The Case of the Tricky Trickster by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1992.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
The PTAs at the schools the Bobbsey Twins attend, elementary and middle school, are holding a variety show to raise money, with students showing off their talents. A boy in Freddie and Flossie’s class, Brian, is going to put on a juggling act, but Freddie and Flossie are going to help another friend, Teddy, with his magic act. Nan and Bert have a rock band with some friends called the Aliens, and they’re going to be performing, too. Danny Rugg, the school bully, even has an act where he’s going to play the accordion.
However, things soon start going wrong with the show. During the rehearsal, someone turns on the Aliens’ amplifier, making a loud sound that startles everyone. Then, a pole falls and almost hits a student while she’s singing. Then, Brian slips on some floor wax. Freddie and Flossie suspect Danny of playing pranks on everyone because he was near the places where the pranks occurred, and it seems like the kind of thing he might do, but there are other suspects.
Some of the other students seem nervous about performing their acts or think that the show won’t really be that good. Could someone be trying to sabotage the show to get out of performing? Then again, there seems to be some kind of rivalry between the music teacher who is directing the show and Mr. Horton, the fifth grade teacher. Mr. Horton seems resentful that he wasn’t given the chance to direct the show, and he keeps trying to prove that the music teacher is doing things wrong and that he could do them better. Just how far would he go to prove that he would be the better director?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction and Spoilers
I thought that the mystery was good, although I also thought that the culprit was obvious about halfway through the story. It might take kids longer to figure out who it is, but there is one person who gets more than their share of the sabotage, and some of the tricks are ones that a person could only play on themselves. There is a student who is trying to get out of having to perform, but once the Bobbsey Twins figure out why, they manage to work things out so that the student is able to go ahead with their act.
The story reminded me a little of The Tap Dance Mystery in the Eagle-Eye Ernie series, although the mysteries aren’t the same. What reminds me of the other book is that both stories involve family expectations. Performing in front of classmates is enough to make anyone nervous, but having family with high expectations present puts a great deal of pressure on a child performer. There is a bit more than that because there are reasons why the student doesn’t think they can live up to everyone’s expectations, but fortunately, a little help from a friend can go a long way!
The Case of the Crazy Collections by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1991.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
The Bobbsey twins’ neighborhood is having their annual block party, and the Bobbsey twins and their parents are helping to set up for it. As part of the party, the neighborhood has rented a tent, where kids from the neighborhood are displaying their collections. The neighborhood kids collect all kinds of things, like baseball cards, comic books, soda cans, autographs, and coins. One boy, Kevin, has an autographed baseball that his grandfather gave to him. The neighbors are charging people money to see the exhibit of collections, and the money will be used for a pizza party later.
Later, Kevin’s autographed baseball disappears. Could the baseball thief be Mr. Sher, a visitor staying with their neighbor, Mr. Andersen? Mr. Sher tried to buy the baseball from Kevin earlier, but Kevin turned him down. Then again, Kevin’s cousin, Steve, was jealous that Kevin has the baseball. Steve turned down the offer of some of his grandfather’s old collectible items in favor of a savings bond, which he has already cashed in and spend on video games. Steve tried to borrow more money from Kevin earlier, but Kevin turned him down because Steve hasn’t yet repaid him for money Kevin loaned to him before. Danny, the neighborhood bully, was also mad at Kevin earlier. He’s a friend of Steve’s and didn’t want to have to pay to see the collections. Then again, another local girl, Jennifer, collects autographs, and they see her at a collectors’ shop. Would she know the value of an autographed baseball, and was she trying to sell it? With so many people coming and going from the tent where the collections were on display, it’s hard to say who might have taken something. The thief may have even been the Bobbseys’ own dog, Chief, who has developed a habit of collecting and hoarding baseballs.
Then, another boy realizes that his prized hologram sticker is missing. Could the thief have taken that, too? Their clues are an unexplained slit in the back of the tent, some footprints, and a pin with Greek letters on it. Can the Bobbsey Twins find the valuable baseball and return it to Kevin?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
Something I thought was interesting about this story was that it brings up the concept of collecting things for fun or sentimental value vs. collecting things because of their monetary value. Most of the kids in the neighborhood collect things just for fun. At first, Kevin doesn’t seem to fully realize the value of the autographed baseball. His attachment to the baseball is because he got it from his grandfather. When he had the offer to sell it to Mr. Sher, he refused because the baseball reminds him of his grandfather.
I had a strong suspicion about the identity of the baseball thief early in the story, and my guess turned out to be right, but I liked it that there were plenty of other suspects to consider. There are child suspects, adult suspects, and even the Bobbseys’ own dog. Any of these could be plausible. When they realize that the hologram sticker is missing, it raises the question of whether the person who took the baseball also took the sticker, if the sticker was taken by someone else, or if the missing sticker is just a red herring. Overall, I enjoyed the mystery, and I liked the abundance of suspects.
