Reviews for The scarecrow mystery

The average rating for The scarecrow mystery based on 2 reviews is 4 stars.

Review # 1 was written on 2020-05-18 00:00:00 Jenni Fender Bobbsey Twins (Wanderer) Book #11-The Scarecrow Mystery Before I begin this review, let me say that this book is my absolute favourite of the Wanderer series (with #2 Secret of Pirate's Cave coming in at a close second) This one keeps a good continuity with the last book as in that one the twins had their last week of school and started their summer vacation. Here, the twins are still on summer break. It starts with the family on the way back from a day trip to the beach. Freddie points out a scarecrow that they are passing by in their car and says that on the way to the beach, it was in a different field a couple miles away. All the kids are kind of cranky after a day at the beach, and Mrs Bobbsey has to stop a mild argument! (The twins almost never fight, so this was something) The next morning, Bert and Nan take a bicycle trip along the road they were on the night before to prove Freddie wrong (and "for the exercise"). Turns out their little brother was right! The scarecrow was in yet another place! As they are investigating this, they see a curly haired fellow watching them warily. He seems to pop up a few times, and passes by in a car (Bert memorises the license plate). Also, as they search the place the scarecrow was the night before, the pair find an unusual skeleton key that they decide to keep and study later. Bert asks a police officer friend to investigate the plate, and being the famous Bobbseys, the cop readily agrees. Later, Nan goes to her art class in the museum (this is actually a semi-regular feature of Nan's life as she is shown to be good at drawing in other books in this series, as well as the replacement "New Bobbsey Twins" series that was published in the late '80s and early '90s) While there, she finds out that a renowned art thief Le Fantome is in town! His photo was shown on the news-a young, sharp faced man with a cleft chin. A note purportedly written by him is in police hands where he says he will steal a painting by talented young artist Liane Renard. When the painting actually goes missing, reporters get involved interviewing the art teacher-and Nan Bobbsey when he sees her there! Being a famous Bobbsey, her thoughts are taken seriously by the reporter, and he promises that she will be on the evening news! That night, the Bobbsey family enjoy seeing Nan on the news. But also, they receive a phone call asking after the key by a man with a French accent! That night, Nan's purse is stolen from their house! The next day, a Mr Hubert Caryll visits. He says he is the owner of the key, but he is disappointed that the key was in Nan's purse when it was stolen. The twins invesigate and find out that the key's funny symbol denotes a lion, which proves that Mr Caryll indeed does own the key *(He owns the Lion Manufacturing Company) The curly haired man appears again when the Bobbseys visit the mall (again, the way the mall is described and even drawn in the artwork shows that their hometown of Lakeport has to be at least a small city-no town I know of could support a mall that size-, and yet there are other signals in the series which say that they live in a town). Although his features don't match Le Fantome, his suspicious behaviour is suspect. Also, the license plate shows that the car he was in was rented by Le Fantom! Bert and Nan cleverly see thru his disguise and he admits that he is indeed Le Fantome (The artwork here is really exciting, but inaccurate. It makes him look like he is attacking the twins whereas in the story he comes clean and is very friendly) Jacques Dupree (aka Le Fantome) denies that he is guilty of anything and affirms that he has been on the straight and narrow ever since he did time for his last "job" a number of years ago. He does admit to stealing the key (which he returns to the twins), and says that he needs it to retrieve a paper for a friend. He promises to tell all if they will meet him that night (as long as his friend agrees) Both Bert and Nan can tell that he isn't a bad person, so they let him do this. He returns with the painter Liane Renard! The foxy young woman (see what I did there? hehe!) backs up Jacques' story and says that she has a French father, but an American mother. Her mother has been estranged from her parents and family because they didn't want her to marry the Frenchman and has recently died. However, lately, she has received letters from her grandfather (who doesn't know her daughter died) saying that he wants to reconcile things. His last letter was urgent-desperate! Her says that he is kidnapped, and the key will explain where. Young Liane (who is also afinaced to Jacques) does not understand the meaning of the key, but he wanted Jacques to retrieve said letter which was hidden in the framework of the painting she drew (which has since been sold, and stolen) Well, the culmanation of the story is that Mr Caryll is the villian. He is holding his uncle hostage so he won't contact his granddaughter and turn the business over to her. The ending is wrapped up rather quickly (but there is much excitement!) as if the written realised that each of these books is only 125 pages or so. Racism against the French seems a common theme of this book as not only Liane's grandparents not wanting their daughter to marry a Frenchman, but Caryll has a few slurs for Jacques during the final showdown (kind of surprising in a Bobbsey book-especially since their accented Black housekeeper and her husband are still in the book! Well, that's all I say about that) Overall, this really is a fun story, and of course, I have many fond memories of this one. I wrote a book report on it in grade 4! I REALLY love writing reports, and I got to read this one out loud to the entire grade which was NEAT! Need I even say that i give this book a 10 out of 10! Sean

Review # 2 was written on 2011-05-08 00:00:00 Rocco Dolciato Decent digest, nothing amazing, nothing bad. It was very solid but not exactly outstanding. Enjoyed the UFO stuff at first but like... Joe seriously considering aliens as a culprit for so much of the book? Come on. How the book handles the explanation of the mysterious lightning is certainly interesting. Not sure if I'm a fan, but it's a take that I didn't see coming at all. I loved Stella.