Category Archives: MG (grades 2-6)

279F: 1970s Kids Detective Book

This was a series of books that I read between 1975 and 1981 (I think).  Each book featured 20 or so stories (2-6 pages long) of a super sleuth who solved a mystery, that invited you to figure out how he solved it.  Answers were in the back of the book.   The lead detective was a “Dr.” and he had a sidekick who narrated, and were set in England.

Thank You!

279E: A girl travels back in time by measuring herself in a closet (solved)

A girl lives in an old house. Her mother is a servant there. The old nursery closet has measurements for growth from the children who used to live there. The girls can travel back in time to play with the children. She gets injured and stops growing in the past time. She also solves a mystery of a lost and valuable book hidden in a tree trunk.

279D: A girl, a ghost and a kitten

I’m looking for a older child/young adult book.  It is set in earlier times, though I can’t recall for certain if it was as far back as Victorian.  A young girl goes to live with an older, severe relative.  She has a hard life but is befriended by a small grey kitten and a mysterious girl who is a ghost.  The ghost gives the girl clues to the cause of her unrest  The girl refers to the kitten as “gray one” or “little gray one”.

278D: Halloween story featuring a new teacher

I have been searching for this book for so long with no luck.  Unfortunately, I don’t remember the title.

I got it when I was in elementary school in the 1970’s.  It was probably published early to mid 70’s.  I got it through one of the school’s reading program catalogs, so it may be a Scholastic book or another company like that.  My best friend and several other students also purchased it.  It was a Halloween book.  It was about school students who have a young, pretty new teacher come to their school.  Her name was Miss – something.  Maybe Miss Grey.  (I don’t trust my memory that far though.)  The students think there is something odd about her.  She wears a big, wide-brimmed hat.  Of course, she’s suspected of being a witch.

The book was a thin paperback.  The illustrations were pencil drawings in black and white.  That’s about all I’ve got on it.  It was such an unusual story and I’ve never seen the book again.  Wish I knew where my copy got off to.  Probably gave it away when I felt I was too old for children’s stories…  geez…

 

When I search online, the later 80’s series about “Miss Nelson” pops up, but that is not it.

 

Thank you for your time!

278A: Rocket Club but not the Rocket Boys

This is a book written in the 60’s about a group of boys who have a rocket club which meets on the farm of an old army general.

They design various rockets, and at one point there is an accident because two of the boys decide to include dangerous design changes.  I think they eventually get a trip to see a launch in Florida.  This is NOT Hickman’s “Rocket Boys” or “October Sky”.  It is also not “Countdown to Zero”.

277C: The moon landing and family drama (Solved)

I used to get books in the mail — “Me and the Terrible Two,” “Alvin’s Secret Code” — and one of them was a book about a boy who watched the moon landing all summer while some family drama was also going on. The book had a low-key melancholy tone. I read it in 1974 or 75, when I was in 2nd or 3rd grade. I wish I could remember more about it, but I’m stumped!

 

276F: Scuba diving adventures

Juvenile fiction from late 1960s or early 1970s with color illustrations of a teen boy and his father/uncle and their adventures scuba diving. I worked in the school library when I was 13-14 and was fascinated by this book, which piqued my interest in oceanography. I’ve searched on and off for many years. It’s not Sea Hunt and it’s not a Hardy Boys book. Any help locating a copy of this book would be much appreciated.

276E: A Pekingese puppy and a mystery (Solved)

The book that I’m looking for was written sometime between the 1940’s and 1960’s (or so).  It was about a young woman who moved to live with her glamorous aunt in London.  Her aunt gave her a Pekingese puppy that she named “Peke Ah Boo”.  There was some kind of mystery having to do with the house next door and possibly a young man who turned out to be a spy?  It may have been a YA book – the copy that I had was hardcover in robin’s blue but there may have been a dust jacket at some point since I don’t remember any identifying marks on the cover.

Any help would be appreciated greatly, it’s driving me crazy!

275D: Bodysuits change colour

This was a children’s novel about a advanced human society living separate to an abandoned post-disaster world.

The inhabitants now live in a peaceful and educated way, having somehow atoned for the previous mistakes. Everyone wears a bodysuit that changes colour dependant on the mood of the wearer. One scene describes a young girl’s family living room where the children ‘paint’ an image on a kind of computer screen that is displayed as an artwork.

In another, the children visit the old city, a chaotic abandoned world. My memories are sketchy but I think they find something there and the protagonist – I think it was the young girl – must walk through a super modern hall, a busy public area, with her bodysuit flashing colours wildly. The bodysuits glowed gently when the wearers were calm, and most were calm, so it was obvious to all when one was upset or aggressive.

Really quite incredibly prophetic as it must have been written before 1985. I borrowed it from a library in Australia in the early 1980’s.