Ginny Gordon and the Broadcast Mystery

    Ginny and her friends are still in business with their lending library and have a big book sale coming up. The profits of the sale will go to the school library so all the town citizens are donating books. One of these books is a rare and valuable copy of Rhyme? And Reason? which Mrs. Arnold accidentally donates and needs back immediately. But uh oh, the book has disappeared and every Hustler swears they didn't sell it. Did someone steal it? And if so, who?

    As all this is happening Ginny is offered the position of emcee for the new radio program "Author Meets Teen-Age Critics". A show where a teenage panel will interview an author about a book. Not only is Ginny the emcee but she's also in charge of selecting the panel, picking the book, and contacting the author. Can she do all this while also searching for the missing book, work at the lending library, keep up school, and basketball practice or did Ginny "bite off more than she can chew"?

    Writing that summary without going into a rant of everything wrong with this book was quite hard. This book got me more heated than anything I've ever read before. At one point I was tempted to ripped the book apart, no joke, I was that frustrated with it.

    Here are the notes I took while reading:

- In the last book Ginny gives Joe the idea to turn his big, old, empty family house into apartments as there's an affordable housing shortage in Harrisville. Joe has ran with Ginny's idea and the apartments will be ready in a week...so it only took Joe about 2 weeks to convert a whole house into apartments. Joe, who the heck are your contractors?

- Once Ginny tells Mrs. Arnold about the missing book Mrs. Arnold insists it's a mystery and wants Ginny to solve it. Ginny has to refuse because her parents told her one more mystery and she's getting shipped off to boarding school. But for some reason Ginny doesn't tell Mrs. Arnold this, she just says no and Mrs. Arnold has a hissy fit and withdraws her patronage from the lending library.

- Really its Mrs. Arnold's fault the book has gone missing. She shouldn't have "accidentally" donated it. This is the same plot for the first and second books and seriously, could Julie Campbell not think up any other plot?

- Mrs. Arnold claims the book is worth $500 and both the Hustlers and Carson feel they morally owe Mrs. Arnold the money which is beyond ridiculous. Again, it was Mrs. Arnold's fault the book was donated. Also how do they know it's worth $500? Just cause Mrs. Arnold says so? She's very eccentric and could be fibbing to make the situation more exciting, as she's known to do. Also she said that was the price last time she had it appraised but book prices go up as well as down.

- Alicia Golden clearly wrote My Heart is in the City. Campbell's not even trying to make that a good mystery.

- No one wants to be on Ginny's panel for the radio show because they won't be on a show run by a girl, even the other girls. Oh please.

- I don't get why everyone is against Ginny doing the radio show. Ginny can simply study/do homework at the stall. Since they're portable not a lot of people come in so she'd have the time. And Ginny said basketball practice is mostly during gym class. So she has plenty of time to do the show. Are the people who disagree with her being the emcee simply jealous that Ginny was picked and not them?

- Why is Ginny, a 14 year old, responsible for contacting the author and not Mr. Adrian or someone at the radio station? It seems really inappropriate. The excuse Mr. Adrian gives is that he wants the show to be ran by teenagers but in that case at least pay Ginny. She had to spend her allowance on long distant phone calls to the authors agent so she's not only not making money, she's losing it to do Mr. Adrian's job for him.

- Honestly the way Lucy turns on Ginny really makes her seem jealous. The radio show is actual work that Ginny could put on a resume and the experience could give her a leg up in a future career, something that Ginny herself realizes. But Lucy, and everyone else, just turns on her instantly and is so bitter towards her about the show. They act as though she's a two-faced, spoiled, brat for wanting to work outside the lending library where, by the way, she does the most work and everyone else just delivers books and then goes and does whatever they feel like. Ginny is in the stall from opening until closing, does the files, organizes and inventories the books, handles the money and the memberships, and deals with customers. She does more than anyone else, she's like the Cinderella of the lending library; they make her do the hard and unwanted jobs but when she wants one night at the ball she's suddenly selfish and spoiled. They even make her go retrieve a book from Mrs. Arnold when they know Mrs. Arnold is mad at her and told her to "never show her face at her house again".