#5 The Case of the Close Encounter by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1988.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
When Nan gets sick, her twin brother Bert, agrees to take over her babysitting job, looking after a 5-year-old boy named Artie. Artie has a reputation for being a troublemaker, but since he’s had experience looking after the younger set of twins in the Bobbsey family, Bert figures that he can handle Artie. Of course, Artie turns out to be a handful. Artie tries to paint his cat’s whiskers and juggle eggs, and he generally makes a mess. Then, he suddenly declares that they’re playing hide-and-seek and runs outside. When Bert goes out to look for him, he sees a bright light from the sky, and when he looks up, he sees what looks like a flying saucer!
Artie doesn’t see the flying saucer and thinks that Bert is making it up. Everyone is in bed when Bert gets home, so he phones the police and reports the UFO. He tells the rest of his family about it the next morning. He speaks to the police and a reporter from the newspaper where his mother works, but they all say the same thing: without more witnesses to the event or more information, there’s not much they can do. Since nobody seems to believe him, Bert decides that they only thing to do is to investigate the phenomenon himself.
Bert and his siblings go to the area where Bert saw the UFO to look for clues about what it could have been. Artie tags along, although he’s more of a distraction than a help to them. In a clearing, they find large patches of grass that have been flattened and burnt. They look almost like footprints made by some kind of fiery dinosaur. The kids aren’t sure what to think of them. Then, while walking along the road, they’re almost hit by an angry man on a motor scooter. When they get back to Artie’s house, Artie’s father identifies the man as Felix Usher, who is renting a cottage nearby. There are stories that the house he’s renting used to be used by smugglers and gangsters and that they might have left some kind of treasure behind, but Artie’s father doesn’t really believe that.
On the way home, the Bobbsey twins stop off at a diner called the Flying Saucer Diner. While they’re talking with the owner, they learn that he bought the place from Mr. Stockton, the same man who used to own the house that Felix Usher is renting. When Mr. Stockton owned it, he called it the Cup ‘n’ Saucer Diner, which is the name on an old coffee cup that Artie found in the field with the burn marks. The kids wonder if there could be some kind of connection between the diner and the UFO Bert saw. Then, they find a tape cassette on Bert’s bike seat with a threatening voice on it, telling him that he saw nothing and he should say nothing, or else!
It seems like someone wants Bert to forget what he saw and stop trying to figure out what it was, but that’s just more confirmation that Bert really saw something and that what he saw was significant. What did Bert really see in the sky? Was it really a flying saucer, and were the burn marks really caused by aliens? Or is something else happening in their town?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
I liked the premise of this mystery immediately! Unlike many mysteries, it isn’t immediately obvious that a crime has been committed. It falls more under the category of what I call Strange Happenings, where the characters know that something weird is going on, but they’re not entirely sure what it is or why it’s happening.
If I read this one as a kid, I didn’t remember the story, but I had a theory from the beginning about what Bert could have seen because I’ve seen the episode from the old Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew tv series The Creatures that Came on Sunday (older than this book) and an episode of Psych (newer than this book) with a similar premise, that someone had seen an alien spaceship or UFO. I guessed right on the type of flying object Bert saw, but I wasn’t sure what made the burn marks on the ground or how the situation could be related to the old house that might have treasure in it. There is also a woman who comes to see Bert and interview him about what he saw for a book she’s writing, but Bert has the feeling that she isn’t really an author, and she dodges questions that he asks her about her other research into UFOs and the encounters other people have had. There is some doubt from the beginning whether or not Bert’s UFO was an alien spaceship, but the book provides enough doubt and suspects to keep the story interesting as readers speculate about who is playing what roles in the mystery.
This book is from the late 1980s, and there are a couple of dated references to technology and pop culture, although it’s not too bad. It’s enough nostalgia that people who were kids in the 1980s would identify with it, but not too distracting for modern kids to enjoy the story. The kids use a very basic modem to connect to their local newspaper’s archives to do some research. It’s not how the modern World Wide Web works, but Internet use wasn’t popular yet at this time. This is still the early days of civilians having remote access to archives and databases through their computers. There wasn’t much to see, and there weren’t as many people who had the ability to see it yet. There is one instance of someone who seems to be talking to themselves in the story, and then, the kids realize that this person is actually using a radio. The modern equivalent is realizing that someone is actually talking on their cell phone, but cell phones were a relatively new invention around this time. They were expensive, brick-like, and heavy, and very few people had them. A radio or walkie-talkie would have been a more practical choice for this time period. There is also a point where the neighborhood bully and his friend tease Bert about seeing a UFO, and they make some references to popular sci-fi movies, like ET and Planet of the Apes.
