Barbara Ann: Mystery Across the Boarder

 

    When Barbara Ann's father has to take a business trip to Mexico City Barbara and her best friend Beverly join him. Barbara's unofficial boyfriend Bob and his friends, Mort, Jerry, and Jimmy, all decided to take a trip to Mexico City too. 

    As they're driving through Texas on their journey Barbara's father allows her to take the wheel and do some driving. Unfortunately Barbara ends up in a minor bang up with a car parked on the side of the road. This car belongs to Mr. Stedman who begins to bawl out the teenage girl. However when he learns her name is Barbara his attitude completely changes to kind and friendly. 

    Once across the border the group of Americans stay at a quaint Inn suggested to them by Mr. Stedman. It is owned by Mr. Sweizer who tells Barbara about Stedman's tragic life; 

    Stedman, a widower, had lost his only daughter and son-in-law in an automobile accident. His only remaining family was his granddaughter, Barbara, who he had custody of and doted on shamelessly. One day while at the beach with her nanny the three year old child went missing. It was ruled that the child had drowned but as her body had never been found Stedman holds onto hope that she is alive. She would now be 16 years old. 

    Once in Mexico City the party pays a visit to Mr. Stedman and meets his nephew, Gordon. Barbara senses a coldness between the two which is enhanced when Gordon makes it clear to Barbara that he does not approve of his uncle's hope that little Barbara is alive. 

    I'm going to stop my summary here because when it comes down to it the book is mostly filler. Barbara Ann of course finds little Barbara in Mexico, completely by coincidence. The nephew, of course, organized the child's kidnapping, and grandfather and granddaughter, of course, are reunited. 

    Mexico was a very popular place for books to be set in and I have read numerous ones taking place there, specifically in Mexico City. However I've never read one in which Mexico is looked down upon so much. The food is described as disgusting and inedible, the women as fat, the children as dirty, and the locations are picked apart. Almost all these old books in Mexico include a trip to the floating gardens of Xochimilco and this one is no exception but instead of describing the beauty of the place and the thrill and excitement of mingling with floating musicians and merchants who pass by the place is called "beautiful from a distance" and a complaint is made about Mexicans tossing their food waste into the water as well as complaints about it turning into a floating market where natives make money off of tourists. 

    To me it appeared as if no one in their tourist party was enjoying the experience of a different country. So it felt very ingenuine when Grosby writes the characters as being sad to leave Mexico. From their reactions throughout the whole book I thought they would be happy to leave. 

    I don't have much to say about this book. It's a typical Barbara Ann book in that the mystery doesn't take up much space and there's plenty of filler events. I did however find it less tedious than I did after my first reading and I think it is a step up from the last book in the series. 

Jane Stewardess of the Airlines

 

    Jane, along with her best friend Sue, have just completed their nurses training and are spending their graduation night worried about their lack of employment. Lucky for them the dean of their nursing school has received a request from Federated Airlines for two trained nurses. The company plans on hiring them as stewardess which was a newly created job field at this time. 

    The girls have to catch a flight to Federated's headquarters for their interviews. This is their first time on an airplane and to their misfortune the plane crashes. Jane helps the injured pilot escape from the cockpit right before the plane goes up in a fiery explosion. Due to her leadership behavior during the incident Jane is immediately given a job. 

    Jane's first assignment is to accompany the wealthy Mrs. Van Verity Vanness on a last minute dash across the country to reach her ill sons bedside. The flight takes place at the same time air bandits have been active and there is a close call with the bandits almost overtaking Jane's plane before the U.S. military comes in with aerial guns blazing. 

    Jane is paid by a newspaper to tell her story about the incident and Mrs. Van Verity Vanness gives Jane a check as a thank you. Jane uses this money to take flying lessons and get her pilot license. 

    When a film company comes to town to use the airport as a filming location Jane is giving the job of stunt pilot. The special effects equipment on her plane malfunctions causing a fire and Jane has to parachute out of the plane as it dives into an explosive crash landing, all while film cameras roll.

    Jane is soon given a promotion to assist in training new flight stewardess which comes with a substantial raise.

