Posted on by TracyC

The Case of the Cool-Itch Kid

Polka Dot Private Eye

CoolItchKid#5 The Case of the Cool-Itch Kid by Patricia Reilly Giff, 1989.

Dawn heads off to summer camp!  At first, she’s not sure that she really wants to go, even though the idea of riding horses, swimming, and roasting marshmallows sounds appealing.  It turns out that there’s only one other girl from her school going, Jill Simon.  All of the other girls on the bus to camp are people she doesn’t know from another school called Coolidge (which Dawn pronounces “Cool-Itch”).

Before she leaves home, Dawn receives a package of small presents from her grandmother.  Among her grandmother’s gifts are some candy and cookies, a pin, and a small mirror surrounded by seashells that Dawn loves.  Later, after their bus stops at a rest stop, she realizes that some of these things are missing.  She particularly notices that the pin and the beautiful mirror are gone.

Who is the thief?  Could it be one of those kids from Coolidge (“Cool-Itch”)?

Dawn misses her family, especially her grandmother.  She hates the food at camp.  She’s upset about losing her grandmother’s presents.  Worst of all, she realizes that she left her Polka Dot Private Eye box at home!  How is she going to solve this mystery?

Part of the story is about the mistakes people make by jumping to conclusions.  Right from the beginning, Dawn assumes that her only friend at camp is Jill because the other kids are unfamiliar, and she thinks they’re unfriendly.  Also, she assumes that the presents disappeared because they were stolen, but actually, it’s due to a series of accidents and misunderstandings.

The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Powder Puff Puzzle

The Polka Dot Private Eye

PowderPuff#4 The Powder Puff Puzzle by Patricia Reilly Giff, 1987.

Dawn is on her way to go swimming with her friend Emily Arrow when her cat, Powder Puff, is startled and jumps into a stranger’s car.  Before Dawn can do anything about it, the car drives away with her cat!

Fortunately, Dawn managed to notice a few things about the car and driver. The car is red and dented.  The driver is tall and skinny and has long, gray hair.  She was eating a jelly cookie and carrying a box and a long pole.  Her license plate had a name on it and that started with “PA,” but Dawn didn’t get to read the rest.

Emily’s father is a police officer, but he can’t trace the license plate with just the letters that Dawn was able to give him.  Instead, he has the kids make Lost Cat posters to put up in the neighborhood.  Still, that’s not enough for Dawn.  As The Polka Dot Private Eye, she should be able to figure out where her own lost cat is!

PowderPuffPicWith the help of her friends, especially Jason, Dawn uses what she knows to put together a picture of the person they’re looking for, and they try to retrace her steps through town.  Can they track down Powder Puff and get him back?

Part of the puzzle that Dawn and Jason overlook at first is the woman’s profession, which is one that the kids hadn’t really expected to find a woman doing, although Dawn spots the clues which point to what the woman was doing in the area and allow them to realize where she had to be going.  Whether more modern kids reading this book would feel the same way about the woman’s profession, I’m not sure.

The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Secret at the Polk Street School

The Polka Dot Private Eye

SecretPolkStreet#3 The Secret at the Polk Street School by Patricia Reilly Giff, 1987.

Dawn’s class is competing against other classes in a contest to see which class does the most for the school.  All of the classes are working on their own special projects, trying hard to keep them a secret until the judging.  Dawn, as the class’s resident detective, suggests that she could solve a mystery on behalf of the class, but unfortunately, there is no mystery for her to solve.  Yet.

Instead, Ms. Rooney’s class decides to put on a play for the rest of the school.  It’s Little Red Riding Hood, and Dawn is playing the starring role.  Jason gets to be the Wolf, borrowing an old wolf costume from his sister without her permission.

At the class’s rehearsal, Dawn gets mad when someone dressed in the wolf costume tries to scare her, and she thinks that it’s Jason, goofing off.  But, it turns out that Jason wasn’t even there, and the wolf costume is missing.  Suddenly, Dawn has a mystery!

Dawn starts receiving messages from “The Wolf” saying that someone is going to get her and Jason.  Then, someone takes a bite out of the loaf of bread that Dawn has been using as a prop (the food that she’s taking to “Grandma’s House” in the play).  Could “The Wolf” be someone in a rival class, hoping to sabotage their play so they can win the contest?

