Nancy Drew, teenage detective is at it again.  It seems like everything she does is magic - she’s an expert canoer and boatman, she can ski competitively, she has skills on the stage including tap dancing, when it comes to knowledge, she’s an expert at everything from floral arrangements to carrier pigeons.  In The Ringmaster’s Secret, we learn that she is an expert at trick riding.

It Is from her teacher, Senor Roberto, that Nancy finds herself entwined with a mystery at the circus.  At the same time, Nancy’s Aunt Eloise has given Nancy a bracelet, which Senor Roberto believes is familiar.  The story he tells her involves a pair of trapeze artists who died tragically and their daughter Lolita.  Lolita is still performing at the Sims Circus which is coming to Nancy’s hometown, so she thinks that would make the perfect opportunity to learn more about the bracelet.

Unfortunately, Lolita’s foster parents have something to hide.  The nasty Mr. Kroon is the ringmaster at the circus and resents Nancy’s poking around.  When one of the trick riders in the act is injured, Nancy replaces the girl and travels with the circus for a time.  This allows her to befriend Lolita and uncover more of the girl’s background.

The mystery starts of slow, but the ending moves at a breakneck pace.  In between, all of Nancy’s friends and family get involved including best friends Bess Marvin and George Fayne.  Nancy’s boyfriend Ned Nickerson makes an appearance and shows some jealousy.  Her father is involved as well, although he seems to throw caution to the wind when he allows Nancy to join the circus knowing that danger is lurking about.  Although Nancy has made friends within the traveling troupe, it’s also not clear until the end who exactly is on her side and where danger is.

The book wasn’t bad as far as the mysteries go.  I suspect the unedited version gave more time to the unraveling of the mystery as Nancy travels to New York and London to learn the truth behind the circus and Lolita’s parentage.  in the 1974 version, this part feels quite rushed along.

There is peril in the book which may seem to propel the story along but it also seems to indicate Nancy makes some foolish choices.  While I am all for doing what is right and taking chances sometimes, this is a story where I felt like Nancy put herself in danger unnecessarily several times.  She blacks out several times, is kidnapped, tied up, and deposited on a freight train.  That one puts her a hundred miles from her home town.  At the airport she is attacked with acid.  While watching the circus in the beginning, she is choked and nearly killed.  Very few of these occurrences result in her getting medical attention with the exception of what happens at the airport.

Rather than having the police helping her, it seems like Nancy is off on her own to solve the mystery and only calls on the police when she is sure of what she knows.  Any of a number of times it would seem to me that the police could have been involved and helping her.  At the same time, when they are helping her it feels forced.  The New York City police seem to drop everything to help on the case.  Even back in the 1950’s and especially the 1970’s, the police had more important cases than a fake talent agency.  In the small towns Nancy traveled in, she would have been more likely to get the kind of help she needed, yet it was there that she seemed to be off on her own without asking for help.

My 14 year old read it as well and felt just about the same as me.  She liked the mystery part quite a bit, but felt a bit disappointed at the ending.  A lot was made of who was spying on Nancy at the circus and yet the payoff for that seemed to be a let-down.  At the same time, she wanted to finish the book and see what happened, so the way the suspense was built-up worked very nicely.  She had read it once before when she was younger and felt that it was a story appreciated best bys someone younger than her.  I agree with that.

Despite the issues I had with the story, I think TThe Ringmaster’s Secret is a good book.  All of the Nancy Drew books were inspirational to girls to break away from many of the social constrictions in the time that they were first written.  Although I don’t like the idea of telling pre-teens to put themselves in danger, inspiring them to take chances and do what’s right can be a good thing.  Although it might seem at times that Nancy is a bit too perfect and everything woks for her too well in the long run, that’s something most girls that age won’t pick up on.  The suspense and action in this is good and keeps the reader’s attention and the story pays off decently.


My Nancy Drew Book Reviews:

The Secret of the Old Clock ~ The Hidden Staircase ~ The Bungalow Mystery ~ The Mystery at Lilac Inn ~ The Secret of Shadow Ranch ~ The Secret of Red Gate Farm ~ The Clue in the Diary ~ Nancy's Mysterious Letter ~ The Sign of the Twisted Candles ~ The Password to Larkspur Lane ~ The Clue of the Broken Locket ~ The Message in the Hollow Oak ~ The Mystery of the Ivory Charm ~ The Whispering Statue ~ The Clue of the Tapping Heels ~ The Mystery of the Brass-Bound Trunk ~ The Mystery of the Moss-Covered Mansion ~ The Secret in the Old Attic ~ The Quest of the Missing Map ~ The Clue in the Crumbling Wall ~ The Mystery of the Tolling Bell ~ The Clue in the Old Album ~ The Ghost of Blackwood Hall ~ The Clue of the Leaning Chimney ~ The Secret of the Wooden Lady ~ The Clue of the Black Keys ~ The Mystery at the Ski Jump ~ The Clue of the Velvet Mask ~ The Ringmaster's Secret ~ The Scarlet Slipper Mystery ~ The Witch Tree Symbol



© 2009 Patti Aliventi

Recommended: Yes