Carolyn KeeneFirst published in 1930, The Nancy Drew Mystery Stories have sold over 70 million copies and become a cherished part of our cultural landscape.The teenage sleuth has been a noted inspiration for generations of women, including Sonia Sotomayor, Sandra Day O’Connor, and Hillary Clinton.
Nancy is asked to locate a stolen pearl necklace that is unusual and very valuable. She soon learns that strange and dangerous people are responsible for the theft. They harass her at home and intensify it when she and her father go to Japan, until they finally manage to kidnap Nancy and her friend Ned Nickerson when she returns to River Heights.
Through clever sleuthing, Nancy is able to penetrate the rites of an amazing group of pearl worshippers, some of whose members are far from devout, and she uncovers underhanded dealings of certain employees of World Wide Gems, Inc., a tremendous international jewelry company. Readers will love accompanying Nancy, disguised as a Japanese girl, in this adventure in Tokyo.
In a response to a friend’s call for help, Nancy’s father, a lawyer, asks her to travel to mysterious Crocodile Island with her friends Bes and George to study the reptiles and try to uncover a group of suspected poachers.
Upon their arrival in Florida, the girls are kidnapped but cleverly escape to pursue their detective work. Dangers mount as they cope with reptiles, enemy boats, and exciting chases after the men who are responsible for a sinister racket that involves many unsuspecting victims. In the end, Nancy makes a bold move to untangle the mass of clues, but she and Ned become imprisoned in the enemy’s submarine and are held for ransom!
A sheep farmer receives a mysterious telephone call shortly after he buys a series of pictures painted on parchment. “Decipher the message in the parchment and right a great wrong,” the voice says. Puzzled, the owner asks Nancy to help.
With Junie, his daughter, Nancy tracks down a kidnapper and a group of extortionists. Is there a connection between the message in the parchment and a boy artist on another farm? And who is responsible for the atmosphere of fear in the neighborhood? After several harrowing experiences, Nancy begins to tighten the net around a ruthless villain and calls on the assistance of her friends Ned, Burt, Dave, Bess and George to bring his nefarious scheme to a dead end.
Nancy goes to Excello Flying School in the Midwest to take lessons, while her friends Bess and George perfect their horseback riding. But soon the young sleuth is confronted with the mystery of a hijacked plane and a missing pilot. Then the rancher’s prize pony, Major, is stolen. Nancy becomes a detective in a plane and on horseback to track down the elusive sky phantom and the horse thief. A lucky find – a medal with a message to be deciphered on it – furnishes a worthwhile clue. Romance is added to mystery when Bess becomes interested in a handsome cowboy. Readers will spur Nancy on as she investigates a strange magnetic cloud, hunts for the horse thief, and finally arrives at a surprising solution.
Gold! There are rumors that long ago a treasure was hidden in a city now buried under the Nevada desert. Nancy and her friends plan to join a dig sponsored by two colleges to hunt for the gold. Before she starts, the young sleuth receives an ancient stone table with petroglyphs on it. With this amazing clue, however, come a threat and danger from a thief who also wants the treasure.
One harrowing adventure after another besets Nancy, Bess, George, Ned, Burt, and Dave in 102-degree temperatures as they pursue Nancy’s hunches above and below ground. They are assisted by a fine woman and a young geology student, but both are unwilling participants in a strange plot. In the end Nancy and Ned nearly lose their lives, just after she has discovered the priceless hidden treasure of gold.
When Nancy Drew eagerly agrees to help her lawyer father solve the mystery of the glowing eye, she has no way of knowing that it will involve the kidnapping of her close friend Ned Nickerson. A puzzling note in Ned’s handwriting set Nancy and her friends Bess and George on a hazardous search for a bizarre criminal. From their base of operations, the Emerson College campus, the three girl detectives and Ned’s college pals follow a maze of clues to locate the kidnapper’s hideout and rescue Ned. Not only is Nancy greatly worried about Ned, but also she is alarmed by the high-handed methods of a woman lawyer who tries to take the case away from her.
Readers will follow Nancy’s exciting adventures as she unravels this dangerous web of mystery.
A bird of ill omen is mysteriously left on the Drews’ front lawn. Did the person who put it there do so with the intent of jinxing Nancy and her father? This strange incident involves Nancy in her famous father’s case concerning a rare bird farm threatened with destruction to make room for a high-rise apartment house complex. People who are opposed to the ruthless take-over of the farm are being made the victims of jinxing by bad luck symbols and other threats to their safety. Even Nancy and her friend Ned Nickerson become targets!
Nancy soon realizes that helping honest people to overcome their superstitions and fears can be as challenging as tracking down criminals. The young detective’s thrilling adventures will keep the reader in breathless suspense from the first page to the last.
Aunt Eloise Drew invited Nancy and her friends to Mirror Bay Bide-a-Wee cabin near Cooperstown, New York, for a visit and a chance to solve the mystery of the woman who glides across the water. Upon their arrival, Nancy becomes mixed up in a vacation hoax and is nearly arrested for fraud.