The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

Summer Fun

SummerFunSummer Fun by Carolyn Haywood, 1986.

This is a cute book of short stories featuring favorite Haywood characters, including Betsy and Eddie.  The children spent their summer in different ways, having fun summer adventures.  None of the adventures is particularly scary.  Although a couple of the kids find themselves in semi-dangerous situations, everything is resolved pretty quickly, and the rest of the stories are more slice-of-life style stories about fun and funny things that the kids do or lessons they learn.

The stories are very easy to read and great for children beginning chapter books or for some light bedtime reading for younger kids.

The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

The stories in this book are:

Bears and Blueberries

Peter is at summer camp, and when he goes on a hike and camp-out with his camp friends, they have encounters with wildlife.

SummerFunPic2The Watermelon Party

Betsy’s father tells her that he used to have watermelon parties with his friends when he was young, and that the person who had the most watermelon seeds at the end of the party would win a prize.  Betsy decides that she wants to have a party like that, but her friend Rodney learns why cheating takes all the fun out of a contest.

A Bell for Jim Dandy

Jim Dandy is a brand of ice cream that comes on a stick.  When the bell on the ice cream truck is broken, Billy gets a job trying to help the driver attract customers in exchange for free ice cream.  But, without a bell himself, how will he get people’s attention?

Betsy’s Property

While Betsy is visiting her aunt and uncle at their summer home by the beach, she discovers a special rock a little ways out from the shore that she likes to think of as all her own.  She likes to sit out on the rock and read with her aunt’s dog, but what will she do when a sudden storm leaves her stranded?

SummerFunPic1Betsy’s Hammock Club

Betsy loves the hammock that her father bought for her, but so does every other kid in the neighborhood!

Eddie and His Hermit Crab

Anna Patricia buys a couple of hermit crabs at the beach as pets.  When she gives one to Eddie, he decides that his crab will win the hermit crab race at the beach!

Eddie and His Money Sheet

Eddie sets out to make some money with sand sculptures and ends up convincing Anna Patricia to adopt a stray cat.

The Picnic

Eddie and Anna Patricia find out that her new cat actually belongs to someone else.  But, they become friends with the cat’s owners, who take them out for a sailing trip and picnic.  When the kids’ parents are late arriving with food for the picnic, Anna Patricia tries to let the kids into the house and discovers how different the Goldilocks story would have been if the bears had a security alarm.

An Afternoon on the Farm

Teddy and Babs visit a farm with their parents and make friends with the grandchildren of the owners, Mark and Sarah.  While the children are playing at being explorers one day, they find a dead animal they’ve never seen before.  When they bring it back to show their parents, they learn why you shouldn’t mess with a skunk, even a dead one. (No mention of disease, just smell, although I’d think that would be a more serious issue.)

End of Summer

It’s time for Mark and Sarah to go home after visiting their grandparents.  With all of the things they have to remember to take with them and all of the things they forget, will they actually make it to the train on time?

Posted on by TracyC

The Case of the Wandering Werewolf

wanderingwerewolfThe Case of the Wandering Werewolf by Drew Stevenson, 1987.

A boy called Chips approaches Raymond with the story that there might be a werewolf in Lost Woods, outside of town. Chips likes animals, and he has been going into the woods to spring animal traps that someone has been leaving there. One evening, Chips thought he saw a man who seemed to turn into a wolf, and the wolf chased Chips away, only stopping when Chips crossed the creek. Chips has heard of Huntley’s monster hunting activities, and he asks Raymond to tell Huntley about the werewolf and see if he will investigate.

To Raymond’s surprise, Huntley says that he has already heard about the werewolf from another source, which he refuses to reveal.  However, he is eager to investigate, on behalf of Chips and his other mysterious source. Verna, who overhears what Chips says about the werewolf, invites herself along on the hunt.

wanderingwerewolfpic1The monster hunt becomes more complicated when Bucky Bovine, a bully at their school, seems determined to stop them from going to Lost Woods to look for the monster. Does Bucky know something about the beast, or could he even be the monster himself?

