The Day Camp Disaster

Nancy Drew: Notebooks #55

by Carolyn Keene, Paul Casale (Illustrator)

Can Nancy catch the prankster, or will the campers call it quits? It's summer vacation and Nancy, George, and Bess have signed up for a two-week-long nature day camp on the outskirts of River Heights. The girls can't wait to get out and enjoy nature, and are thrilled to be spending their days making butterfly feeders, planting sunflowers, and taking hikes. But things at Camp Northwoods start going haywire right from the start. The projects the campers work so hard on during the day keep getting ruined at night! Nancy is suspicious -- these don't look like natural disasters. Just who is wrecking all of the campers' hard work? And can camp continue with a culprit on the loose?

Genres: Childrens, Mystery

80 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 2003

About the author

Carolyn Keene is a writer pen name that was used by many different people- both men and women- over the years. The company that was the creator of the Nancy Drew series, the Stratemeyer Syndicate, hired a variety of writers. For Nancy Drew, the writers used the pseudonym Carolyn Keene to assure anonymity of the creator.

Edna and Harriet Stratemeyer inherited the company from their father Edward Stratemeyer. Edna contributed 10 plot outlines before passing the reins to her sister Harriet. It was Mildred Benson (aka: Mildred A. Wirt), who breathed such a feisty spirit into Nancy's character. Mildred wrote 23 of the original 30 Nancy Drew Mystery Stories®, including the first three. It was her characterization that helped make Nancy an instant hit. The Stratemeyer Syndicate's devotion to the series over the years under the reins of Harriet Stratemeyer Adams helped to keep the series alive and on store shelves for each succeeding generation of girls and boys. In 1959, Harriet, along with several writers, began a 25-year project to revise the earlier Carolyn Keene novels. The Nancy Drew books were condensed, racial stereotypes were removed, and the language was updated. In a few cases, outdated plots were completely rewritten.

Other writers of Nancy Drew volumes include Harriet herself, she wrote most of the series after Mildred quit writing for the Syndicate and in 1959 began a revision of the first 34 texts. The role of the writer of "Carolyn Keene" passed temporarily to Walter Karig who wrote three novels during the Great Depression. Also contributing to Nancy Drew's prolific existence were Leslie McFarlane, James Duncan Lawrence, Nancy Axelrod, Priscilla Doll, Charles Strong, Alma Sasse, Wilhelmina Rankin, George Waller Jr., and Margaret Scherf.

Reviews

[Cassidy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The main characters of this book are Nancy, Bess, and Hannah. They go to a day camp during the summer and they go every year. Nancy, Bess, and Hannah are vry good detectives. The day camp disaster is about three girls who go to a camp and do fun arts and crafts and ohter nice things and leave for the night come back in the morning and everthing is destroyed. They stay over at the camp one night and figure out who the victim is. they realize that the victim is a camp mascot Rocky the Racoon! I think this book is very good and i like the mystery. I think i am most like Nancy because she is snoopy and always wants to know what the gossip is and that is just like me! i think anyone who likes adventure adn mystery would like this book.

[Bmack · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book and I think it is a great beginning chapter book for kids who like mysteries. The “mystery” is believable and it does keep you interested to find out the conclusion. This is a great series for beginning readers.

[Kiki]

Of the very few Nancy Drew Notebooks I have read, this was my favorite, and I have read it multiple times.