The Power Boys are a series of six juvenile mystery novels that were published from 1964 to 1967 by Whitman Publishing. [1] The books were written by Mel Lyle, a pseudonym, [2] and illustrated by Raymond Burns. [3]
The books were aimed at the pre-teen market. [4]
Jack Power (age 17), Chip Power (age 15), and their Dalmatian dog, Blaze, live with the boys' photojournalist father Thomas Power. Since the death of their mother Jack and Chip travel with Mr. Power during school vacation [5] and come upon mysteries, which they investigate.
Jack Power is described as being tall and slender, with reddish-brown hair cut short, and he has green eyes and freckles. He is portrayed as more serious and dependable than his younger brother. [6]
Chip Power is slim, almost as tall as Jack, has blond hair with reddish glints, and his eyes are blue. He is more impulsive, and sometimes his eyes or face are described as mischievous. [6]
Thomas Power is about as tall as Jack, but looks shorter because he is of heavier build. His hair is black and streaked with premature grey. The boys and their father are portrayed as very close to each other. [6]
Detective James Wilson, of the New York Police Department, is a tall man with white hair and gray eyes. He is Mr. Power’s oldest and dearest friend. [7]
Dick Donovan looks very similar to Jack – tall and lean, with red hair and freckles. [5] He is the son of wealth Barry Donovan, and appears in the last two novels.
Blaze is a Dalmatian dog that Mr. Power bought from a Los Angeles fireman. The Dalmatian joined the family at the end of the first book, after Mr. Power returned from covering a brush fire that threatened Griffith Park. His name was chosen because of his firefighter connection. [6]
The six books in the series are as follows:
In The Mystery of the Double Kidnapping Jack tells his new friend, Dick Donovan, that he lives in Chicago, [5] but none of the books take place there, since the Power boys travel with their father during vacations. Three of the books are set in New York City (books 1, 5, and 6), but it is not until the third of these New York books, which is the last in the series, that the family makes the city their new home, since Barry Donovan, a wealthy man who appeared in book five, could supply Thomas Power with a lot of future work. The first paragraph of this last book tells how much the brothers love their new eight-room apartment. We also learn that Mrs. Donovan helped with the decorating. [7]
Book 2, The Mystery of the Flying Skeleton, takes place in the Florida Keys before and during a hurricane; [9] book 3, The Mystery of the Burning Ocean, takes place in Bermuda; [10] and book 4, The Mystery of the Million-Dollar Penny, takes place in the Ozarks. [11]
The books were published with illustrated hard covers, but no dust jackets. [3] Raymond Burns' line illustrations were done in a single color, which varies from book to book.
It is likely that the series was written by two authors. William Larson, an editor hired by Whitman in 1964, stated that if more than one book in a series was published in a year, they were almost always written by different people. [12] A 1964 article stated that sometimes two authors write under the same pseudonym, "such as Julie Campbell or Mel Lyle," but Whitman restricted the writers under one byline "because juvenile readers detect differences in style and send letters of complaint." [2]
William Manners (the pen name of William Rosenberg) [13] wrote a series of mystery novels for Whitman Publishing, [14] but there are no published sources stating who wrote the Power Boys series.
The Power Boys mysteries are of interest to many who collect classic children’s series books. In 1986 The Armchair Detective reported that the Summer 1986 issue of Mystery & Adventure Series Review published an article suggesting that the Power Boys author (or authors) may have borrowed ideas from other Whitman Publishing series. [15] The October 2010 issue of Yellowback Library has a review of The Mystery of the Flying Skeleton, [16] and the May 2011 issue of Susabella Passengers and Friends contains a review of the entire series, and asks subscribers if they know who wrote the books, using the pseudonym of Mel Lyle. [17]
During the 1950s a series of short paperback Power Boys novels were published by Triple Nickel Books. These novels were written by Arthur Benwood, and told of the adventures of Ted and Steve Power. The books sold for fifteen cents each (three nickels). [18]
Ellery Queen is a pseudonym created in 1929 by American crime fiction writers Frederic Dannay and Manfred Bennington Lee and the name of their main fictional character, a mystery writer in New York City who helps his police inspector father solve baffling murders. Dannay and Lee wrote most of the more than thirty novels and several short story collections in which Ellery Queen appeared as a character, and their books were among the most popular of American mysteries published between 1929 and 1971. In addition to the fiction featuring their eponymous brilliant amateur detective, the two men acted as editors: as Ellery Queen they edited more than thirty anthologies of crime fiction and true crime, and Dannay founded and for many decades edited Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, which has been published continuously from 1941 to the present. From 1961, Dannay and Lee also commissioned other authors to write crime thrillers using the Ellery Queen nom de plume, but not featuring Ellery Queen as a character; several juvenile novels were credited to Ellery Queen, Jr. Finally, the prolific duo wrote four mysteries under the pseudonym Barnaby Ross.