On the wooded mountain near the cabin further exciting events await Nancy and the other girls. In the deep forest, a weird luminescent green sorcerer appears who threatens to cast an evil spell on anyone investigating his strange activities. In a dangerous twist of circumstances Nancy finds that solving one mystery helps to solve another. What happens when the young detective and her friends uncover a cleverly concealed criminal operation?
Nancy and her friends Bess and George spend an exciting week exploring a mysterious zigzag house with its fantastically crooked staircase, its bizarre serpent picture, and an unpredictable robot that nearly causes the young detective to lose her life. But despite the threat of danger from the robot, Nancy is determined to solve the mystery of the weird house and to locate the missing owner who is wanted by the police. It takes keen logic and quick thinking for the young detective to plow through the tangled thicket of clues and find the key to this complex puzzle. With the help of her friends, Nancy captures an elusive swindler and uncovers the secret of the crooked banister, but not before they have several hair-raising adventures – one on a broken bridge over flaming water, another in a hidden room with poisoned portraits!
The strange disappearance of a young Turkish client of Mr. Drew’s and the gift of an Oriental rug with a coded message woven into its decorative border start Nancy on a difficult search for a missing mannequin. What happened to the attractive figure that Farouk Tahmasp used in the display window of this rug shop? Who is trying to keep Nancy from finding it – and why?
Tracking down the intricate trail of clues takes Nancy and her friends Bess and George, Ned, Burt, and Dave to Turkey. Their sleuthing leads them to the Grand Bazaar in the exotic city of Istanbul, where Bess mysteriously disappears. Suspense mounts when Nancy encounters a vengeful enemy at an ancient underground reservoir.
Events move swiftly as Nancy and her friends try to solve this challenging mystery!
“Nancy Drew, forget the ghost hunt!” a male voice rasps on the telephone. Despite the mysterious warning, the teenage detective and a group of friends start out on a ghost-hunting expedition to investigate five places reputed to be haunted. Danger strikes at once when Nancy tries to overtake the canoe that paddles itself on Lake Sevanee. Thrills and chills mount as the ghost hunters pursue a phantom horse and ghost rider racing across the field that surrounds the Red Barn Guesthouse. During these happenings and other weird events Nancy finds herself pitted against a dangerous adversary, clever enough to operate invisibly.
Thrilling, dangerous adventures confront Nancy Drew while on a safari in East Africa with a group of American college students. Excitement runs high as the teen-age detective delves into the theft of a fabulous sapphire formed by nature millions of years ago. The mystery starts in Nancy’s home town. Her lawyer father’s client, Floyd Ramsay, who fashions beautiful and unusual synthetic gems, is accused of stealing the magnificent spider sapphire and exhibiting it as his own creation. Mr. Ramsay’s enemies blackmail him and by their vicious acts try to deter Nancy from going on the safari.
Readers will join Nancy as she uncovers a nefarious scheme and solves the strange disappearance of an injured jungle guide.
Lovely young Carla Ponce, who lives in Peru, invites Nancy and her friends Bess and George to visit her and solve her “monkey mystery,” which promises to lead to a fabulous treasure. A clue is carved on an intriguing wooden plaque that is so old, most of the crossword cipher is obliterated. When a notorious gang headed by El Gato (the Cat) steals the priceless relic, Nancy’s hopes of solving the mystery are almost shattered. But the daring young detective’s ability to think fast and act quickly results in the recovery of the plaque.
Nancy’s determined efforts to decode the crossword decipher take her to the magnificent, awe-inspiring Incan ruins at Cuzco and Machu Pichu. Through clever deductions, perseverance, and dangerous adventures, Nancy and her friends help to capture a ring of vicious smugglers and go on to make an astounding archaeological discovery.
Nancy Drew must search for a flight of 99 steps to solve the mystery of a friend’s weird dream. Her search leads her to France, but before she leaves the United States, an unknown person calling himself Monsieur Neuf warns the young sleuth not to pursue her mission.
With her friends Bess and George, Nancy arrives in Paris to join her father who is working on another case: to find out what, or who, is frightening wealth financier Monsieur Leblanc into selling large amounts of securities. Startling discoveries convince the young detective that Mr. Drew’s case and her own mystery are linked by the 99 steps, and that a mysterious man has a strong hold over Leblanc. Is it blackmail? Nancy’s quest for further clues leads to the romantic chateau country in the Loire Valley, where a web of danger closes in tightly around the three girls.
When Nancy Drew and her two close friends arrive for the Emerson University June Week celebration and learn there has been a mix-up in their motel reservations, the confusion leads to a baffling mystery.
Uncle John Rorick, a descendant of the early settlers of the town of Emerson, invites the three girls to be his guests at his historic mansion on Pine Hill. Shortly after their arrival, he tells them about the phantom who haunts the mansion’s library. Uncle John also relates the weird family saga of a lost French wedding gown and valuable gifts which went to the bottom of a nearby cove in the sinking of the Lucy Belle a hundred years before. Could there possibly be some connection between the phantom and the old ship disaster? Nancy wonders.
In between enjoying the university’s June Week boat races, river pageant, and fraternity dances, Nancy and her friends work diligently to solve the mystery of Pine Hill and to find the long-lost wedding treasures.