- The worst part is that Ginny starts to believe all the terrible things people are saying to her and blames herself/is constantly apologizing. Ugh Ginny stop, you didn't do anything wrong.

- The Hustlers even blame Ginny for the theft of Rhyme? And Reason? when it was as much their fault as hers, which is not at all. It was Mrs. Arnold's fault and she needs to take responsibility for it.

- John acts so immature at the meeting, refusing to acknowledge anything Ginny says and pretending like she's not there. Why is everyone taking his side? Of right, jealousy.

- Ginny's parents want her to quit the radio show because she is a little behind in one class and they believe the radio show is interrupting her school work... but the show hasn't even started yet, it's her having to do everything at the lending library with no help from the others, which is making her fall behind in class. Yet they don't want her to quit the lending library.

- This is all an excuse for Ginny's father to tell her she must have John hired as her co-emcee because John supposedly wont fall behind in school like Ginny, a girl, would. My goodness, imagine your own parents trying to take away your opportunities and achievements and give them to your friend who they like more. Is John secretly Mr. Gordon's son or something, jeez. Also the Gordon's maid is getting married and so wont be working for them anymore. Instead of hiring a new maid they just make Ginny take over and they worry the radio show wont leave anytime for Ginny to clean the house. Why the heck can't Mrs. Gordon just do the housework? She doesn't have a job so what is she doing with all that free time? Make a damn bed yourself lady.

- John is immediately nice to Ginny once he gets hired as co-emcee which proves he was jealous all along.

- Johns dad says all bibliophiles are thieves which is quite strange.

- Ginny was gonna have to take on less duties at the Stall once the radio show starts airing so would have less time-consuming responsibilities and could have emceed alone. This was all just a ploy to get John on the show but it's a weak one considering John could have simply been a panel member.

- Everything gets fixed for Ginny simply when her friends help her get a panel and write a letter, Chuck joins the Hustlers, etc. John really didn't have to be an emcee, her friends just needed to be kinder.

- The hints to let you know that Alicia's mystery man is Tim O'Leery are painful. Yes, we get it, moth as in Timothy.

- Ginny gets criticized for waiting so long to get an author for the radio show even though she was only brought on about 2 weeks before airing.  Also this should not be her responsibility! Mr. Adrian is terribly   unprofessional.

- Chuck claims to have had a portable lending library and been emcee of a radio show at his old town. Sure, Jan.

- It's annoying that the Hustlers weren't picked for the panel from the start cause we all know it's gonna be them. Also the book cover gives it away.

- After the first show Ginny hands over her, and Johns, emcee job to Chuck. First off it's not Ginny's place to give the job away, second she doesn't talk to John before giving his job away, and third it's irresponsible of her to quit after one show.

(It's now months later and I realize I was so heated over this book I never even finished the review.)

Ginny Gordon and the Lending Library

    This was the first Ginny Gordon book I had ever read. I was ecstatic when I found it at a book store because at the time I believed I had already read all of Whitman's series for girls. After reading it I bought the rest of the series online and read them in order. But this is my first time reading Lending Library in order. Interesting how the title simply says "and the Lending Library" instead of Mystery of the Lending Library.

- As the book starts we find out its still October. It's been less than 2 months and Ginny is solving her 4th mystery and the Hustlers are onto their 3rd business venture. Things really move fast in Harristown.

- I don't really understand the point of the lending library. It's like a normal library except you have to pay to borrow books. The only other benefit is that books get delivered to the customers which is supposed to be helpful to shut-ins. But how many shut-ins could one town have and if they couldn't get themselves to the library for any health reasons you think the library employees would be nice to deliver a book to them once in awhile. I just don't understand renting a book when you can get it from the library for free.

- The illustrations are slightly better in this book than the last. The strange close ups of characters faces is gone however the rest is the same including Ginny's big medallion necklace and matching belt buckle. Also check out how old John looks in this illustration and he's supposed to be 15!

- The book Ginny is trying to hunt down was sold to The Hermit who lent it to Joe Dakor who lent it to Doctor Bascom who lent it to Mrs. Blaketon. Honestly, how rude. Why would they all think it's okay to lend something that doesn't belong to them to someone else.

