This was one of my favorite books as a child. It is the story of two young girls who are shipwrecked alone with 4 babies! The girls are sweet and very motherly and do a fantastic job of caring for the children in a survivial situation. As a baby-obsessed girl myself, I found this story to be a fairy-tale! I just read it again as an adult and found it to be quite as charming as I remembered, though perhaps slightly idealistic. I'm excited for my 8-year-old to read it now!

of course i have to read anything by the author of Caddie Woodlawn! this book is cute, but ridiculous. what if Robinson Crusoe was two pre-teen girls and had four babies to care for? it's cute, don't get me wrong. the very-practical Mary can be just as ridiculous as the very-dreamy Jean. their rescue is implausible. but, who cares? an adventure story with plucky girls, humor, and lots of babies.

I read this when I was about 10. I'm sure it is the most improbable story ever written, but I LOVED it. I read it over and over until it finally got lost when we moved from California to Oregon. I've wanted to find a copy ever since so I could revisit it. And really, It's by the same author as Caddie Woodlawn, how truly terrible can it be?

I found this book on my Grandma Routson's shelves on one of our visits. I love this book. It's a girl's dream.

When 2 Scottish girls accidentally get stranded on a desert island with four babies, things get interesting. This is a delightfully improbable story of girls who love nothing better than to take care of babies. I delighted in the unabashed depiction of girls who want to be mothers and incredible adventures along the way.

I picked this book up from the Dublin library discard shelf around the time that Harriet was a newborn. Feeling a little overwhelmed by how much attention and care she needed those first couple months, I picked up the book. It had an absurd title and was short enough to finish quickly. From the cover art, I was under the impression that Baby Island was written in the 1960s or early 1970s. Actually though it was first published in 1937.

Mary and Jean on a ship bound for Australia where their father has relocated for work. They have befriended the parents of the youngest passengers and have been the on-board baby sitters. In the middle of a huge storm, they end up on a lifeboat with four babies: the toddling twins Elijah (Blue) and Elisha (Pink), Ann Elizabeth (age 1) and Jonah (age 4 months).

The story is a classic desert island / shipwreck adventure akin to the first half of Robinson Crusoe or the horrible Swiss Family Robinson except from the perspective of a group of children. While the necessities of food and water are covered in the plot, along with the need for a safe and dry shelter away from the tide, nothing is mentioned about the infants numerous diaper changes. There is some hinting at the problem with the many times Mary and Jean are washing Pink and Blue's outfits but it's done in such a saccharine way that being stuck on an island with a handful of young children and limited supplies seems like such a magical adventure.

After the initial at sea disaster where the children were genuinely scared and aware of how much danger they were in, the book began to bore me. Mary and Jean are so busy having fun that they never stop to think of the ramifications of their situation. Nor do they seem to care for the children beyond seeing them as cute (and hungry) play things.

Oh you know...just two pre-teen girls stranded on an island with 5 babies. One of the sisters (the older one, go figure) is the perfect little mother who is delighted to inherit all of these babies. The other, more interesting sister, suggests that they throw one of the babies overboard because his name is Jonah and takes to a monkey instead of a baby. Overall, it is a ridiculously fluffy Robinsonade. I grew tired of Mary's obsession with babies, grammar, and moral reform, but it provides an interesting contrast to more modern female castaway stories like Island of the Blue Dolphins.

I loved this book as a kid. I picked it up again because I remembered it was actually one of my first exposures to Scottish history - I thought they talked more about Bonnie Prince Charlie, but it was just the monkey they named Prince Charley. They were more concerned with William Wallace, being Wallaces themselves. Anyway, it's a terribly improbable story that just makes me laugh as an adult. If only caring for babies was as easy as it is in this book!

This is a Gold Star book because it combines the best elements of storytelling: a gripping tale written in fanciful language, protagonists who embody virtue and patience despite hardship, and the beauty of child-like innocence. Two sisters, 10 and 12 years old, show resilience, courage and grit in the face of daunting challenges while also displaying compassion and nurturing love to the young ones in their charge. Their wisdom and motherly instincts help them survive on the island, but it’s one sister’s innocent, seemingly naive, act of respect to her elder that causes them to be rescued. The reverence for faith throughout the story is felt through their consistent practice of Christianity. The Divine is brought to the forefront of this story, a far cry from the themes of most modern children's books, in which God is never mentioned.
We rate children's books for virtue, language, story, and beauty and flag content advisories when needed.

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I loved this book when I read it in the summer of 1950 before entering third grade. I loved babies and the idea of being shipwrecked with 4 of them ... Heaven. This book was responsible for my love of reading. I could never get any of my there daughters to read it, though, in spite of a generous bribe. I still re-read it occasionally and enjoy it just as much though my tastes have evolved. I love the quaint language and the illustrations. Maybe I can get my granddaughters to read it.

Grabbed a stack of (mostly kids') books from my own library that I haven't read yet. This was the first of about 8.

This was a childhood favorite of my wife. Shelved on the same shelf as The Babysitters' Club, etc. I don't think she knew this was written in 1937 with a lot of nostalgia for previous eras. It was certainly interesting with that in mind.

Kind of fun watching these two girls (9 and 12) cast to sea with 5 baby/toddlers being really low-key about the whole thing.

Also, kind of amazing that they survived and were able to find enough food, avoid malaria, etc.. but this is a children's book. Don't think too hard about it.

Also, this book contains plenty of references to Robinson Crusoe, which is one I haven't ever read, but seems to be a must-have for this genre of desert-island adventures, or for being a smart person in general. Well, I'm about to remedy that...

We expected to enjoy this book so much more than did. We so enjoyed 'Winter Cottage ' we had high expectations of this one.

Two girls without a mother are going to join their father who has lived in Australia for some time, when a storm causes the the girls and four babies to be cast off alone in a life boat. This idea has so much potential for an exciting story. We found that at the time this was written childcare was so different that I had to keep stopping reading to explain things my daughter found confusing. Such as some of the ' babies ' are nearly two years old which wouldn't be classed as a baby these days. They don't seem to say more than 'ma ma' 'me me' etc, they didn't notice the absence of their mothers apart from one baby who was an only child so she had been a bit 'spoilt ' as she had got used to being 'settled' by her mother at night! Even to an 11 yr old it seemed unnatural for a baby not to be crying for it's mum. There were times when they couldn't find enough food and again I had to stop to explain I don't know why the books said a two year old couldn't digest food such as a tin of beans and seemed to live mainly on cow's milk. We also found it unrealistic that a a 12yr old girl should be completely obsessed with being a mother before and on the island, even to a child this seemed not right and seemed to suggest she had had to grow up to soon and was trýing to fill a role she felt was useful to be loved. The girls seemed to be too concerned if the mothers of the babies would approve of such and such, and constantly worried if the identical twins should be mixed up and not know which was which ! The important things to worry about seemed to be missed in this book. The character of Friday also seemed dated and unrealistic, his reason for being on the island was unbelievable too !

This book hasn't aged well but we loved the idea.