The Secret of the Musical Tree - Margaret Sutton

This is book 19 from the Judy Bolton series and is set at Christmas time.

Since Applewood have republished The Judy Bolton Series recently and these are available through the book depository it makes choosing which Judy Bolton book to read easier as I am no longer limited by what I can find on ebay at a reasonable price. For Christmas 2012 I decided I wanted to read a Christmas based story so I chose Judy Bolton and The Secret of the Musical Tree.

The story is set shortly before Christmas and Judy and Peter are married. Peter is an FBI Agent. They have a young girl living with them called Roberta.

Judy goes Christmas shopping to prepare for the upcoming festive Christmas lunch where she is having family over including her cousin Roxy Zoller.

Whilst shopping Judy is mistaken for her cousin Roxy. She is told by a Store Clerk of a present she bought the day before and she was told by a friend of Roxy's that Roxy and her father were in a plane accident. The friend that talks to Judy about this is trying to find Roxy to talk to her about a missing emerald.

Judy in talking to Roxy learns that something is wrong and her first big clue comes in the form of the present that Roxy sent which says to open before December 23rd.

Roxy and Judy change places and we learn that Roxy was being held captive by crooks trying to find out where the missing emerald is.

The mystery had is ups and downs. That said I did actually continue to read it with interest to the very end.

Some things did bother me. Judy decides to sneak around the house in Roxy's high heels instead of choosing her rubber soled shoes. This seriously leaves you wondering why Judy would make such a stupid mistake. Secondly just as soon as Judy takes Roxy's place she decides to try and escape the place though I thought she was suppose to be there because they had threatened to hurt Roxy's father if Roxy tried to escape so Judy and Roxy traded places. Also what cousins are identical? I think someone in that family has some explaining to do, you can't get close to identical out of cousins. Anyway in the end all is right for Christmas day which is just what you want in a Christmas mystery.

Famous FiveTV Series Five Go to Smuggler's Top Part 1 and 2

Episode 4 and 5 of Season 1 is based on Five go to Smuggler's Top. A storm making a tree land on the roof of  Kirren Cottage see the Five packed up to spend their holidays with their friend Sooty Lenoir and his little sister Marybeth to their home at Smugglers Top.  We first see Sooty and his sister wearing clothes that are so 1970's, the clothes are great then again George's navy windbreaker is also a favourite and I think I owned on once upon a time. Not to mention Cheryl Ladd in Charlies Angels also had a satin version in the 80's.

The Five find themselves in the middle of an adventure.

The house they are staying at is intriguing and as the Sooty's Stepfather doesn't like dogs the children scheme to bring Timmy into the house and hide him when necessary via one of the secret passages that goes through the wardrobe in the bedroom (a bit Narnia like)

There are different suspects, one who dresses like Sherlock Holmes and sticks out like a sore thumb and reminds me of Professor Slughorn from Harry Potter.

The butler of course is also a suspect and the children suspect he may be only pretending to be deaf and in a good plot outline Sotty's Step father is a suspect as Sooty and his sister dont trust him.

Someone kidnaps their Uncle Quinten, and Sooty also disappears. Can there still be smugglers at Smuggler's Top?

The Famous Five discover an underground tunnel and Timmy saves the day.

Some of the darker filming issues appear in these episodes and some are unclear due to the "Mist" and "Fog" on the marshes but you get use to that with this series.
You start to see that Julian's character can be quite rude to adults in the series as he says some things that would seem out of place when staying as a guest at someones house. Not really what I remember him being like in the book but definately these aren't the only

Another great episode.

T31 The Three Investigators in the Secret of Skeleton Island Movie

The Three Investigators book series ran from 1964 to 1987 and comprised of 43 books.

The sleuths in the series are Jupiter Jones, Pete Crenshaw and Bob Andrews. 

The original book series started with the boys aged 13 to 14 years. Although the movie version picked boys of similar age they come across in the movie as somewhat younger especially the actor playing Bob who is noticeably smaller and who brings along his teddy bear on the adventure. It wouldn't be realistic to believe that a 13yr old boy would sleep with a Teddy bear whilst sharing a room with 2 friends his age. So it seemed a bit silly to add this to the movie.

