Carolyn Keene | |
|---|---|
| Language | English |
| Genre | Mystery |
| Subject | Writing books |
Carolyn Keene is the pseudonym of the authors of the Nancy Drew mystery stories and The Dana Girls mystery stories, both produced by the Stratemeyer Syndicate. In addition, the Keene pen name is credited with the Nancy Drew spin-off, River Heights, and the Nancy Drew Notebooks.
Edward Stratemeyer, the founder of the Syndicate, hired writers, beginning with Mildred Wirt, later Mildred Wirt Benson, to write the manuscripts for the Nancy Drew books. [1] The writers were paid $125 for each book and were required by their contract to give up all rights to the work and to maintain confidentiality.
Benson is credited as the primary writer of Nancy Drew books under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. [2] Harriet Adams (Stratemeyer's daughter) rewrote the original books and added new titles after the withdrawal of Benson. [1]
Other ghostwriters who used this name to write Nancy Drew mysteries included Leslie McFarlane, James Duncan Lawrence, Walter Karig, Nancy Axelrad, Patricia Doll, Charles S. Strong, Alma Sasse, Wilhelmina Rankin, George Waller Jr., Margaret Fischer, and Susan Wittig Albert. Also involved in the Nancy Drew writing process were Harriet Stratemeyer Adams's daughters, who gave input on the series and sometimes helped to choose book titles; [2] : 158 the Syndicate's secretary, Harriet Otis Smith, who invented the characters of Nancy's friends Bess and George; [2] : 140 and the editors at Grosset & Dunlap. [2] : 228
In 1979, the Stratemeyer Syndicate changed publishers to Simon & Schuster, a move that the former publishers, Grosset & Dunlap, went to court to prevent, claiming a breach of contract. The decision was made in favor of the Syndicate, stating that they could choose which publisher they would like to use for subsequent entries in the series.
In 1985, the Syndicate was bought by publishers Simon & Schuster; the Drew books are now handled by Mega-Books, a New York book packager. [3]
| # | Writer | Story | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 36 | Harriet Adams | The Secret of the Golden Pavilion | 1959 |
| 37 | The Clue in the Old Stagecoach | 1960 | |
| 38 | The Mystery of the Fire Dragon | 1961 | |
| 39 | The Clue of the Dancing Puppet | 1962 | |
| 40 | The Moonstone Castle Mystery | 1963 | |
| 41 | The Clue of the Whistling Bagpipes | 1964 | |
| 42 | The Phantom of Pine Hill | 1965 | |
| 43 | The Mystery of the 99 Steps | 1966 | |
| 44 | The Clue in the Crossword Cipher | 1967 | |
| 45 | The Spider Sapphire Mystery | 1968 | |
| 46 | The Invisible Intruder | 1969 | |
| 47 | The Mysterious Mannequin | 1970 | |
| 48 | The Crooked Banister | 1971 | |
| 49 | The Secret of Mirror Bay | 1972 | |
| 50 | The Double Jinx Mystery | 1973 | |
| 51 | Mystery of the Glowing Eye | 1974 | |
| 52 | The Secret of the Forgotten City | 1975 | |
| 53 | The Sky Phantom | 1976 | |
| 54 | The Strange Message in the Parchment | 1977 | |
| 55 | Mystery of Crocodile Island | 1978 | |
| 56 | The Thirteenth Pearl | 1979 | |
| # | Writer | Story | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| 57 | Harriet Adams | The Triple Hoax | 1979 |
| 58 | The Flying Saucer Mystery | 1980 | |
| 59 | Nancy Axelrad | The Secret in the Old Lace | |
| 60 | The Greek Symbol Mystery | ||
| 61 | The Swami's Ring | 1981 | |
| 62 | Sharon Wagner | The Kachina Doll Mystery | |
| 63 | Nancy Axelrad | The Twin Dilemma | |
| 64 | Richard Ballard | Captive Witness | |
| 65 | Nancy Axelrad | Mystery of the Winged Lion | 1982 |
| 66 | James Duncan Lawrence | Race Against Time | |
| 67 | Richard Ballard | The Sinister Omen | |
| 68 | Sharon Wagner | The Elusive Heiress | |
| 69 | James Duncan Lawrence | Clue of the Ancient Disguise | |
| 70 | Sharon Wagner | The Broken Anchor | 1983 |
| 71 | James Duncan Lawrence | The Silver Cobweb | |
| 72 | The Haunted Carousel | ||
| 73 | Enemy Match | 1984 | |
| 74 | The Mysterious Image | ||
| 75 | Sharon Wagner | The Emerald-Eyed Cat Mystery | |
| 76 | The Eskimo's Secret | 1985 | |
| 77 | James Duncan Lawrence | The Bluebeard Room | |
| 78 | The Phantom of Venice | ||
Nancy Drew is a fictional character appearing in several mystery book series, movies, video games, and a TV show as a teenage amateur sleuth. The books are ghostwritten by a number of authors and published under the collective pseudonym Carolyn Keene. Created by the publisher Edward Stratemeyer as the female counterpart to his Hardy Boys series, the character first appeared in 1930 in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series, which lasted until 2003 and consisted of 175 novels.
Mildred Augustine Wirt Benson was an American journalist and writer of children's books. She wrote some of the earliest Nancy Drew mysteries and created the detective's adventurous personality. Benson wrote under the Stratemeyer Syndicate pen name, Carolyn Keene, from 1929 to 1947 and contributed to 23 of the first 30 Nancy Drew mysteries, which were bestsellers.
