Swallowdale is a children's adventure novel by English author Arthur Ransome and first published by Jonathan Cape in 1931. The book features Walker siblings (The Swallows) and Blackett sisters (The Amazons), camping in the hills and moorland country around a lake, with Maria Turner, the Blacketts' Great Aunt, acting as an antagonist. It is the second book in the Swallows and Amazons series; preceded by Swallows and Amazons and followed by Peter Duck. Ransome was living in the Lake District and he drew on his experiences and memories of encounters over many years with the local farming community. Ransome had often climbed Old Man of Coniston and in the book this becomes the children's Kanchenjunga. Expeditions to Kanchenjunga in the Himalayas had been much in the news while Ransome was writing the book. Source: Wikipedia (en)