The Mystery of the Hairy Tomatoes

Third-Grade Detectives #3

by George E. Stanley, Salvatore Murdocca (Illustrator)

Hair, Hair, Everywhere
Someone's been digging up Mrs. Ruston's tomatoes. She thinks it's Noelle's dog, Rover, and unless Noelle can find the real thief, Rover's in big trouble.
It's the hairiest case yet for Mr. Merlin's Third-Grade Detectives. Hair in Mrs. Ruston's tomato patch, hair in Amber Lee's hamburger -- can Noelle and Todd comb through the evidence and solve the mystery?

Genres: Mystery, Chapter Books, Childrens, Fiction, 2nd Grade

80 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

George Edward Stanley was born in Memphis, Texas on July 15, 1942. He received a bachelor's degree in 1965 and a master's degree in 1967 from Texas Tech University. He earned his Doctor Litterarum in African Linguistics in 1974 from the University of Port Elizabeth in South Africa. He lived all over Europe and Africa, studying and teaching foreign languages, working for the U.S. government, and writing books for young people and adults. He started writing fiction while a Fulbright professor in Chad, Central Africa, where about the only diversion he found available was listening to the BBC on his short wave radio. That led to his writing radio plays for a program called World Service Short Story. Three of his plays were eventually produced. After writing and publishing over 200 short stories in American, British, Irish, and South African magazines and linguistics articles in major international journals, he started writing books. He wrote over 100 fiction and non-fiction books for young people including The Katie Lynn Cookie Company series and the Adam Sharp series. He also wrote under the pseudonyms of M. T. Coffin, Franklin W. Dixon, Laura Lee Hope, Carolyn Keene, Adam Mills, and Stuart Symons. He was a professor of African and Middle-Eastern languages and linguistics in the department of foreign languages at Cameron University. He died from a ruptured aneurysm on February 7, 2011 at the age of 68.

Reviews

[Deacon]

The book was really exciting, and when you pick it up, you don't want to put it down.📘📚

[AS]

This is a neat series, probably best suited for kids who are just getting into chapter books. I like the way there is some science in them, some secret codes (and how to solve them), and the kids get to be the heroes, with adult characters gently guiding them. I think they would be engaging for young readers and there are things to learn as well, in an enjoyable way.

I didn’t like this particular one as well as the first one I read, (“The Riddle of the Stolen Sand”), but I would still pass it on to a kid reader, who would probably enjoy it.

[Elizabeth]

AR 3.4

[Courtenay]

Light-hearted fun for kids

[Dolly]

This is the third book in the Third-Grade Detectives series by George E. Stanley and Sal Murdocca. Our oldest really likes this series and she really enjoys learning about and solving the different kinds of puzzles. The incorporation of police lab work to help solve the mystery is also another interesting facet of the story.

Overall, I thought this was an interesting story and we will certainly look for more books in this series at our local library.

[Lizzie]

Yuck! Hairy tomatoes! It was a good book! I read it in one day!

[Emily]

My son wanted me to read this book. It was a fun little read which includes codes to figure out.

[Elaine Hebert]

I like this book because I like mysteries.

[Leslie Santamaria]

Solid early reader with a fun mystery demonstrating problem-solving skills for kids.

[Jesse Baldwin]

Hairy Tomatoes? Gross! Students would have fun reading this because younger students don't typically like vegetables the way it is.

[Kaitlyn]

The plot is mysterious .

[Hillvan]

380L