The Gatehouse Mystery
/The Gatehouse Mystery by Julie Campbell (1965) This is the third book in the Trixie Belden series. It all takes place back home, back in Sleepyside, where Trixie and Honey are neighbors, and T’s brothers are coming home from camp, and Jim is around—as well as T’s incredibly annoying pest of a little brother. They stumble on this mystery by finding a big old diamond—unlikely that it’s real, but it is. Trixie theorizes endlessly about how it got in the “Gatehouse”—but she’s ultimately correct. The funniest parts are Trixie in conflict with new hired help—an irresponsible and very suspicious new chauffeur for the Wheelers—with the very apt name, “Dick.” All great characters—the kids, Regan the groom, Miss Trask, and Tom Delanoy—who I personally relate to. I love Trixie, she’s fearless and pretty much a whirlwind, an agent of chaos, and constantly picked on. I also like Honey quite a bit—her emotional response to everything—they’re a great pair, and Jim’s not bad either. I wasn’t sure if I’d continue reading Trixie Belden, but now I’m hooked, more or less—we’ll see how the next book is. There are so many editions of these books, but they’re relatively easy to find and inexpensive—so you’d be wise to look at the different versions and try to get older ones—some have really fantastic covers, and some have amazing, unlikely, full-page illustrations lurking inside. I noticed some slight changes in the text—in different editions—too, but just some words and phrases. Some obsessives might want to explore that further.
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