At this year’s Malice Domestic conference I met Mark Baker,
the creator of the wonderful Carstairs Considers blog. It was fun to talk to
someone who knows so much about mysteries, and who, like myself, is a fan of
the Mrs. Pollifax mystery series.
As we compared notes about mystery novels, he discovered my
deep dark secret.
“You’ve never read Trixie Belden?” Mark was too polite to
gasp, but he dropped his dinner roll.
I’m a huge Nancy Drew fan and I never meant
to snub Trixie, but Nancy filled all my teenage sleuthing needs. But I feel strongly about reading the classics, so I added
one book to my post-Malice TBR pile: The
Secret of the Mansion by Julie Campbell, er, Kathryn Kenny, er, Julie
Campbell Tathum.
Actually, Julie Campbell Tathum, a literary agent, was the
originator of the Trixie Belden series and wrote the first six books between
1948 and 1956. Tathum also wrote for the Ginny Gordon, Vicki Barr, and Cherry
Ames series. The publisher, Whitman, assigned the nom de plume Kathryn Kenny to
the Trixie Belden series. There is some evidence that Tathum wanted to write
for the Stratemeyer Syndicate, but was not offered a position with The House
That Built Nancy.
I feel like a louse, but, Nancy, I have to confess. I
couldn’t stop turning the pages of The
Secret of the Mansion.
In this first book of the Trixie Belden series, 13 year old
Trixie is bemoaning the boring summer stretching out before her when Honey
Wheeler, a millionaire’s daughter, moves in next door. Then a runaway kid hides
out in a nearby mansion and rumors fly that the mansion has a fortune hidden
inside. Suddenly Trixie’s summer is packed with excitement, fun, and danger.
Lots of danger.
Trixie’s uninhibited, impulsive nature is contrasted by the
quiet personality of her new friend, Honey. Honey is a poor little rich girl
who worries that her mother doesn’t love her. She’s been sheltered so much that
her family moves to the country so she can get some sunshine and put on
some weight. Trixie and Honey form an instant friendship. Trixie helps Honey come
out of her shell and Honey’s quiet nature reins in Trixie’s impulsive personality. A
bit.
Trixie is not only unsupervised in a way that would make a
modern parent call in Child Protective Services, she is often left in charge of
her young brother, Bobby, who manages to get bitten by a copperhead while under
Trixie’s less than stellar supervision. Trixie does know first aid and it’s a
good thing too, because in the span of just a few days characters also get
thrown by a horse, fall off ladders, crash bicycles, narrowly miss getting hit
by a truck, and dive headfirst into a rock. There’s also a fire and a mad dog
attack. Oh, and a plane crash, I almost forgot the plane crash. Trixie is
always fanning Honey when she gets faint at the sight of blood or is overcome
by stress, but with a friend like Trixie, that happens to Honey all the time.
One can hardly compare 13-year-old Trixie with 18 year-old Nancy.
It’s a comparison of Bobby sox to penny loafers, bicycles to roadsters, but both had
freedom that modern teens, with all their expensive technology,
can only dream of.
Action packed, with a likeable main character who always
chooses the most exciting path, Trixie Belden and The Secret of the Mansion gets an enthusiastic thumbs up from this
lifelong Nancy Drew fan.
Have you read the Trixie Belden books? Team Nancy or Team
Trixie?