- The Hermit calls Babs a "brazen hussie" which I find absolutely hilarious.

- Babs causes a lot of problems at the Lending Library; she takes out books without marking down what she's taking, she locks the keys to the display window in the display window, and she leaves the shop unlocked and unguarded. They complain about her messing things up so much that I felt like they might as well kick her out of the Hustlers. I personally adore Babs because I admire her appetite but this is a business and she doesn't take it seriously so bye bye Babs.

- "Ginny quickly grabbed the book and put it behind her back. "Both or none. That's our agreement according to your terms Mr. Barker. And I will now make some terms of my own. If you do not behave like a gentleman, I shall not permit you to come inside this Stall again.  I'm not accustom to having strange men come here and order me about. You have no right to come in here and demand anything. We don't want your kind of business in our Book Stall. And, furthermore, I don't have to sell you the books, you know."" 

    My notes simply contain this paragraph and the words "you tell him Ginny".

- The problem of finding Mrs. Arnold a companion is absolutely ridiculous. It's very obvious Mrs. Dakor is going to be her companion but we have to wait until 2/3rds of the book and endless baiting for Ginny to realize Mrs. Dakor is the solution.

- Ginny is actually not very smart but to make her appear smart, everyone around her is extremely dumb, to the point that I feel Lucy might even be a little mentally disabled. That's not a joke either, that's truly how her character reads sometime. John is smarter than Ginny, he has to be so he can rescue her in the end but deducing the situation she is in without her telling him. But to cover up his intelligence Campbell has his character keep his thoughts and suspicions to himself.

- Ginny decides to spring a trap to catch the villain but decides against telling John because "John would only make fun of her" and so she, a 14 year old girl, confronts the big, male, professional criminal, all alone. C'mon Ginny this is your 4th time doing this in 2 months, you know it ain't gonna end well!

- And another book goes by where we don't find out Whiz's real name.

Overall this book is pretty good. The one thing I really like about Ginny Gordon books is how much Harristown is used. I love when Ginny and the gang are constantly on the move going from one person's house to another. That was the problem with the last book, most of it took place in the old barn.

- Ok I have one more note to make. As I'm getting this post put together I'm realizing that this book has way too many pictures! I remember thinking that when I was reading it but I didn't realize just how many it had until I had to scan them all. It has 31 illustrations and a lot of them are unnecessary. For example the first 4 illustrations (shown below) all show the same scene; members of the Hustlers on Ginny's porch talking. There really didn't need to be so many. I'm curious about why there were so many more than other books.

Ginny Gordon and the Mystery of the Old Barn

    The Hustlers' new project is the Snack Barn. It's essentially a teenage club house where they serve sandwiches, burgers, ice cream, soda, etc. On their first night in business a mysterious man appears and requests Ginny to hang onto an envelope. Soon another man appears and demands Ginny hand it over. On top of that food has been inexplicably disappearing.

- It's early October at the start of the book. That places the other books in September since the school year was already started. The events of the last two books were over the course of two weeks. These books were released years apart (1947, 1950, and 1954), I think if I was reading them at the time they came out I'd be a little annoyed with 7 years passing when only a few weeks passed in the books.

- Not long into the book Ginny has a confrontation with Henderson, a menacing man who threatens to harm her if she doesn't hand over the envelope she'd been given. Ginny keeps her cool the whole time even while she makes a run for it. Since Ginny has had two encounters with villains in the previous books this seems pretty possible. I like that Ginny's experience has kind of shaped her character.

- The illustrations in this book are hideous! The first three books in the series were released with dust jackets and had artwork that was very 1940s-ish. Not quite sure how to describe it, it was pretty average for these Whitman book with a few pretty exceptional illustrations. The books were then re-done as cellophane covers and the artwork got updated and way worse. The original illustrator was Margaret Jarvis and the new illustrator was Margaret Wesley. Anyways all the illustrations feature an up-close shot of a characters face with other characters in the background. They're absolutely horrifying.