The Mystery of the Missing Mummy by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1989.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
It’s only two days before Halloween, and the Bobbsey Twins are getting their costumes ready. Flossie is going to be a black cat, Bert is dressing as Frankenstein (the monster, not the scientist, for purists), and Nan is a traditional witch in a pointed hat. Only Freddie isn’t sure what he’s going to be yet. He could just put a sheet over his head and go trick-or-treating as a ghost, but that doesn’t seem exciting enough. He wants to be something really scary, but he doesn’t have much time left to decide.
The children’s mother offers Freddie some inspiration when she tells them that she will be writing a story about a new museum exhibit for the local newspaper. The new exhibit is an ancient Egyptian mummy. She asks the kids if they want to go to the museum with her to see the mummy, and they eagerly accept. Freddie thinks that a mummy would make a great costume idea, so he will be a mummy for Halloween.
The museum curator, Mr. Foxworth, gives the Bobbseys a special tour of the exhibit after hours, when there are no other visitors. The Bobbsey Twins are fascinated with the exhibit, and they talk about Egyptian hieroglyphics and the reasons why ancient Egyptians wanted their bodies preserved as mummies for the afterlife. Mr. Foxworth says that the mummy belongs to a wealthy woman named Mrs. Truesdale, who is also there to see the exhibit with her fifteen-year-old nephew, Lex.
The kids notice that Lex seems nervous, and he tells them that there’s a legend about the mummy coming to life. He even says that he’s heard strange noises coming from the mummy case. Mrs. Truesdale thinks that’s nonsense. The mummy has belonged to their family for 60 years. However, when the case is opened, Flossie is certain that she hears the mummy sigh. Then, when Freddie takes a closer look after the others leave the room, he sees the mummy breathing, and it tries to grab him!
Freddie and Flossie try to tell everyone what they saw, but everyone assumes that it was just their imagination. The kids go to the library to do some research about mummies, and they learn that Lex was telling them the truth about the legends surrounding this particular mummy. Nan doesn’t believe that the legends are real, but when the kids walk home from the library, they see the mummy walking in the park!
The kids run home and tell their parents what they saw. Their parents remind them that it’s almost Halloween, and it could have been somebody in costume, on their way home from a Halloween party. It sounds like a reasonable explanation, but the next morning, they hear a news report on the radio that someone broke into the museum and stole the mummy from the exhibit! The kids wonder if the mummy could have really come to life and broke out of the museum itself rather than being stolen.
The Bobbsey Twins decide to report their mummy sighting in the park to the police. At they police station, they see the security guard from the museum. The security guard tells them that the mummy did come to life and that it knocked him unconscious before leaving the museum, but nobody believes him because it sounds too crazy. The kids believe the security guard, but it also occurs to them that their parents might be right, that it could have been someone dressed as the mummy rather than the mummy itself. But, why would someone want to dress up like the mummy to pull a stunt like that, and if that’s what happened, where is the real mummy now?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
I was pretty sure I knew right away who one or two of the culprits was because I figured that a theft and stunt like this would have to involve more than one person. However, I figured that there had to be another confederate involved because my favorite suspects were accounted for the first time the mummy moved. It turned out that I was way off base because there were suspects I hadn’t considered. The motive behind everything was different from the one that even the kids believed. I was pleasantly surprised by the twists in the story. There is a clue later in the book that more than one person dresses up as the mummy at different times when the kids realize that the mummy looked thin one time and fat the next time they saw him.
I liked the pieces of historical information about mummies included in the story, although the part about tanna leaves bringing mummies to life and attracting them is fictional, a concept created for a movie called The Mummy’s Hand from 1940. That’s why it’s important that one of the books Freddie finds at the library is about mummies in movies. At one point, Freddie and Flossie use what they’ve learned to build their own trap for the mummy.
I also noticed that the mummy’s legend comes with curse that rhymes when it’s translated into English, sort of like how the clues on the old Spanish map rhyme in English in The Goonies. In real life, things translated from one language to another don’t maintain their rhyme scheme. That went over my head when I was a kid, but I hadn’t studied other languages at that point, so the idea didn’t occur to me.
At one point in the story, the kids receive a message from the “mummy” that is clearly written on modern paper that someone tried to make look old, and the kids notice right away. They realize that it’s modern computer paper that someone yellowed with a candle, and they see where the holes at the sides were torn off. Modern kids might not understand what they mean about holes being torn off at the sides of the paper, but this was a familiar feature of computer paper at the time the book was written in the 1980s. Modern computer paper doesn’t have holes at the sides, but when I was a kid in the 1980s, there were perforated sections on both sides of the dot matrix printer computer paper with a series of little holes in them. The holes were where the printer would grab the paper and feed it through the machine. They later became unnecessary when printer designs changed, which is why you don’t see paper like that any more. When I was a kid, we would tear off those perforated sections with the little holes after printing. We would also have to break the individual sheets apart at perforated points because the sheets of paper were all joined together to feed continuously through the printer. That’s the type of printer paper that the kids in the story have. I don’t know if everyone did this, but I’d sometimes use those edging strips with the holes for little craft projects, or make them into little chains or bracelets.
