The Freddy the Pig series
by Walter R. Brooks
illustrated by Kurt Wiese 

The central characters of the Freddy the Pig novels are the animals on the Bean Home Farm in rural New York State, mostly official residents, but many wild like the rabbits, or unofficial like the bugs. All of them reason and talk, although we're several novels into the series before the animals begin letting on to humans that they can talk just as well as the latter. And sometimes reason better.

In the cumulative thousands of pages of the series, Brooks has plenty of room to develop and populate his landscape. A new idea from Freddy, pooh-poohed by Jinx (the black cat), may be rescued by the plain sense of Mrs. Wiggins (smartest of the cows), and then perhaps turned into a speech by Charles (the rooster) — all in the course of some neatly intertwined adventures of animals and people. And then Freddy may write a little celebratory verse.

Brooks provides a wide range of down-home personalities, and after reading several of the novels, the animals and humans become treasured acquaintances. Take a drive on a country road, and you may wonder if the Bean Farm isn't that place you glimpse across the fields yonder, and Centerboro drowsing at the next junction.

These are brilliant children's stories, and grownups will discover that they read surprisingly well. Relaxed humor, attention to character, and plots with deft twists and interweaving, provide good entertainment. Brooks also pays attention to value, whether of words, things, actions, or institutions. Not all of this is what you'd expect. Even now rereading them, I sometimes find myself wondering ...

Walter R. Brooks (1886-1958) wrote twenty-five novels in the Freddy the Pig series between 1927 and 1958; and Freddy's poems and songs were collected in a separate volume. The novels are listed below in chronological order, but it's not at all necessary to read them in this order. Given several at hand, you should read the earliest one first, because many bits of background, or occasional characters from duck to lion, recur in later books.

1. Freddy Goes to Florida
   The farm animals go south for the winter, with adventures on the road.
2. Freddy Goes to the North Pole
   To see Santa Claus, naturally.
3. Freddy the Detective
   A mystery. The first novel to be centered around the Bean Home Farm. Freddy emerges as the leading character of the series with intelligence and initiative; accompanied by Jinx the black cat. Simon and his tribe of rats make their first appearance as villains.
4. The Story of Freginald
   About a bear.
5. The Clockwork Twin
   A robot boy.
6. Freddy the Politician
   Brooks now hits his stride: from here on the plots are reasonably complex, the writing is more consistently witty, the characterizations more interesting and often subtle.
7. Freddy's Cousin Weedly
   Weedly is a very young pig, fearful and shy. Jinx brings him back to the Bean Farm to give him some education. An excellent book to start younger readers into the series.
8. Freddy and the Ignormus
   The Bean Farm animals must confront a scary monster in the nearby woods. A fine adventure, one of my favorites.
9. Freddy and the Perilous Adventure
   Ballooning — controlled and uncontrolled flight. A lot of handy little details about ballooning. There's also a subtheme of individualist feminism: Alice and Emma, two sister ducks on the Bean Farm pond, struggling to outgrow their Uncle Wesley. Boomschmidt's Circus plays a part also.
10. Freddy and the Bean Home News
    Small-press publishing, down on the farm. I easily identify with this theme.
11. Freddy and Mr. Camphor
    Freddy does house-sitting, and gets to live on a houseboat.
12. Freddy and the Popinjay
    A bird in fancier feathers.
13. Freddy the Pied Piper
    Mr. Boomschmidt's traveling circus, and his star Leo the lion, have major roles here; they are found in a number of the novels. Reviving the circus, rescuing Leo, and ridding Centerboro of a plague of mice, are the substantial activities. This novel feels heavier dramatically than many of the others.
14. Freddy the Magician
    Amateur Freddy versus a pro magician.
15. Freddy Goes Camping
    How to foil ghosts — real or otherwise. Mr. Camphor again.
16. Freddy Plays Football
    He's already well-padded.
17. Freddy the Cowboy
    Yes, a pig on horseback. Gunplay and knife-waving, mostly for bluff. Riding, rodeo, and even bats.
18. Freddy Rides Again
    Cowboy doings again.
19. Freddy the Pilot
    Since my parents when single were small-plane hobbyist pilots for a time, I have a particular fondness for this one.
20. Freddy and the Space Ship
    A homemade spaceship takes some of the animals to a Martian landscape. The succeeding two novels spring directly from this one, although in unexpected directions. In their down-home Bean Farm way, these are better science fiction for kids than much of the so-called "juvenile science fiction". — This is a good point to jump into the latter novels, since those following more or less develop from this one.
21. Freddy and the Men from Mars
    I always found this particularly funny.
22. Freddy and the Baseball Team from Mars
    There are "Martians" — and then there are Martians.
23. Freddy and Simon the Dictator
    Politics again, this time with the rats and Mr. Camphor.
24. Freddy and the Flying Saucer Plans
    Spies at the Bean Farm.
25. Freddy and the Dragon
    More detective work.

Died-in-the-hide Freddy fans will enjoy checking out the Friends of Freddy organization. However, newcomers to the series, or those who haven't read all the novels or not lately, should note that a number of the discussions there and elsewhere are surprise-spoilers.

The Freddy the Pig books originally were published by Knopf in trade and library bindings. In 1997 Overlook Press began reprinting the series in nice editions faithful to the Knopf trade originals, including the wonderful Kurt Wiese black-and-white illustrations.

After luckily finding Freddy the Detective, I read and reread the novels. These are beloved books; they are classic animal stories of a distinctively American kind.