- Ginny has twin beds in her room which is very convenient for when Lucy spends the night. These old books always have girls with twin beds in their room so when their friends spend the night they don't have to share a bed. It's so weird to me, just have the characters share a bed or sleep on a couch.

- The man living in the woods and stealing food is obviously Henderson, everything pointed to it but Ginny blindly believes its Chadwell for absolutely no reason other than Julie Campbell hoping it would throw the reader off a bit. However it just makes Ginny look extremely dumb.

    Overall this book is alright. It doesn't have as much action as the other books, which has been one of my favorite things about this series. This book contained a lot of standing around an empty Snack Barn talking, and lots of Ginny thinking over the mystery to herself.

Ginny Gordon and the Missing Heirloom

    "Not twenty-four hours after newspaper headlines acclaim Ginny Gordon for capturing a jewel thief, she is knee-deep in another mystery. Who stole Mrs. Arnold's valuable pin? Was it the same person who set fire to John's workshop? Why did the hoarse voice over the telephone sound so familiar?  Was that a face at the grimey window of the old cupola? A bit of fluff on the window sill set Ginny on a trail --- through a secret passage, down a lonely dark road, into a musty attic --- a trail as breath-taking as the one she followed in Ginny Gordon and the Disappearing Candlesticks."

    Here we are at book 2 in the Ginny Gordon series. This is probably the book I remember most from the series because I found it so creepy. Although the plot is different from the first book it's also the same; an item accidentally given to the Swap Shop by an older resident disappears and Ginny has to find it. You could totally mix both book titles and they would still work fine; The Missing Candlesticks, The Disappearing Heirloom. Yep, there's no real difference. Anyways lets get into it.

- The last book set up the ground work for this mystery. It casually mention that a sewing box was donated to the Swap Shop by Mrs. Arnold. The box is looked at by customers but never bought. John takes the box to his grandmother's to see if she'd like to purchase it but she happens to already have an exact copy of the box. At this time Mrs. Arnold's chauffeur, Carson, shows up at the Swap Shop saying Mrs. Arnold changed her mind about selling the box because she believes a piece of her jewelry is still inside it. At the end of the book John tells Ginny the piece of jewelry was not inside the box and is considered missing and it's up to the Hustles' to find it lest the Swap Shop gets a bad reputation for losing something in their possession.

    All of this fits into the first story really well. The box being looked at by customers is mentioned because the box is worth $5 and the Hustlers' need the $5 to pay the shop's electric bill. Carson showing up at the shop is important because at the time Ginny was trying to be alone in the shop to hunt for the secret passageway. I'm actually impressed by how smoothly Campbell was able to do this. However since this book came out two years after the first it must have been quite annoying waiting for the mystery to continue after being mentioned at the end of the first book.

- Ginny and John talk about how the Swap Shop hasn't "made a cent so far" yet in the last book they sell an ashtray. I remember because Whiz was annoyed at having to use his own money to buy supplies and Lucy said he didn't have to because she'd made a sale and Ginny teaches him how to use petty cash vouchers.

- I'm not sure why Whiz is drawn so much smaller than Ginny. The last book said he was almost 13 and Ginny is 14 so pretty much only one year apart but he's drawn almost 2 heads shorter than Ginny.

- In the last book Babs had gone to visit The Hermits cottage and doesn't come back. Whiz is worried about her so goes to look for her and ends up injured when he falls into a hole in The Hermits yard. In this book Babs goes to check on a secret tunnel that leads to the Bascom's house and doesn't come back. Whiz is worried about her so goes to look for her and ends up slightly injured when he gets caught in a cave-in in the tunnel. For some reason I felt re-using such a similar scene was annoying.

- Babs, Lucy, and John all go missing in this book and Ginny has to find out what has happen to them. I guess Campbell really liked this plot device. Funny how nowadays a cellphone would completely destroy this.

- I liked Lucy's little adventure to New York. Maybe it's because Lucy is timid and easily scared but it was fun seeing her do her own detective work and I liked how Mr. Trentor was so kind after finding her hiding in his backseat.

- It was interesting seeing a culprit that is actually mentally insane.