As always, there are other explanations besides monsters and mysteries that require solving.  Fortunately, Huntley is an excellent detective as well as a Monster Hunter, and he puts the pieces together to explain not only the werewolf but other strange things that have been happening around town.

The book is part of the Monster Hunter series and is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Case of the Visiting Vampire

VisitingVampireThe Case of the Visiting Vampire by Drew Stevenson, 1988.

This is the second book in the series about J. Huntley English, Monster Hunter, an extremely intelligent boy who also believes in real-life monsters and is determined to become a monster hunter so that he can find some. Along with his best friend, Raymond (who narrates the books), and Verna, a bossy girl who goes to school with Raymond, he investigates possible monsters around their small Pennsylvania town. The stories are humorous mysteries, and in a kind of Scooby-Doo fashion, there are other explanations besides monsters for the mysterious things that happen.

In this story, the Big Lake Theater in Barkley, PA, is putting on a play called The Count of Castle Dracula, and a visiting actor from Romania working at a local college is playing the part of the vampire. When Verna gets a part in the play, she becomes convinced that the actor, Bela Mezgar, is a real vampire. He behaves strangely and is never seen out during the daytime. Then, Verna overhears him talking on the phone to someone about his coffin and saying that “one heart must die so the other may live.” She tells Raymond and Huntley what she heard, and the monster hunter eagerly begins his investigation. However, a mysterious stranger also seems to be showing an unusual interest in the actor.

This book was written before the end of the Cold War, when Romania was still a communist country. Although things have changed since then, I don’t think that modern kids would have too much trouble understanding the situation. It’s a fun mystery for elementary school kids.

The book is currently available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Case of the Horrible Swamp Monster

horribleswampmonsterThe Case of the Horrible Swamp Monster by Drew Stevenson, 1984.

This is the first book in the Monster Hunter series.

Raymond Almond knows that his class project isn’t going to go well when he finds out that bossy Verna Wilkes is in his group. Verna convinces the group that their project should be a movie because her father recently gave her a movie camera. What makes it bad is that she insists that it should be a monster movie and that Raymond should play the part of the monster.

Raymond is embarrassed about having to stumble around the spooky Lost Swamp in the ridiculous monster costume, but he puts aside his embarrassment when what looks like a real swamp monster appears in the background of the footage.  Even bossy Verna is scared at the idea of a monster living in the swamp where they were filming.

Fortunately, Raymond’s best friend is J. Huntley English, an intelligent boy and amateur cryptozoologist (or Monster Hunter, as he likes to put it). When Raymond and Verna tell Huntley what they’ve seen, he’s quick to join in the investigation, eager to discover proof of a real monster.

horribleswampmonsterpicThe course of their investigation takes a strange turn when friendly Mr. Walton, who works as a janitor at the same bank where Huntley and Verna’s mothers work, is arrested for stealing money. The kids refuse to believe that he’s guilty and soon learn that there is a connection between the thefts and the mysterious monster and possibly the strange fisherman who has also been lurking around the swamp.

The book is available online through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

Something Queer in Rock ‘n’ Roll

SQRock

Something Queer in Rock ‘n’ Roll by Elizabeth Levy, illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein, 1987.

SQRockPic1Gwen and Jill join a couple of other friends in forming a rock band.  They want to enter a rock contest run by a local tv station.  In order to enter, they have to have an original rock song, so they write one about Jill’s dog, Fletcher.  They discover that Fletcher loves pizza so much that he gives a spectacular howl when they offer him some.  They make Fletcher and his wonderful howl part of their act.

When they audition for the station, the put on dog ear costumes to match Fletcher’s ears and call themselves Fletcher and the Gang.  The people at the station love their act, especially Fletcher’s howl, and they are accepted onto the program.

However, shortly afterward, Fletcher disappears.  They search everywhere for him and put up posters, but no luck.  Jill is convinced that Fletcher must have been abducted because he would never run away.  It turns out to be true, and they discover it for sure when they get a phone call telling them where to find Fletcher.

