Nancy Drew: The Ringmaster's Secret - Carolyn Keene

Nancy Drew #31: The Ringmaster's Secret
Carolyn Keene
Grosset & Dunlap
Copyright : 1954
978-0448095318

The amazon.com product description:

Nancy is given a beautiful gold bracelet and finds that one of the charms is missing. When she learns the unusual story behind the jewelry, she sets out to solve the fascinating mystery. The bracelet had been presented to a former circus performer by a queen who loved horses. For some reason the performer had to sell the bracelet but would not reveal her true identity. Clues lead Nancy to Sims’ Circus, where she meets Lolita, an unhappy young aerialist who has a horse charm wrought exactly like those on Nancy’s bracelet. Will Nancy be able to find the original owner of the bracelet?

As a kid, I collected and read my way through quite a few of the original Nancy Drew series, and I still have several boxes of the books I loved as a kid stashed away around the house. This was one of my favorites. It held up fairly well on the re-read too, even though I'm now way, way out of the target age range. That, I think is the cause of any of my gripes with the book and the series.

Nancy Drew: The Ringmaster's Secret has held up pretty well. It's now 60 years old and still in print, which is pretty amazing in itself, but the story still works well too. Everyone loves the circus, and horses are always a draw too - that's what pulled me into this book if I'm remembering correctly from the first time I read it.

Now, though, I found myself gritting my teeth at the writing - had to remind myself that this book was really geared for kids between 9 and about 15 years old. Which is most definitely no longer me, and also that the characters and setting are those of the mind 1950's. With that in mind, I still found it an enjoyable and quick read - a bit of a nostalgic trip down memory lane.

Nancy's a clever character. None of my gripes can take away from that, nor do I want to. However, I did find that everyone around her was a bit too helpful - making it so that things came to her a bit too easily. Maybe that's just modern-day cynicism on my part though.

As a kid, I loved these books and collected any of them that I could. Always the original series though. For some reason I never did like any of the more modern versions. The same thing held true for the Bobsey Twins, Hardy Boys and the Cherry Ames series of books. Since then, I've recommended the original Nancy Drew books many a time when I worked in the bookstore. I still would recommend them.

Robert Galbraith is J. K. Rowling

I have the feeling that this might just be the biggest piece of news in the publishing (and reading?) world this year: Robert Galbraith, author of The Cuckoo's Calling, is actually a pen-name of J. K. Rowling. Since the news came out, the book has become just about impossible to find, of course.

Apparently, the news has been out for a while, at least in the U.K. I, however, only just found out about it last night.

The Cuckoo's Calling
Robert Galbraith (J. K. Rowling)
Mulholland Books
Copyright: April 30, 2013
978-0316206846

The amazon.com product description:

The Cuckoo's Calling is a 2013 crime fiction novel by J. K. Rowling, published under the pseudonym Robert Galbraith.

A brilliant mystery in a classic vein: Detective Cormoran Strike investigates a supermodel's suicide.
After losing his leg to a land mine in Afghanistan, Cormoran Strike is barely scraping by as a private investigator. Strike is down to one client, and creditors are calling. He has also just broken up with his longtime girlfriend and is living in his office.

Then John Bristow walks through his door with an amazing story: His sister, thelegendary supermodel Lula Landry, known to her friends as the Cuckoo, famously fell to her death a few months earlier. The police ruled it a suicide, but John refuses to believe that. The case plunges Strike into the world of multimillionaire beauties, rock-star boyfriends, and desperate designers, and it introduces him to every variety of pleasure, enticement, seduction, and delusion known to man.

You may think you know detectives, but you've never met one quite like Strike. You may think you know about the wealthy and famous, but you've never seen them under an investigation like this.
I do have to wonder, if you read The Cuckoo's Calling before finding out the author's real name, did your opinion of the book change after that discovery?

New Poll

There's a new poll at the top left of All Booked Up: What is the best P.D. James mystery novel?

I'm asking because I get asked by people quite regularly what the best novel is of hers to read. I know the best known  books of hers are the Adam Dalgleish mystery novels. I'm curious to know what you think the answer is.

Think Of A Number - John Verdon

Think Of A Number
John Verdon
Crown Publishing
Copyright: July 2010
978-0307588920

The amazon.com product description:

An extraordinary fiction debut, Think of a Number is an exquisitely plotted novel of suspense that grows relentlessly darker and more frightening as its pace accelerates, forcing its deeply troubled characters to moments of startling self-revelation.

Arriving in the mail over a period of weeks are taunting letters that end with a simple declaration, “Think of any number…picture it…now see how well I know your secrets.”  Amazingly, those who comply find that the letter writer has predicted their random choice exactly.  For Dave Gurney, just retired as the NYPD’s top homicide investigator and forging a new life with his wife, Madeleine, in upstate New York, the letters are oddities that begin as a diverting puzzle but quickly ignite a massive serial murder investigation.

What police are confronted with is a completely baffling killer, one who is fond of rhymes filled with threats and warnings, whose attention to detail is unprecedented, and who has an uncanny knack for disappearing into thin air.  Even more disturbing, the scale of his ambition seems to widen as events unfold.

Brought in as an investigative consultant, Dave Gurney soon accomplishes deductive breakthroughs that leave local police in awe.  Yet, even as he matches wits with his seemingly clairvoyant opponent, Gurney’s tragedy-marred past rises up to haunt him, his marriage approaches a dangerous precipice, and finally, a dark, cold fear builds that he’s met an adversary who can’t be stopped.

In the end, fighting to keep his bearings amid a whirlwind of menace and destruction, Gurney sees the truth of what he’s become – what we all become when guilty memories fester – and how his wife Madeleine’s clear-eyed advice may be the only answer that makes sense.

A work that defies easy labels -- at once a propulsive masterpiece of suspense and an absorbing immersion in the lives of characters so real we seem to hear their heartbeats – Think of a Number is a novel you’ll not soon forget. 

To be honest, Think of a Number is not my usual reading material, being a mystery/thriller type of novel, where I usually read history, historical fiction, and science fiction/fantasy. I was asked to read the book by one of the managers at work. Surprisingly, I'm glad he did ask, as I quite enjoyed the read - and I wouldn't have read it otherwise, I suspect.

There are some things about the book that I think were a bit over the top (such as the cluelessness of some of the detectives: I still can't believe that someone doesn't know the saying "like a bull in a china shop" (not quite a direct quote)).

Regardless of all that, the book was one I found hard to put down until it was finished - full of surprising twists and a rather creepy bad guy - who's not who you might think it is. The story is as much in the motivations of the characters, both Dave Gurney and the murder as it is in the solving of the crimes. It's very dramatically written too.

I suspect that the book will end up as a movie, and think it would do very well as one too - though I have not even the slightest guess to casting. I also wonder if there's going to be any more books, making Think Of A Number into a series.

John Verdon has done a very good job with this, his first novel, and I wish him luck with any future enterprises as well. Think Of A Number is a book for any mystery/thriller lover.