Time and again, the children from "Knight's Castle" have longed for another magic adventure.

But you can't find magic just anywhere. It doesn't grow like grass. It requires the right place and the right time . . . Or thyme, as the case may be. At Mrs. Whiton's house, magic grows as wild as the banks of thyme in the garden. Growing there is olden time, future time, and common time. Or so says the Natterjack, the toadlike creature who accompanies the children on a series of hilarious, always unpredictable adventures.

"Anything can happen," the Natterjack says, "when you have all the time in the world."

A children's magical adventure very much in the vane of E.Nesbit stories. Unfortunately, it's constantly acknowledging how similar it is to the works of E.Nesbit, which does not help matters. It is especially unhelpful due to the fact that it is quite dissimilar in one respect, which is that it is nowhere near as imaginative.
It picks up quite a bit towards the end but is still fairly tame and boring compared to the predecessors it tries to ape. ( )

Fun, though the Louisa May Alcott chapter was NOT my favorite. What person would want Jo to marry Laurie? But then I never "shipped" Harry and Hermione either. Anyway, it required a little too much of a stretch of the imagination. ( )

Edward Eager's books were stories I loved as a child and having re-read them as an adult I still quite enjoy them. The stories and characters hold up to the test of time. These books are clever and intriguing and the characters are very endearing. ( )

I remember enjoying Eager's books borrowed from the library when I was small: this one, and "Half Magic". ("Magic by the Lake" was a bit contrived though). He admired E Nesbit's magical stories and modelled his American children's adventures on them. This is funny and entertaining; we will just have a brief sigh and headshake over the "Red Indians" who exist only to scalp people, and the cannibals on the desert island who eat people..... There is an episode featuring the Underground Railway and the children help a slave family to escape in that, so he does redeem himself a bit.