- The first time I read this book I had no idea who the culprit was. I was also terribly creeped out by the two phone calls to Ginny, the lonely stretch of road to Mrs. Arnold's, and the showdown with the culprit. Since I remembered who the culprit was this time I didn't find it so mysterious or creepy.

    To be honest I found some parts of the book to be...overdeveloped I guess would be the word for it. There was a lot to the culprit's evil plan and so many suspects and so much going on that I felt a little overwhelmed at times.

    The end of the first book and beginning of this book fit together so well that I feel more like they're one book together, simply in two parts; Ginny Gordon and the Swap Shop Mysteries.

Ginny Gordon and the Disappearing Candlesticks

    "There is no doubt about it, two of the four silver candlesticks were gone! Yet Ginny Gordon was sure she had locked the door before she left the swap shop. Anyway who would have wanted those tarnished candlesticks? And why had they only taken two of the four?

The business of clearing up the mystery of the missing candlesticks, and at the same time running the Swap Shop, keeps every member of the Hustlers' club busy, for in solving one mystery another is turned up."

    This is the first book in the Whitman series, Ginny Gordon. Although well written this series would become overshadowed by the author's other series, Trixie Belden. There are many similarities between Ginny Gordon and Trixie Belden including recycled plot points and scenes. I've read the series once but don't remember too much from it so lets see how this re-reading goes.

- The book starts out with Ginny sharing her plans for the Swap Shop. Her and her club, the Hustlers, plan on renting a little shop for $15 a month, collecting broken and/or unwanted items from people in the neighborhood in exchange for store credit, and fixing and selling the items. Pretty much it's a thrift store and I think it's a great idea.

- At the beginning of the book we also hear about Ginny's failed attempt to solve a mystery; she had previously thought a citizen was a German spy with plans to blow up the local bank. Turns out he was just an accountant. It's nice to see one of these teen amateur detectives be wrong. I wonder how many mysteries Nancy Drew stumbled on to that weren't actually mysteries.

- Ginny is 14 but already has enough accounting education from school to handle "the books". She goes all into accounts receivable/accounts payable stuff that I have no clue about. Did they actually teach this kind of stuff in school back then cause that'd be cool.

- Ginny immediately takes a strong disliking to Mr. Grinsler, an antique seller who asks the Swap Shop to give him leads to antiques in exchange for a commission. When Lucy asks why she instantly dislikes him Ginny says she can't stand his lisp;

    "She pirouetted around the room, taking little mincing steps and imitating Mr. Grinsler's speech: "Mike hath given me permithin to ficth my mealth on an elecricth plath....Phooey!""

    She also calls him a sissy for cooking his own food instead of going out to eat. I don't know if there's supposed to be a subtext here. Maybe it's because I've been reading some old Nancy Drew books where the villain is always Jewish/Romani/Italian/etc. These books come from a different time so why wouldn't a villain be made gay. Anyways I think Ginny's dislike is supposed to be taken as her 6th sense telling her the guy is bad news but it just comes off prejudice. 

- At one point Babs gets accidentally locked in an old wardrobe and almost suffocates to death. She's in there for hours until Ginny finally finds her. Later when Ginny thinks that Babs has ditched helping her at the Swap Shop to go to a movie Ginny thinks to herself that she wishes she had left Babs in the wardrobe to suffocate to death. Kind of extreme don't cha think?

- When Ginny realizes there's a secret entrance hidden somewhere in the Swap Shop she starts searching the showroom instead of the office even though all the clues she found were in the office. This was just a ploy to make her find it later in the evening for plot reasons and so obvious it was annoying.

- The ending involves all the characters going to a movie, Ginny goes alone to the Swap Shop where she ends up alone with the villain until one of her gang happens to show up because he became suspicious. This same setup was used again by Julie Campbell a few years later for Trixie Belden and the Gatehouse Mystery.

- When Ginny starts noticing the trap door coming up I don't know why she doesn't jump on top of it. It was right in front of the desk so why not step on top and pull the desk over it trapping Grinsler until she gets help.

    Overall this book is entertaining and the pace is excellent. That's one thing I enjoy about Julie Campbell's books for Whitman; there's so much packed into one book but it doesn't feel too fast paced.