More retro fun off the side pile though it never seems to get any smaller and I’ve already counted the trilogy while having two in it left to read. I’ll admid that I read the first of these in March and can’t remember an awful lot about it …

William Arden – “The Secret of Phantom Lake” (No 19)

(22 November 2012, charity shop)

There’s a chest with a secret sprung loaded protective device, a pirate on its trail and the first of two times the boys get locked in a bout in this trio of reads. A ghost town full of perhaps actual ghosts, a professor, a mysterious Scotsman and a love story mean the book is packed with incident but it all makes sense in the end.

M. V. Carey – “The Mystery of Death Trap Mine” (No 24)

(22 November 2012, charity shop)

Another book by M. V. Carey featuring the brave girl character Allie Jamieson Carey being a woman seems to have inspired her to add this excellent character. Off the boys go to Allie’s uncle’s Christmas tree ranch in New Mexico, where a neighbour has a mine and there’s a really chilling bit where they find an actual body. Another older female character provides clues and red herrings. This copy is notable for the back matter, with ads for Bytes Brothers novels I immediately wanted to collect (anyone read them?) and a Spectrum programming guide that matches its 1980 reprint date:

William Arden – “The Mystery of the Dancing Devil” (No 25)

(22 November 2012, charity shop)

Alerted by a small girl to a series of odd thefts, the boys are shocked to discover a terrifying dancing “devil” might not be the usual illusion things turn out to be but an actual being! Arden locks us in a boat again (is this a theme of his?) We’re enmeshed in the lives of the itinerant folk who dwell around the town (but in a positive way) and there’s an interesting point about one of them being passionate about returning Indigenous art to the people it came from, a modern theme in a 1970s book!

You can read about my first, second and third sets of these books via the links.

These are Books 23-25 in my 2024 TBR project – 116 to go!