#20 The Weird Science Mystery by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1990.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
The Bobbsey Twins are all getting ready for their school’s science fair. Bert’s project is about dog behavior with the family’s dog as his subject. His twin, Nan, is also studying animal behavior, but with a chicken named Zelda. Because the science fair is open to both middle school and elementary school kids, the younger twins, Freddie and Flossie, can also enter. Freddie is entering with a large baking soda volcano.
When the kids arrive to drop off their projects, Nan and Bert notice another boy from their class, Martin Crane. Martin is a science whiz, but he isn’t very nice. He’s not really a bully, like Danny Rugg, but he makes fun of the Bobbseys’ science projects. They don’t know what Martin’s project is because he’s bringing it in boxes labeled “Top Secret”, but he swears that it’s going to win first prize.
When Freddie sees the other students’ projects, he starts to doubt that he has any chance of winning a prize himself. There’s a boy who has an impressive star chart display, and Danny Rugg has a display of spiders. There’s a girl named Ellen with an exhibit showing how pearls are made, including real pearls! Ellen says that her uncle is in the jewelry business and loaned her the pearls. Ellen’s younger sister, Melissa, says that Ellen’s project is unfair, although she doesn’t say why she thinks so. Melissa says that she didn’t do a project herself because she thinks the science fair is dumb.
Mr. Newman, Nan and Bert’s science teacher from an earlier book in the series, is one of the judges of the science fair. He’s going around the fair, taking pictures of the projects, but Martin refuses to unpack his project, saying that he will reveal it tomorrow. Then, Melissa screams that Danny’s poisonous spiders have escaped, and people start panicking and running! Mr. Newman says that Danny’s spiders are definitely not the poisonous kind, and he makes Danny apologize for telling people they were. The Bobbseys wonder if Danny could have let the spiders loose on purpose as one of his pranks. Then, suddenly, Ellen screams that her pearls are gone!
While the teachers are looking for the pearls and trying to encourage the thief to come forward, other accidents happen to other science fair projects. Freddie’s volcano suddenly erupts even though he didn’t set it up to do that yet. Someone cuts the leash on their dog, so he gets loose, and release’s Nan’s chicken from her cage. Ellen said that the pearls in her collection were valuable, so the teachers call the police. But, were the pearls stolen because they were valuable or because someone wants to sabotage the science fair? Was the theft of the pearls related to the sabotage of the other projects, or are these two separate acts? Also, what does Martin have in those boxes labeled “Top Secret”?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
Sean and I were talking earlier about how later books in the New Bobbsey Twins series focused more on the younger set of twins, Freddie and Flossie, and seemed to involve lower stakes in the mysteries. I reviewed this book shortly after The Clue in the Classroom, so I could compare two science-based mysteries that took place at the kids’ school, one earlier in the series and one later.
The other science-based mystery in the series involved an invention and industrial espionage, while this one involves the school science fair. However, I thought the mystery was well-done. When the Bobbseys arrive at the science fair, the story establishes multiples suspects. Danny Rugg is a repeat suspect because he’s the school bully and general nemesis, and he could have set his spiders loose as a distraction while he took the pearls and set up other things to go wrong. Then again, Melissa seemed upset about her sister’s project, so she might have had a reason to sabotage it. Martin is being mysterious about his science fair project, but what if he doesn’t actually have one in those boxes of his? Maybe he couldn’t think of anything or ran out of time to do his project, so he’s sabotaging everyone else’s project to provide a reason for why his project will suddenly disappear or turn out not to work. I even had a theory that each of those people might have done something since multiple disasters happened at the same time or almost at the same time. From the beginning, there are multiple possibilities that seem about equally likely, which is good for making readers wonder, and the kids are active investigators in the story, investigating suspects individually, not just waiting for chance to give them the answers. Those are the ingredients for a good mystery.
Although the story takes place at a kids’ science fair, there are a couple of factors involved that add some excitement and higher stakes to the story. The value of the pearls has the adults worried about getting them back. (Personally, I wondered about just how valuable the pearls were. Since they didn’t seem to have any form of security to protect them, like a locked display case, and since Danny Rugg lied to everyone about his spiders being poisonous, it occurred to me that Ellen might have lied to everyone about the value of the pearls to make her project seem more exciting, although that is never clarified during the story.) I also appreciated the thief’s motive for stealing the pearls because it wasn’t just about the pearls’ value. It was one of the ideas that I can for a possible motive, but I’ll leave it a secret about which of my theories was right.
