Posted on by TracyC

Double Trouble on Vacation

DoubleTroubleVacation

Double Trouble on Vacation by Michael J. Pellowski, 1989.

The Daniels twins are at it again! Sandi and Randi are looking forward to spending their vacation at the lake with their family. Sandi is trying to work on her wilderness merit badge, and Randi just wants to go fishing. But, when Bobbi Joy, a bully they know from school, turns up at the lake, visiting her cousin, the girls make the mistake of accepting a bet from her. Randi bets Bobbi Joy that she can beat her in the fishing derby, not knowing that Bobbi Joy’s cousin, who is her fishing partner, is a fishing champion. Although the stakes are fairly harmless, just taking a jump in the lake with all her clothes on, Randi still can’t stand the idea of losing to Bobbi Joy.

Things get complicated when Randi is sprayed by the skunk that their little brother Teddy tried to befriend. Randi doesn’t want her team to be disqualified from the fishing derby, but she can’t go smelling like skunk! Instead, she talks Sandi into taking her place once again. But, Sandi has to give a speech later that day in order to get her merit badge. Can she help her sister and still make it in time to make her speech?

This book is currently available through Internet Archive.

DoubleTroubleVacationPicThis is the last of the four books I have in this series, but there are two other books in the series that I don’t have and haven’t read: A Double Trouble Dream Date and Double Trouble Mystery Mansion.  In A Double Trouble Dream Date, the twins conspire to get roles in a new music video with a teen star, when only Sandi is actually able to sing.  In Double Trouble Mystery Mansion, the girls are investigating a haunted house which holds a hidden treasure.  There is a real ghost in the story, but only Sandi has been able to see it.  At first, Randi doesn’t believe her that there even is a ghost, and the girls attempt another switch to see if they can convince the ghost to show himself to Randi, too.

Posted on by TracyC

The Secret Summer

SecretSummerThe Secret Summer by Ruth Chew, 1970.

This was one of my favorite books when I was a kid. Its original title was Baked Beans for Breakfast, but I think the paperback copies are mostly under this title.

Joe and Kathleen, who are brother and sister, are disappointed because their parents are taking a trip to Europe without them instead of taking the whole family to the lake like they usually do in the summer. Worse still, their babysitter favors their younger siblings and is very hard on them.  The babysitter is even cruel and neglectful by making the older siblings sit outside in the heat all day while she played with the younger siblings inside, not even allowing Joe and Kathleen to come inside for water.  Finally, Joe comes up with a plan for himself and Kathleen to escape their babysitter by going to the lake by themselves.

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They leave a note for the babysitter saying that they are going to visit their grandmother and take a bus to the lake. Thus begins the adventure! The children camp out in the woods, trying to avoid people who know them and might tell their parents or babysitter where they are.  They do make some new friends, including a nice older lady who hires them to help her with chores in her big, old house. However, as well as Joe and Kathleen take care of themselves, they can’t plan for everything.  What will happen to the children when an emergency rescue means that their secret will be discovered?

Ruth Chew may be better known for her fantasy stories, but this was the first book of hers that I encountered.  It would especially appeal to fans of The Boxcar Children, another story about resourceful children who are trying to survive without help from adults.

The book is currently available through Internet Archive.

Posted on by TracyC

The Case of the Lost Lookalike

LostLookalike

The Case of the Lost Lookalike by Carol Farley, 1988.

“I want to swoop in and spout out the answers to baffling mysteries while everyone around me blinks in befuddlement.  I want to reveal the amazing solutions to puzzles while everyone gasps in admiration.  Except the criminal, of course, who gasps for other reasons.”
— Flee Jay Saylor

This is the second book in the the Flee Jay and Clarice Mysteries.

In The Case of the Lost Lookalike, Flee Jay and Clarice are spending the summer at a lake with their aunt, and someone there says that Clarice is the very image of a little girl named Caroline who was apparently kidnapped 40 years ago.  Little Caroline disappeared from her own bedroom one night after her mother died under rather suspicious circumstances.  Most people assume that Caroline is dead, too.  The girl’s father is now a strange recluse who lives on an island in the middle of the lake.

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But, as the girls puzzle over this old mystery, other mysterious things begin to happen.  A woman produces pictures of the missing girl which look nothing like Clarice.  Then, her shop is broken into, and the pictures of Caroline disappear.

When someone persuades their aunt to let the girls visit the old recluse on the island, the man’s reaction is surprising, and they come to realize that Caroline’s disappearance might not be the real issue at all.  Clarice takes some frightening risks to get to the bottom of the mystery!

My Reaction

In a way, this story is two mysteries in one because Clarice figures out what really happened to Caroline when she disappeared years ago at the same time that the girls unravel the mystery that is affecting people who live in the small town by the lake now.  The mystery of what happened to Caroline would not have resurfaced at this particular time if someone else hadn’t brought up the issue as a distraction from something else.

What I like best about this series is the sense of humor and the way that Flee Jay says things as she narrates the story: “I mean, new cottages and magic lakes are terrific and all that, but nothing can ever take the place of a peanut-butter, brown sugar, and banana sandwich.”

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The Case of the Vanishing Villain

The Case of the Vanishing Villain by Carol Farley, 1986

As you can see, my copy of this book has been … well-loved.

This is the first book in a series about two sisters, Flee Jay (short for Felice Jennifer) and Clarice Saylor. Twelve-year-old Flee Jay wants to be a detective, just like in the books she’s read, but her pretty younger sister is a child genius who has more aptitude for it. Clarice is somewhat eccentric for a ten-year-old, but she is also intelligent and logical and has a memory for details and obscure facts. Throughout the series, the two of them kind of compete to solve mysteries. Although Clarice usually comes up with the solution before Flee Jay, it usually takes the two of them together to get to the bottom of things because Flee Jay is an average kid who behaves like an average kid and helps Clarice understand how average people behave.

The story begins with an explanation and a request for help from Flee Jay. She and her genius younger sister, Clarice, were taking an early morning ferry from Michigan to Wisconsin to visit their grandparents when a series of strange events connected with an escaped convict took place. Clarice managed to solve the mystery, but Flee Jay wants readers to go through the events as they happened to see whether any normal person could have solved the mystery like Clarice did.

From that point on, Flee Jay describes what took place from the moment they arrived at the ferry until just before the ferry docked at its destination. She introduces all of the strange passengers on the ferry, including a family of three women who may have unwittingly brought the convict on board, a woman with an annoying barking dog, a bearded man with a guilty secret, and the overly-attentive ship’s steward, Mr. Woolsey, who is keeping an eye on the girls during the trip.

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From the moment that Flee Jay learns about the escaped convict from Clarice, who “accidentally” overhears the police and Mr. Woolsey talking about him through a vent while standing in the sink in the ladies’ room next to Mr. Woolsey’s office, Flee Jay wants to be the one to find him. At first, they don’t really know whether he’s on the boat or not, but when the boat is underway, a woman screams that there was a strange man in her stateroom, and then, they’re pretty sure. Flee Jay and Clarice take it upon themselves to consider all the hiding places and to question the other passengers. Of course, Clarice produces the solution to the puzzle, but she does credit Flee Jay with inspiring her. According to Flee Jay, she just figured things out because she’s nosy, but that’s left to the readers to decide.

Join eccentric 10-year-old genius Clarice and her long-suffering sister as they try to put the pieces together to keep the convict from getting away right under the noses of the authorities!

The book is written with humor and is fun to read. The clues fit together neatly, and the black-and-white pictures, list of characters, and map of the inside of the ferry help readers understand the action.

The book is currently available through Internet Archive.