Book 19 - The Secret of the Unseen Treasure

From the back of the book - "The light shining Honey's palm made the hand look reddish and bony. "Point your flashlight at the ground and let a little more light out," Trixie said. "If we can find our footprints then we'll know which way to go.". As Honey directed the light downward, a pair of beady little eyes gleamed redly nearby..."





This time it's Mrs Elliot who benefits from Trixie's investigative skills. Mrs Elliot's flowers were once enough to support her but since her husband died a few years ago she's been finding it harder and harder to make ends meet. Her stepson has returned to live with her and help out but now it's not just making ends meet that's worrying her. Someone tries to burn down her barn, steal her social security cheque, destroy her flowers, sabotages her water pump and even tries to convince Social Security that she's been defrauding them!

When I first picked this book up this morning I couldn't remember anything about it. It didn't take long for me to remember the cheques turning up in the lake and the fact that Mrs Elliots savior was a new breed of plant in her garden but that's all I could remember so imagine my surprise when Trixie and Honey discover a marijuana crop!!! And then the discussion about hemp and the act some states were trying to legalize it (over 30 years ago)! Certainly not what I expected from a Trixie book!

Once again I'm happy that all of the Bob-Whites get a look inn this book, though for a chunk of it Brian and Jim are away, which leaves Mart in the starring male role for a little while (totally awesome for a Mart fan like me). Dans experiences in his gang days once again help shed some light on the mystery and I have big props for Di, even though she's scared out in a strange place in the middle of the night she's brave enough to keep doing what needs to be done.

It was really easy to imagine how pretty the flowers etc at Mrs Elliots were and I'm glad it had a happy ending for everyone, except for the villain of course.

My only beef this time was the timeline. Last book the Bob-Whites are fresh back at school for the start of a new year, this time it's the start of the holidays again, a whole school year disappeared and no one aged a day, I guess this I'd where the timeline starts going screwy and the agelessness of the characters starts pushing beyond belief.

Join me next time for the Mystery off Old Telegraph Road, which, if I remember rightly, has counterfeiting and a bikeathon!