#9 The Clue in the Classroom by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1988.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
Nan and Bert are walking to school when Bert starts trying to follow Nan, practicing shadowing someone, like his favorite comic book detective, Rex Sleuther. Nan thinks that Bert’s attempts at following her are ridiculous, especially since she already knows he’s there. Then, she spots a tall man who is really being shadowed.
The tall man keeps looking over his shoulder and ducking into doorways, like someone is after them. It doesn’t take the kids long to realize who is following him because a man in a trenchcoat, who is walking behind the tall man, keeps pausing and pretending to tie his shoe or look in store windows every time the tall man glances back. It’s not very subtle. When the man in the trenchcoat sees Nan and Bert watching him, he gives them a menacing look and seems like he’s about to confront them, but then, he leaves. They lose sight of the tall man. It’s a bizarre experience, and it ends when the kids’ mother drives up with their younger siblings and gives them a ride.
At school, Nan meets her new science teacher, and she realizes that he is the tall man who was being followed by the man in the trenchcoat. He introduces himself as Mr. Newman (ha, ha), and he seems much more relaxed than he was before. That is, until they all see the message written on the blackboard in the classroom: “Newman, give up your plans. We’re watching you.” Mr. Newman exclaims, “Oh, no! They’ve found out! They know!” (I seriously wish that at least one of my old teachers had started their first day in class by saying that exact thing.) Mr. Newman doesn’t explain what it’s about. He just quickly erases the message on the board and begins talking about the science project he’s assigning.
When Nan tells her siblings about Mr. Newman and what happened in class, Freddie says that Mr. Newman will also be teaching the afternoon science club that he joined. Mr. Newman will be teaching them about robots, and they’re going to have a meeting at his house, where Mr. Newman will show the club his inventions. Bert says that Freddie can help them figure out what Mr. Newman is doing and what and who he’s afraid of after he’s seen the projects that Mr. Newman is working on.
Bert decides to take a walk past Mr. Newman’s house to get a look at it before Freddie goes there. While he’s doing his reconnaissance, Bert sees what looks like people fighting in one of the windows. When he knocks on the door to see if Mr. Newman is all right, Mr. Newman says that he is and insists that there’s no one else there. Then, a strange woman shows up and starts asking Bert questions about Mr. Newman. She says that she’s his former boss at a computer company and wants to know if Bert saw anything in his house. She seems very interested in what he might be working on, but Bert just says that Mr. Newman was too busy for visitors.
Is this woman really Mr. Newman’s former boss, and does she have anything to do with the mysterious man in the trenchcoat? Someone breaks into the school and trashes Mr. Newman’s classroom. What is this secret invention of Mr. Newman’s that everyone seems so interested in, and why would someone threaten him over it or try to put a stop to his work?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
The kids’ first thoughts about the mysterious people who are after Mr. Newman is that they might be spies, and they’re partly right. This is a matter of industrial espionage. People are after Mr. Newman’s invention because they can make a lot of money from it.
The robot Mr. Newman is building is really impressive, even by modern 21st century standards. Back in the 1980s, when this was written, a robot that large and sophisticated would have seemed almost like science fiction, although increasing developments in robotics technology would have made it seem more possible. Companies were working on developing robots during the 1980s, and Honda was working on a humanoid robot that could walk on two feet. Kids had toy robots. (I wanted one but never got one.) I don’t remember any classes for building robots for kids, but there may have been some that I didn’t know about at the time because I was still pretty young in the 1980s. In the 21st century, there are modern robotics classes for kids, and they sometimes show off their robots at competitions.
#22 The Super-Duper Cookie Caper by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1991.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
Freddie decides that he wants to get a new bike, and inspired by the school bake sale, he decides that he’ll make and sell cookies to raise the money. His grandmother makes really delicious oatmeal chocolate chip cookies that everybody loves, so he plans to make and sell them. He persuades his twin, Flossie, to help him by promising her part of the money from the cookie sales. Their parents approve of the plan, and their mother offers to help them because neither of them has much experience with cooking.
When Freddie and Flossie go to sell the cookies in the park, they’re pretty popular. Everyone loves the cookies, and Freddie boasts about his grandmother’s secret recipe. Their last customer is a man who gives them a dollar with some kind of white powder on it, and he doesn’t seem to think much of the cookies. Freddie doesn’t care because everyone else likes them, and they’re making money.
There are some complications to selling cookies. First, Flossie has a sweet tooth, and Freddie has to keep stopping her from eating their stock herself. Then, a boy at school, Brian, announces that he’s going to set up a rival business in the park, selling brownies. Freddie gets the idea of offering broken cookies as free samples and selling orders of cookies door-to-door.