SQRockPic2Fletcher is all right, but now, he suddenly hates pizza!  It seems that Fletcher’s abductor fed him nothing but pizza until he started to hate it.  Did someone do that on purpose to ruin their act for the contest?  How would this person have even known about their act?  Also, what can they do about the contest now that Fletcher is more likely to run from the sight of pizza than howl for it?

The other rock bands in the contest are all hilarious with themes that include spiders, potatoes, mummies, and clowns.

The book also includes the music and lyrics for the kids’ rock song about Fletcher: “Hungry All the Time.”

It is part of the Something Queer Mysteries.

Posted on by TracyC

Something Queer at the Birthday Party

SQBirthdaySomething Queer at the Birthday Party by Elizabeth Levy, illustrated by Mordicai Gerstein, 1989.

Jill and some other friends are throwing a surprise birthday party for Gwen. They send out invitations secretly and create a mystery game for Gwen with a series of clues to lead her to the party.  As part of the game, Jill pretends that someone broke into her house and stole a painting of her and her dog, Fletcher.  The clues to the thief lead Gwen into the room where all of their friends are hiding, waiting to surprise her.

Gwen loves their little mystery and the surprise, and the party seems a success. But when it’s time to bring out the cake and open presents, Jill discovers that they are missing from the closet where they were hidden. At first, Gwen thinks that it’s just another mystery game, but Jill tells her that the presents really are missing. Who took the presents, and where are they now?

SQBirthdayPic1Gwen takes her party and all the guests on a hunt across town for her missing presents, but the big clues turn out to be right back where they started, and Fletcher leads them right to what they’re looking for.

The solution to this mystery touches on a problem that children with a birthday near Christmas understand: When your birthday is near a major holiday, people don’t pay as much attention to it or give as many presents.  My grandmother said it was the same with her when she was young, and she was also the eldest child in a large family, so her birthday was never quite what it should have been.  In the story, one of the girls’ friends had this problem, and it was the motive behind this temporary theft.  The culprit didn’t mean to keep the presents forever, they just wanted to pretend that they were all theirs for a little while.  Gwen forgives the culprit and shares the rest of her birthday with this person.

The book is part of the Something Queer Mysteries.

Posted on by TracyC

The Witch King

WitchKingThe Witch King by Maeve Henry, 1987.

Robert is the son of a fisherman in a small village by the sea. All his life, he’s grown up hearing stories of a mysterious City to the south that was fashioned ages ago from a silver tree. Wondrous things are said to happen there. People from the City used to visit the Witch Women in Robert’s village for advice, but no one has come there from the City in a long time, and people now doubt whether the City really exists. People have even stopped believing in the Witch Women. However, Robert believes in the old stories, and he wants desperately to see the City for himself.

The stories say that someday the Witch King will come to the City and plant a seed so that a new tree will grow. Robert wants to see this story come true, and Granny Fishbone, a strange old woman who tells Robert the old stories, says that the time of the Witch King is close. She gives him a pendant in the shape of a fish and tells him that it came from the City and that it is time for Robert to take it back there.

With some misgivings, Robert’s family lets him set off on his seemingly crazy quest of finding the City. To Robert’s surprise, he is met on the road by the Royal Wizard of the City. As Granny Fishbone said, the time of the Witch King is near, and there is trouble in the City. The Spell that controls the City is failing, and the King has been seeking a remedy for the problem.

The City has become corrupt because a usurper murdered the rightful king years ago and took over the City. He had his wizards cast a spell on the City that let him control everything in it, and he manipulated historical accounts to make it seem as though he was the founder of the City himself. Robert knows differently because Granny Fishbone is really one of the Witch Women, and she told him the true story about the miraculous tree and the founding of the City. The king’s grandson, David, is also corrupt and wants to learn to control the spell over the City for his own power. He believes that he is the prophesied Witch King, and he tries to convince Robert of it so that he will help him.

When Robert learns that David’s plans for controlling the spell may mean sacrificing his own sister, Princess Sophie, who Robert loves, Robert does his best to thwart his plans by telling the king and the Royal Wizard.  Although David at first seems to have the upper hand, he is not the true Witch King. Granny Fishbone was correct that the time of the true Witch King has come, and Robert has a much bigger role to play in the story than he thinks.  As the ancient prophesy says, the City will have to be destroyed in order to be saved.