live in the tree, where she opens a shop selling cakes and sweets. For all that she has seen, Connie's superior manner still needs a good deal of softening.

As the group climb to the lands at the top of the tree, Connie's boastful ways keep landing her in difficulty, and the tree and its folk refuse to be impressed by her. They visit a Land of Giants, reached by way of a beanstalk, and a Nursery Rhyme Land where figures such as Jack and Jill and little Miss Muffet are met in person. A visit to the land of the strict schoolmistress Dame Slap goes wrong and most of the party are shut up in her school, so that the two sisters have to contrive a rescue. In the Land of Marvels Connie wanders off and vanishes, and the others have an anxious search before she is found and brought safely back. Through these scrapes Connie slowly begins to lose her airs and to see the worth of her new friends.

Toward the end the friends face their sharpest dangers. In the Land of Secrets, Connie listens in on a secret that is not hers to hear, and as a punishment her voice is taken away. It can be restored only in the Land of Enchantments, which comes to the tree next, and that land proves so dangerous that several of the group are nearly lost in it for good before all are brought safely out and Connie can speak again. At one point the Faraway Tree itself seems to wither and sicken, and it is the folk of the tree, working together, who save it. By now Connie has changed completely: her boastfulness is gone and she has grown truly fond of the tree and its people. The friends round off their adventures with a visit to a Land of Treats - ice creams, a roundabout ridden on live animals, balloon rides and a circus. Connie is sorry to leave, and the children say a fond good-bye to the Faraway Tree and its folk, closing the series.

The book, and the series, ends with Connie fully reformed. Near the close she loses her voice as a punishment for eavesdropping in the Land of Secrets, and it is given back to her only in the Land of Enchantments, a place dangerous enough that several of the group are nearly lost there for good before all are brought out safely. When the Faraway Tree seems to wither and die, its folk band together to save it. Humbled by her adventures, Connie has shed her boastful manner and become genuinely fond of the tree and its people. The friends celebrate with a final visit to a Land of Treats, full of ice creams, a roundabout ridden on live animals, balloon rides and a circus. Connie is sad that her stay is over, and the children say a fond good-bye to Moon-Face, Silky, the Saucepan Man and the rest, and to the Faraway Tree itself. As the last of the three books, it leaves no thread open: the door on the Enchanted Wood is closed with the tree safe and its folk secure.