Nan and Bert start helping with the cookie-baking, but things don’t always go well in the kitchen. There are times when they forget ingredients or let the cookies burn. Then, the children realize that the card with the recipe on it is missing! They search the kitchen and realize that there is a chocolate smudge on the kitchen window. It looks like someone reached through the window and stole the recipe!
There are a few logical suspects. It could be Brian, hoping to cash in on the success of the cookie-selling. It could be their old nemesis, local bully Danny Rugg, who stole their free samples earlier and generally likes to mess things up for the Bobbseys. Then again, there is the mysterious man who keeps showing up at the park. The Bobbsey Twins find out that he owns his own bakery. To find out who the recipe thief is, Freddie decides to invent a trap. He tells everyone that his grandmother has given him her other secret recipe for super-duper cookies that’s even better than the first one. Who will take the bait?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
Sean and I were discussing earlier how later books in the New Bobbsey Twins series tended to focus more on the younger set of twins than the older Bobbsey twins and seem to involve lower-stakes mysteries. Earlier books in the series involved definite crimes, police matters, and strange phenomena. A stolen cookie recipe feels like much lower stakes. However, I thought this one was well-done for what it was. There are some definite suspects, enough to sow some doubt about who the recipe thief is. The actual thief is someone I suspected but not necessarily the most obvious suspect, and the thief’s motives do make logical sense, although I’m not sure (spoiler) any real adult would seriously consider that kind of business model. It sounds more like something a kid might do, and that’s partly what allows readers to doubt whether it’s a child or adult who took the recipe.
There is also a punchline to the story. There was one thing that I had guessed early on about the grandmother’s “secret recipe.” It’s not as “secret” as the kids think it is. I guessed that because, when I was a kid, one of my grandmothers always baked chocolate chip cookies. Those cookies were one of the highlights of going to her house. When we were little, my brother and I liked them so much that we guessed that she must have been a baker before she retired. When we were older, we found out that she’d actually been a bookkeeper and that her cookie recipe was just the Toll House recipe from the chocolate chip package. She made two versions, with and without nuts from the pecan tree in her backyard, but it was still the Toll House recipe. It’s a similar situation with the Bobbsey Twins’ grandmother’s secret recipe. The only thing the grandmother changed was the cooking time. Everyone just thought that the cookies were special because her grandchildren thought they were, and they convinced other people. Few things are as special as homemade cookies from your grandmother!
#10 The Chocolate-Covered Clue by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1989.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
Flossie has made a new friend, Casey Baker, whose parents own Baker’s Bakery. They invite her to come for a tour of the bakery to see how they make everything. It means getting up very early on a school morning because the baking has to start very early. They need to have everything freshly baked by the time the bakery opens for customers. Although it’s difficult to get up that early, Flossie enjoys the tour, seeing the large electric mixers where they make the cake batter and the enormous oven where they can bake over 100 cookies at once.
While the Bakers are showing her everything, they all realize that they feel cold. Someone has left the door to the alley open. Nobody is around, so they assume that it must have just been left open by a deliveryman making an early delivery.
Later, while Flossie and Cassie are admiring a beautiful chocolate cake, something really strange happens. A masked man suddenly runs into the shop, grabs the cake, and runs away with it! Who could be so desperate for chocolate cake that they have to resort to theft? The Bobbsey Twins’ mother is covering a series of recent burglaries for the local newspaper, but this is the weirdest theft the kids have ever heard of.
It gets weirder as the day goes on. While Freddie and his mother are running errands, they stop at a diner, and the same masked man runs in and smashes the chocolate cake on the counter with his bare hands! Freddie tries to chase him, and the man throws cake at him. The cake that was smashed was also from Baker’s Bakery.
The Bobbsey Twins talk to Casey, and she tells them that someone stole their delivery list. From then on, this crazy cakenapper starts tracking down and stealing and smashing every chocolate cake Baker’s Bakery made that day – including the one that the Bobbseys had delivered to their house.
What’s behind all of this cake carnage and chocolate destruction? Does someone have a grudge against the Bakers or against chocolate-based desserts?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction and Spoilers
I really liked the premise of this mystery! It’s such a fun, crazy concept of someone going all over town, smashing cakes, apparently for no reason. It’s the sort of mystery that I sometimes call a “Bizarre Happenings” mystery. That’s a mystery where strange things happen that encourage the characters to investigate, but it’s not obvious what’s behind it all or what sort of crime is really being committed. An example from adult literature would be the Sherlock Holmes story, The Red-Headed League, where the characters know that someone has been deceived into joining a special club for red-headed men that doesn’t actually exist and paid to copy entries from the encyclopedia, but they’re not sure why at first. In the case of the Bobbsey Twins mystery, the characters know that someone is stealing and destroying chocolate cakes, which is a very bizarre form of theft, but they’re not sure why. Readers can guess from the beginning that this rash of cake thefts is related to a different crime.
