On the Run (novel)
{{Short description|1964 children's novel by Nina Bawden}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=April 2022}}
{{Infobox book |
| name = On the Run
| title_orig =
| translator =
| image = Three on the Run (novel).jpg
| caption = Cover for US edition
| author = Nina Bawden
| illustrator =
| cover_artist =
| country = United Kingdom
| language = English
| series =
| genre = Children's novel
| publisher = Victor Gollancz (UK)
Lippincott (US)
| pub_date = 1964
| english_pub_date =
| media_type = Print (Hardback; Paperback)
| pages = 207 pp
| isbn =
| oclc =
| preceded_by = The House of Secrets
| followed_by =
}}
{{Portal |Children's literature}}
On the Run (also Three on the Run) is a 1964 children's novel by British author Nina Bawden. It was also published as Three on the Run in the United States.[https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000GT0XRK Amazon.com] It is an independent sequel to The House of Secrets.Saturday review, book 48, 1965, p. 130 [https://books.google.com/books?id=D17oAAAAMAAJ&q=nina+bawden+%22three+on+the+run%22 Online]
Plot
When Ben's cousins, whom he lives with, are unwell, he is forced to spend the summer with his father and stepmother-to-be. They live in London and have little time to spend with Ben. So Ben decides to explore the gardens of the terrace houses in his street. He walks along the walls connecting all the houses until he comes to one covered in jagged glass. Ben then falls into the garden and meets Thomas, a young boy from Tiga, who is being kept in London, while his father, Chief Okapi, is exiled there. When Ben discovers a plot to kidnap Thomas, he, Thomas and Lil (a friend of Thomas) decide to run away.
Bawden's comments on the book
Bawden said that the novel is set in London and in Herne Bay,[https://books.google.com/books?id=_Q_HP9YHvgsC&dq=bawden+herne+%22on+the+run%22&pg=PT88 Autobiography retrieved 21/1/17] ‘a seaside town on the coast of Kent’, where Bawden's parents lived.Cornelia Jones, Olivia R. Way: British children's authors: interviews at home, American Library Association, 1976, {{ISBN|0-8389-0224-3}}, p. 41 - p. 54
Nina Bawden remarked she intended "to write about children actually escaping — even though temporarily – from the world of grownups".
Reviews
“Children's Literature Review” states that the book sometimes suffers “slightly through being too full of incident”
Books
- On the Run, Faber and Faber, 2009, {{ISBN|978-0-571-24647-2}}