Conversations and Chapter One Summary and Analysis

The story opens with a prelude called "Conversations" that occurs during a reunion of Gerald Darrell, his siblings and his mother in which he announces his intention to write a sequel to his first book, "My Family and Other Animals." His mother initially tells Gerald's brothers that she can't stop the project but when he proposes to include a particular story about his mother, she joins in the objections. Gerald notes that, considering the number and intensity of the arguments against the project, there's only one thing to do: Sit down to write.

Chapter one, titled "The Christening," begins with a description of the Greek island where the family, Gerald, his mother, brothers Leslie and Larry, and sister Margo, goes to escape the dreary weather of England. They soon make friends with a taxi driver...