Actually, the solution to the story is very similar to that of another Sherlock Holmes story, The Adventure of the Six Napoleons, where someone is stealing and smashing busts of Napoleon. It has nothing to do with Napoleon or the busts themselves. There is something hidden inside one of the busts that someone is desperate to find, but because the busts all look alike, they have to track down and smash them all to find the one they really want. It’s like that with the cakes. The destruction of the cakes has nothing to do with the Baker family, their business, or the cakes themselves. Someone came into the bakery, looking for a place to hide, and dropped something in the cake batter while it was being mixed. Because the batter in the massive mixer was made into multiple cakes, they can’t be sure which cake now contains what they want. They need to track down the right cake in a hurry, before someone else finds what they hid. What seems to be an oddball crime puts the Bobbsey Twins up against a dangerous criminal!
The Secret at Sleepaway Camp by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1990.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
The Bobbsey Twins are headed to Camp Evergreen this summer! Before they leave for camp, their mother, who is a part-time reporter for the local newspaper tells them that she was just covering a story about a baby polar bear who disappeared from the local zoo. Flossie is upset about it because she’s fond of the polar bear, Snowflake, and likes to see her when she goes to the zoo. Nobody knows exactly how Snowflake got out of her enclosure. All they know is that the gate was found open, and Snowflake was gone. Mrs. Bobbsey recommends that the kids forget about it for now and concentrate on having fun at camp.
Nan and Bert are going to be counselors’ helpers at camp, and all the kids are looking forward to activities like swimming, horseback riding, and archery. The only downside is that Danny Rugg, local bully and troublemaker, will also be there as a counselors’ helper. (Danny is a long-standing nemesis in the Bobbsey Twins series, from the original incarnation of the series. See The Bobbsey Twins of Lakeport.)
Strange things start happening at camp right from the moment that the Bobbsey Twins arrive. Tanya, the head counselor, tells them that, for some reason, all of the camp’s rowboats are leaking. When the kids investigate, they discover that someone has deliberately drilled holes in all of the boats.
The first thought that the Bobbsey Twins have is that Danny is responsible because he has a history of playing mean pranks, although he denies it. Danny does say that he doesn’t see why everyone else at camp should have fun while he’s miserable. His job as a counselors’ helper is working in the kitchen, and he hates it because it’s hot in there, and he thinks the cook is weird.
When Freddie goes to unpack in his cabin, he meets another boy named Ian. Ian is from the city and has never been to the countryside before. He’s a little nervous and homesick, and he says that the camp’s cook has told him that the camp is haunted. Freddie says that he’s sure there’s nothing to worry about and that they’ll have fun at camp.
Arts and crafts goes fine, and the kids enjoy meeting the camp’s mascot, a tame raccoon named Bandit. Tanya explains that they found Bandit when he was just a baby and that the kids should never try to play with wild raccoons. However, when the kids arrive at the archery range, they discover that someone has snapped all the arrows in half! Because of the stories the camp cook has been telling everyone, some of the campers think that it’s the work of the camp’s ghost. The Bobbsey Twins still suspect Danny, and they offer their services to Tanya, to investigate and find out who’s really causing all the trouble at camp.
Danny isn’t the only suspect. Nan overhears the cook, Sal, telling the kids about a hungry, child-eating bear in the woods who is supposedly friends with the camp ghost. Does he just like scary stories, or does he have a special reason for wanting to frighten the kids at camp? Even Tanya seems to have something to hide, getting mysterious notes and meeting someone in secret.
Soon, other strange things happen at camp. Someone puts a snake in Freddie’s bed, and the kids see strange lights in the woods at night. Then, someone steals all the ponies out of the corral and smashes the kids’ clay art projects. Some of the kids think that it’s the work of the ghost Sal has been talking about, but the Bobbsey Twins are sure that someone only wants them to think that. What are all the pranks and sabotage really about?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
I was pretty sure I knew right away who was behind the camp sabotage, but this is one of those stories where there’s more than one person doing things that are unrelated. Danny eventually admits to playing some of the pranks, like the snake in Freddie’s bed, but not all of them. I was also wrong about who the main villain was. The missing polar bear at the beginning does figure into the mystery of the things happening at camp. I figured it would be important, but I didn’t guess how and why.
One of the clues the kids find is a lucky rabbit’s foot keychain. The kids comment that those used to be popular good luck charms, but not many people have them anymore. I have to admit that I had a pink one when I was a kid that I got from a novelty shop. I don’t think I realized at first that it was a real rabbit’s foot. I think I assumed that it was fake because I bought it in a place that sold magic tricks and costume props, so I figured it was imitation, like everything else. I figured it out eventually, and then, I didn’t feel quite so lucky about it. I’m sure that those keychains fell out of popularity because other people felt the same way I did about them, and they were concerned about animal cruelty. I believe it’s still possible to buy real and faux rabbit’s foot keychains, but it’s been a long time since I last saw them displayed at a store, so I think the kids were probably right about them not being as popular as they once were.