The Stratemeyer Syndicate was a publishing company that produced a number of mystery book series for children, including Nancy Drew, The Hardy Boys, the various Tom Swift series, the Bobbsey Twins, the Rover Boys, and others. They published and contracted the many pseudonymous authors doing the writing of the series from 1899 through 1987, when the syndicate partners sold the company to Simon & Schuster.
The Dana Girls was a series of young adult mystery novels produced by the Stratemeyer Syndicate. The title heroines, Jean and Louise Dana, are teenage sisters and amateur detectives who solve mysteries while at boarding school. The series was created in 1934 in an attempt to capitalize on the popularity of both the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories and the Hardy Boys series, but was less successful than either. The series was written by a number of ghostwriters and, despite going out-of-print twice, lasted from 1934 to 1979; the books have also been translated into a number of other languages. While subject to less critical attention than either Nancy Drew or the Hardy Boys, a number of critics have written about the series, most arguing that the Dana Girls' relative lack of success was due to the more dated nature of the series.
The Hardy Boys, brothers Frank and Joe Hardy, are fictional characters who appear in several mystery series for children and teens. The series revolves around teenagers who are amateur sleuths, solving cases that stumped their adult counterparts. The characters were created by American writer Edward Stratemeyer, the founder of book-packaging firm Stratemeyer Syndicate. The books themselves were written by several ghostwriters, most notably Leslie McFarlane, under the collective pseudonym Franklin W. Dixon.
Harriet Stratemeyer Adams was an American juvenile book packager, children's novelist, and publisher who was responsible for some 200 books over her literary career. She wrote the plot outlines for many books in the Nancy Drew series, using characters invented by her father, Edward Stratemeyer. Adams also oversaw other ghostwriters who wrote for these and many other series as a part of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, and rewrote many of the novels to update them starting in the late 1950s.
Franklin W. Dixon is the pen name used by a variety of different authors who were part of a team that wrote The Hardy Boys novels for the Stratemeyer Syndicate. Dixon was also the writer attributed for the Ted Scott Flying Stories series, published by Grosset & Dunlap.
Edward L. Stratemeyer was an American publisher, writer of children's fiction, and founder of the Stratemeyer Syndicate. He was one of the most prolific writers in the world, producing in excess of 1,300 books himself, selling in excess of 500 million copies. He also created many well-known fictional book series for juveniles, including The Rover Boys, The Bobbsey Twins, Tom Swift, The Hardy Boys, and Nancy Drew series, many of which sold millions of copies and remain in publication. On Stratemeyer's legacy, Fortune wrote: "As oil had its Rockefeller, literature had its Stratemeyer."
The Mystery At Lilac Inn is the fourth volume in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. It was first published in 1930 under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. Mildred Wirt Benson was the ghostwriter for the 1930 edition.
Walter Karig was a prolific writer, who served as a US naval captain. Karig wrote a number of works on Allied naval operations during World War II. He also wrote scripts for the television series Victory at Sea. Besides his works on naval history, Karig was a novelist, publishing under his own name, and a journalist.
The Mystery of the Ivory Charm is the thirteenth volume in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. It was first published in 1936 under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. The actual author was ghostwriter Mildred Wirt Benson.
The Mystery of the Tolling Bell is the twenty-third volume in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. It was first published in 1946 under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. The actual author was ghostwriter Mildred Wirt Benson.
The Clue in the Crossword Cipher is the forty-fourth volume in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. It was first published in 1967 under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. The actual author was ghostwriter Harriet Stratemeyer Adams.
The Thirteenth Pearl is the fifty-sixth volume in the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories series. It was first published in 1979 under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. The actual author was ghostwriter Harriet Stratemeyer Adams. The Thirteenth Pearl is the end of the original 56-book series published by Grosset & Dunlap. Subsequent volumes were published by Simon & Schuster.
The Kay Tracey Mysteries were published under the name Frances K. Judd, a house pseudonym of the Stratemeyer Syndicate, a book packager. The series was conceived as a response to the popularity of the Nancy Drew Mystery Stories and likewise features a teenage girl detective. While the original entries in the series lasted only from 1934 to 1942, the books were updated, revised, and have been re-issued numerous times, most recently by Bantam Books in the 1980s, and have been translated into Swedish and French. Many critics see Kay Tracey as markedly inferior to Nancy Drew, but some find the series to be significant as one of a number of series that provided girls with a feminist role model prior to third-wave feminism.
The Nancy Drew Mystery Stories is the long-running "main" series of the Nancy Drew franchise, which was published under the pseudonym Carolyn Keene. There are 175 novels — plus 34 revised stories — that were published between 1930 and 2003 under the banner; Grosset & Dunlap published the first 56, and 34 revised stories, while Simon & Schuster published the series beginning with volume 57.
The Honey Bunch series of books were part of the Stratemeyer Syndicate's production of 20th century children's books featuring adventurous youngsters, which included the series Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys and the Bobbsey Twins. This series was written under the pseudonym Helen Louise Thorndyke, and published for most of its duration by Grosset & Dunlap. The series began in 1923 and chronicled a young girl named Honey Bunch on her various trips and adventures. Along with Laura Lee Hope's series Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue, it was one of their most famous series for younger children.
