You’re misunderstanding my post. In fact, you’re implying the exact opposite of what I was saying. Expecting a book that’s 80 years old to reflect today’s sensibilities is pretty unrealistic, don’t you think? In 1927 the US was an openly racist society (by today’s standards), so naturally the literature of the time reflects that.
For my part, it’s not exasperation at the attitudes of 80 years ago, but the fact that when I was 8 years old, these things completely passed me by.
You misunderstod me first, by assuming I was unaware of this. I know the book was written in 1927 (I specifically identified it as the “first” in the series), and it was in response to Fish’s statement that there was racism in the earlier, unedited copies. I simply provided another example, with extra siginificance for being in the first book.
The description of the vendor is actually worse than I stated but I don’t have a copy handy and can’t post an exact transcript (I’m sure someone in this thread can). F&J specifically chose this man as their distraction because they (and the narrative) expect him to react in an over-excited fashion, being Italian and all.
Of course, when I first read this book at the age of ten or so, I didn’t pick up on the racism either.
What about the Hardy Boys Casefiles from a decade or so ago? I haven’t read one in years, but I remember them having a few plots other than smugglers and being a little more creative (although in retrospect, having an evil spy organization known as “The Assassins” and a secret agent known as “The Grey Man” might not be the hight of creativity). I also remember particularly enjoying the Hardy Boys/Tom Swift Ultra-Thriller crossovers.
Heh. I remember reading one of those… something about time traveling, I think it was. It was actually a lot better than a typical Hardy Boys episode.
There are some books that I look at now and am ashamed to have loved so much in my rash youth. Nancy Drew/Hardy Boys books would be among those. How old are they supposed to be anyway? Are they high school dropouts? College graduates? Why do they always have so much time on their hands?
To zero in on the second half of the OP’s title, I frankly dislike any book labeled as a “mystery” that doesn’t involve some form of deduction - you know, the ones where the final scene is based on guesses and “clues” never revealed to the reader, or else a dramatic confession out of the blue. Those really need to have a different label, IMHO, because to me, they sure aren’t mysteries.
Yeah, yeah, not everyone shares my definition. But I’d sure be able to find books I like a lot easier if the “mystery” section of the bookstore weren’t so damned… inconsistent.
Oooh, ooh, and another quality I really hate… When the book gives you the clues, but not until two or three pages before the final scene!
We need another John Dickson Carr, who all but TELLS you who’s guilty in the first few chapters, if only you have the damn brains to see it (which I rarely do)…
Couple o’ my faves from ol’ FWD:
The Masked Monkey. Whacked-out hijinks on the Brazilian Amazon, sinister Macumba rites, piranhas, and more information about golf ball salvaging than you will ever need to know.
The Witchmaster’s Key. A somewhat more nuanced evocation of British mineral worship than one might expect, although there are plenty of ‘black witches’ running around to keep things interesting. Plus Frank and Joe spend a fair amount of time confounding their enemies by using Misson Impossible-style masks to disguise themselves as Dutch people.
The Clue in the Embers. One of the Hardys’ chums inherits a curio shop, and proceeds to learn that things kept in fictional curio shops are always interesting but never safe. This book was my first encounter with the word “curio,” and its description of the shop’s marvelously eclectic contents made me long for the day when a hypothetical distant, curio shop-owning relative would cack off, so that I could inherit it.
Just out of curiosity, how’d you feel about the series Columbo? The murderer is revealed right at the beginning and plants a series of clues pointing to someone else. Despite this, Columbo (apparently possessing psychic infallibility) instantly zeroes in on the murderer and they spend an hour playing cat-and-mouse. Oddly, it never occurs to the suspect to say “Y’know, I’m tired of running into you every time you want to clear up ‘just one more thing’, Lieutenant. From now on if you want to chat, call my lawyer.”
The Hardy Boy books, and Nancy Drew, and Tom Swift, were done by the Stratemyer
Syndicate. I don’t know about the Hardy’s, but Nancy Drew was mostly written by
one person for long stretches. I suspect the Hardy Boys were similar.
As for racism, the early Nancy Drews had it too. (I read a bunch to my daughter.) Oddly, the early Tom Swift books, though they had a black character who spoke in dialect, treated the character with a lot more respect.
The Tom Swift books are what got me into reading when I was a kid. The school library had shelves and shelves of the things. I loved 'em.
Now I really can’t remember much, except he had a rocketship sometimes…
-Joe
The thing I mostly remember about the Hardy Boys books is that they introduced me to the name “Chet”. I’d never heard it elsewhere. Is it short for something?
It introduced me to the word jalopy" as well. And to a society where people took “fast trains” instead of driving ot flying.
Chester.
Not to mention “chum.” I’d never heard that before. I believe Chet was a chum, missing in one of the books.