Eleanor and Eddy appear as the main characters in three novels Langton wrote before The Fledgling: The Diamond in the Window (1962), The Swing in the Summerhouse (1967), and The Astonishing Stereoscope (1971). Like The Fledgling, all are unique and thoughtprovoking fantasies in which Langton explores how history forms the present for individuals and for the community.

The Diamond in the Window tells how Eleanor and Eddy find a secret playroom in the attic of a turreted and gabled old house in Concord and learn that Nora and Eddy, two earlier Hall children, vanished from this room one night. They search for the lost children, then learn they are involved in an adventure that might leave them in another time and space. In The Swing in the Summerhouse, Eleanor and Eddy visit a set of fantastic worlds illustrating the wisdom in their Uncle Freddy's quotations from Thoreau and Emerson...