The Secret of the Sunken Treasure by Laura Lee Hope (Stratemeyer Syndicate), 1989.
Before I begin, I’d like to acknowledge Sean Hagins, for supplying me with photos of this book! Usually, I take pictures of books myself, but I just couldn’t find a physical copy of this one. Sean is a big fan of the Bobbsey Twins, particularly the New Bobbsey Twins mysteries, and you can see some of his video reviews as well as videos about his photography work on his YouTube channel, SJHFoto. Thanks, Sean!
The two sets of Bobbsey Twins and their parents are on vacation in Florida for a week. It’s just a fun family vacation, although Mrs. Bobbsey is hoping to write an article about a sunken treasure ship called the Granada. The Bobbsey Twins are intrigued at the idea of searching for sunken treasure, although nobody has detected a sign of the treasure since the ship sank in 1801. Dan Chester, he brother of a family friend, lives in the town where the Bobbseys are staying along with his 15-year-old daughter, Meg. Dan and Meg are divers, and they have been searching for the wreckage of the Granada, and they think they have a lead. The Bobbsey Twins are excited to think that they might be able to participate in the search for the treasure or be there when the Chesters find it!
However, when Dan and Meg pick them up at the airport, they have bad news. Although they were able to locate the wreckage of the Granada, they were delayed reaching shore to claim their find because their boat propeller broke, and someone else claimed the Granada before they could. Joe Lenox, the man who claimed the wreckage, runs an underwater salvaging company, and he’s tough competition for the Chesters because he can afford all the latest sonar equipment. It’s a heavy blow to Dan and Meg, losing such an important find when they were so close to claiming it. The only consolation is that everyone will be able to watch the old safe from the wreckage being hauled to the surface. The safe is supposed to contain the treasure the ship was carrying.
When Joe Lenox learns that Mrs. Bobbsey is an out-of-town reporter, he invites the entire Bobbsey family to come with him on his boat to see the treasure being recovered. They accept the invitation, although the kids feel a little funny about it because Joe is Dan and Meg’s competitor.
On the boat, Joe shows the Bobbseys his equipment and explains how everything works. (I grew up in Arizona and have never been diving, so I have very little context for understanding diving equipment. This part looks informative, but since this book was published decades ago, there may have been some changes in equipment since then. I wouldn’t know.) Flossie is hoping that, when the treasure is brought up, she will get the chance to try on the famous tiara that is supposed to be in the safe. However, everyone is in for a shock. When the divers go to recover the safe, they discover that someone has already managed to open it and remove the strongbox containing the treasure!
Now, Joe feels cheated out of a treasure he thought he had safely claimed, and he wants to know who’s responsible. The logical suspects would be Dan and Meg, who felt cheated out of their opportunity to claim the treasure first and who have the diving skills needed to reach the safe. A charm belonging to Meg is found in the safe, making Joe and the police believe that the Chesters are guilty. Although, there are also the other members of Joe’s crew to consider. They were the only other people who knew where the wreck was. Could any of them gone out to raid the wreck before the official salvage operation? Can the Bobbsey Twins find the real thieves?
The book is available to borrow and read for free online through Internet Archive.
My Reaction
I had a couple of favorite suspects early on in the story. The book establishes that it would have taken at least two people to deal with the safe, so I was looking for a pair of people. I was only partly right, though, because there’s another suspect who isn’t introduced until later in the book. The first person I suspected is guilty, but there were more people involved than I thought.
The book explains a little about how a person can lay claim to a sunken ship. The characters say that they have to fill out paperwork at the courthouse. There are laws regarding claiming a sunken ship and official procedures to follow. It’s not as simple as finders keepers. It does matter who found it, where they found it, and who the ship belonged to originally. There were also some changes to the laws around the time this book was written and published with the Abandoned Shipwreck Act of 1987. I’m not completely sure whether each Joe or Dan and Meg could have legally claimed the ship. It partly depends on whether or not it was within US territorial waters or outside the official three-mile limit, and it also depends on whether or not the ship was property of a foreign government which could lay claim to it. For the purposes of the story, we have to assume that Joe Lenox was able to successfully lay a claim to the ship and that Dan and Meg could have done so if they had reached the authorities first. What makes me doubt this is how it would have worked in real life is that the treasure on the ship belonged to a Spanish countess, which makes me think that it could be regarded as property of the Spanish government, but it would be difficult to determine that without additional information.
Jestress's Forgotten Books and Stories 