This is a delightful little book - a nice quick read. Very different to Hardy's usual fiction of course as the intended audience were children. The language is not what many children today would be used to reading - and although descriptive in parts it is much less so than say the novels. Two boys exploring some caves, discover how to divert the course of a river that flows through West Poley, their actions cause havoc, and they enjoy weilding such power over the villages of East and West Poley. However they are soon endangered by their own actions, and are of course taught a sharp lesson. Without, I hope, giving too much away there isn't the bleak and terrible ending of so much of Hardy's adult fiction in this one. ( )