As the second movie was released 2 years later it will be interesting to see if the boys fit into the roles better at that age.

In the book series Bob also has a  leg brace he wore, due to multiple fractures inflicted when he rolled down a hill which wasn't done in the movie.

In the books the Three Investigators headquarters is a house trailer, hidden in a salvage yard owned by Uncle Titus Jones and Aunt Mathilda who Jupiter has lived with his the death of his parents in a car crash at the age of 4. It has many secret entrances, a telephone, small lab, a dark room and an office. The movie did the idea of secret entrances well in the movie and the headquarters was interesting to see.

Overall the movie enjoyable, was well acted for the age of the actors, filmed well and  easy to watch.

Beverly Gray at the World's Fair

This is it. Book number 6 and the only book in the series I have not read yet.
I have been enjoying starting the series at book 1 in preparation for this books arrival and will be happy to read on in order after this is finished in order to piece things together as they happened. The first time around I read the series in whatever order I could get them off eBay with a good condition dust jacket, this time I am reading to link the entire story together.

I decided to read one chapter as is was real late when I finished reading Beverly Grays Career and ended up reading 5 chapters. This is pretty much how this book read. Never a chapter alone as perhaps intended but like with any great compelling book in large digestible chunks, each time looking and thinking " I only have so many chapters left." it brought back memories as how I felt each time a Beverly Gray book arrived the first time I read the series. Even for me a inn tube person I considered getting a camera out to capture the arrival of this rare prize. It is great to find a series you can get really excited about. For me that excitement has come from Beverly Gray and Trixie Belden mainly now and The Secret Seven and Famous Five growing up.
Reading the series in order has also put the characters in better order for me. I can understand now why you would have 12 Alpha Deltas, as it allows Beverly to travel but still be with friends in adventures and mysteries. I do wish that Clair Blank as an author spent more time describing her characters. Most I would not have the faintest idea as to their facial features, hair color etc. Some Alpha Deltas I barely know anything about, where I grew up on Enid Blyton books where the characters seemed to be defined in a lot greater detail.

The story starts with Lois leaving on a ship for Paris to study art for a year. Ralf Mathews, Larry Owens and Paul Benson, all suitors in Beverly Gray's Career are all present.
Connie has arrived and we learn her name is really Constance Elwood and Connie is for short. Connie Elwood and Kathleen Ryan move in with Lenora and Beverly just after Lois leaves.

Lenora, Connie and Beverly leave for Chicago and Beverly runs into Shirley ( not a long time till they saw Shirley again as was stated would be the case in Career ) Kathleen Ryan stays in New York and Jim Stanton turns up. Kathleen raves about how good looking Jim is and I can't remember anyone carrying on about Larry being as good looking. Would of been good to have seen a movie and have them side by side to see who they picked for the actors to play Larry and Jim.

Beverly and Virginia become involved in a murder at the world's fair. When Lenora becomes a part of the investigating team, Lenora shows a spunk and prowess that Beverly seems to drift in and out of. Lenora states she loves detecting and again I think here is a girl who doesn't know what she wants to do for a career but she knows exactly what she loves doing. I then start to thinking is detective work that different to reporting? Why doesn't Beverly show more passion for pursuing the bad guys like Lenora does? Would a good reporter really hold off on a scoop story to get a fuller story later? Lenora spends a long time convincing Beverly that they should break into someones room to investigate. Lenora has a sense of urgency and gunho whilst Beverly is more contemplative.

The ending to the story was superb and again a great lead into the next adventure. The main mystery finished some time earlier and poor Beverly was attacked by a tiger and suffered yet another marriage proposal from poor Jim. You think he would get fed up of being shot down. We also learn of Shirley's fate. If the world fair hadn't of dated this book then the new invention showcased at the world fair of television definitely did. Funny to see Lenora scared of a cable car too considering they are so tame by today's standards.

Reading the books in order has done a lot to fill in gaps of who's who and learn more about the Alpha Deltas.