    As winter comes along many flights get cancelled due to snow. As Jane is checking in at the airport one day to learn her flight has been cancelled she overhears that an isolated village is having a flu outbreak and no medicine has been able to be transported to them due to the snow. Veteran pilot Slim Bollei decides to make the dangerous trip to the village and Jane accompanies him. The plane gets lost in the snow then makes a minor crash landing but still gets the medicine safely to the villagers. 

    As the one year anniversary of Jane and Sue becoming stewardess rolls around Jane happens to be a passenger on Sue's plane. Aboard the flight is child film star Jackie Condon as well as two shady looking men; Bardo and Mellotti. The two men end up hijacking the plane and kidnapping the boy. The passengers and pilot are dropped off at an isolated area in Canada but Sue and Jane are kept on to take care of the child. The men take the plane to an isolated shoreline bare of anything except two cabins and a seaplane. After night arrives the three kidnapped victims escape the cabin to the sea plane in which Jane flies them to freedom at dawn. The criminals pursue in the commercial plane but the U.S. coast guard is spotted just in time to make a rescue of the three.  

- Out of the first four plane trips in this book two of them end in crashes and one is attacked by air bandits. Not the best publicity for the newly emerging commercial flight business.

- This book had a lot in common with Vicki Barr and I read them as existing in the same world. So when Jane is walking through the Chicago Airport I got a little sentimental thinking that this is the same airport Vicki would be walking through 13 years later. 

- The movie stars names were based off of real movie stars and I found that really amusing. For example child actor Jackie Condon would have been fictionalized Jackie Coogan, leading lady Claudette Bennett would have been Constance Bennett, etc. 

- The kidnappers/hijackers are an example of anti-Italianism that was common at the time. I always find these offensive depictions of Italians very interesting as it seems to be a forgotten part of America's history.

- Jane is a bit of a boring character because she is perfect. She is top of her class at nurse school and she instantly becomes the top stewardess and pilot when she ventures into those fields. She's so perfect that she is constantly offered fabulous job opportunities; besides being given one of the two open stewardess positions she is also offered to accompany Mrs. Van Verity Vanness on an around the world trip, and offered a job in Hollywood as an actress. If the book didn't end when Jane, Sue, and Jackie are rescued by the coast guard Jane would have probably been offered a job with them. 

- One part I really liked was when Sue was on a flight that had almost crashed. After they land safety and Sue gets all the passengers off and on their way she sits down in the empty plane and has a cry. I wish Jane had done something like this as it would make her seem more human. Instead Jane goes through multiple plane crashes and air chases but never seems to have much if any negative emotions due to it. 

    Overall it's a fun easy read with amazing cover art. If you enjoy Vicki Barr than I would recommend this book.

Mystery of the Jade Idol

    While on vacation at their aunt and uncle's Mexico plantation, cousins Judy and Susanne find themselves entrusted with a key to a valuable ancient artifact. The plantation soon becomes a hotbed of crime as the key is stolen, all of Susanne's jewelry is stolen, the Jade idol is stolen, Rosetta the maid is shot, and strange ghosts even begin to appear. Suspicion lays mainly on Phil, a young man who befriends the girls and disappears as soon as the Jade idol is gone. However there is no short supply of suspicious person around the plantation.

- Judy and Susanne are 17 but they act like 12-year-olds. They're just plain stupid. They talk so openly about having the key and where they're going to hide it that it would have been more surprising if it wasn't stolen. They also act very carelessly and put themselves in dangerous situations, then when Colonel Thompson scolds them for it they have hissy fits saying "he's not the boss of us!".

- Rosetta is dying of a bullet wound and they don't get a doctor because the closest one is fifty miles away. Why do they not consider a doctor just cause of that? There's plenty of horses to ride to a doctor on.    

    After doing some research I've learned that with one horse they could have covered about 40 miles in one day meaning they could have had a doctor there in tree days max and that's if the doctor did not have a car. However if they took multiple horses, which the plantation had, and switch between them on the ride then they could have rode the 100 mile round trip in one day.

- I felt like the ending was a little strange and not well thought out. There's a culprit who was a totally surprise which is always nice and then one who was really obvious from the first sentence they're mentioned in.

- Why doesn't the uncle come back in the end?

    I wrote this book review in 2017 but after a recent re-reading I found that my thoughts were more or less the same. I enjoyed the book less this time around and found it a bit boring and drawn out.