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.
The Rover Boys, or The Rover Boys Series for Young Americans, was a popular juvenile series written by Arthur M. Winfield, a pseudonym for Edward Stratemeyer. Thirty titles were published between 1899 and 1926 and the books remained in print for years afterward.
Trixie Belden is the title character in a series of "detective" mysteries written between 1948 and 1986. The first six books were written by Julie Campbell Tatham, who also wrote the Ginny Gordon series; the stories were then continued by various in-house writers from Western Publishing under the pseudonym Kathryn Kenny. Today the rights to the series are owned by Random House. The series was out of print for a number of years, but Random House began releasing a new edition of the books in mid-2003. As of mid-2006, volumes 1 – 15 have been reissued.
Justin Richards is a British writer. He has written science fiction and fantasy novels, including series set in Victorian or early-20th-century London, and also adventure stories set in the present day. He has written many spin-off novels, reference books and audio plays based on the long-running BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who, and he is Creative Consultant for the BBC Books range of Doctor Who novels.
The Great Airport Mystery is Volume 9 in the original The Hardy Boys Mystery Stories published by Grosset & Dunlap.
Avon Publications is one of the leading publishers of romance fiction. At Avon's initial stages, it was an American paperback book and comic book publisher. The shift in content occurred in the early 1970s with multiple Avon romance titles reaching and maintaining spots in bestseller lists, demonstrating the market and potential profits in romance publication. As of 2010, Avon is an imprint of HarperCollins.
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Tin Goyenda is a series of juvenile detective novels written by Rakib Hasan and published in Bangladesh by Sheba Prokashoni. The Tin Goyenda series is a subseries of Kishore Thriller series of Sheba Prokashoni. Apart from Tin Goyenda, Kishore Thriller Adventure is another subseries. The books were made into a TV series in 2014, where the main protagonist 'Kishore Pasha' was starred by Kabyo Shagore Nurul Momen.
Whitman Publishing is an American book publishing company which started as a subsidiary of the Western Printing & Lithographing Company of Racine, Wisconsin. In about 1915, Western began printing and binding a line of juvenile books for the Hamming-Whitman Publishing Company of Chicago. A few years later Hamming-Whitman went bankrupt, and Western took over the company, found success in selling the inventory of low-cost juvenile books, and formed the Whitman Publishing Company. Whitman now primarily produces coin and stamp collecting books and materials. The company is owned by Anderson Press.
The Invisible Detective is a series of juvenile adventure novels, written by Justin Richards. Originally published in the United Kingdom between 2003 and 2005, the series has also been released in the United States.
Ginny Gordon is the main character in a series of five mystery books for adolescent girls published by the Whitman Publishing Company of Racine, Wisconsin from 1948 to 1956. The books were written by Julie Campbell Tatham, writing as Julie Campbell. Margaret Jervis was the illustrator.
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The Meg Duncan books are a series of six juvenile mystery books originally published by Western Publishing between 1967 and 1972 and reprinted in 1978. They were written by Holly Beth Walker and illustrated by Cliff Schule. The series was developed by editor Dorothy Haas, and first printed under Western Publishing's hardback-imprint formats. They were later reprinted as paperbacks.
Girl detective is a genre of detective fiction featuring a young, often teen-aged, female protagonist who solves crimes as a hobby.
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