Off The Rails

You may not be aware of this book; I wasn't. It's called Tootle and it was a very kind gift from a friend in America. Alexander absolutely loves it. I have deep misgivings about it.

The plot is that a train goes to train school, but gets distracted by footering about in the meadow. The townspeople get together and persuade him back on to the tracks. I can't decide if the message is to put in the hard work to achieve your ambition and stop procrastinating or that you are destined to be something (e.g. a train) and don't even think about wanting to be something different.
Here's the review page on GoodReads. There are some entertaining comments.... much as described by several parents here, I now just talk about the pictures; reading the whole thing would take all bloody night, and I just make up a slightly more palatable story instead.

The book was published in 1945 and I can't help noticing that about 20 years later the same children who must have grown up reading it rather embraced the 'off the rails' ambition pretty much as illustrated here. The authors must have been furious.