Flash Evans, Camera News Hawk (Flash Evans #2)

Alas, with the second book in the Flash Evans series, we come to the end of this short-lived series by famed Nancy Drew ghostwriter, Mildred Wirt Benson (writing under the pseudonym Frank Bell).  It's rather a shame this series did not last beyond these first two books, as the stories are quite exciting, fast-paced, and filled with both mystery and adventure.  Benson definitely pulled out all of the stops in this series, constantly putting her title character in some of the most dangerous (and outrageous!) situations; yet, like any good, plucky series book hero, he always manages to come out of each scrape pretty much unscathed.  Both books are great reads, and even for those who are not necessarily fans of boys' series books (like me!), the stories are very enjoyable, and I would definitely recommend them.

 

Flash Evans, Camera News Hawk is set nine months after the events in the first book, and Jimmy, or "Flash" as he is called by his fellow photographers, is now seventeen-years old. As seems to be his habit of being in the right place at the right time, Flash is invited by his fellow photographer, Joe Wells, to watch Bailey Brooks, a famed aviator and parachute jumper, test out a brand new parachute of his own design.  Joe now works for a newsreel company, filming the scenes rather than simply taking still photographs.  He and Flash snag images of the successful test of the parachute, but Flash grows uneasy when he sees Brooks talking with a man named Albert Povy, who Joe says is an unsavory character that has been suspected of being a spy.  With a scar running down the side of his face, he has the typical appearance of a series book villain!

 

Similar to the first book, this one has an overarching mystery (involving a government agent and a potential theft of important papers), while at the same time putting poor Flash through the ropes with one harrowing adventure after another.  The first is a horrific train wreck (how does Flash always manages to survive these disasters with barely a scratch?!?!), in which his friend Joe Wells is injured, placing Flash in a position to take his place as a cameraman to help out his rather contentious partner, George Doyle. Doyle and Flash take an instant disliking for each other, but to help his friend, Flash agrees to do the camera work.  Their first assignment is to video the Indianapolis auto race (which may have been a vague reference to the famous "Indianapolis 500," which began as far back as 1911), and while they arrive late and other film crews have all the prime spots, Flash's luck aids them out, as their not-so-great spot turns out to be the very place a horrible racing accident occurs, which they capture it all (p. 44)!

 

From there, Flash and Doyle just happen to be at the right spot when a bridge gives out, with a speeding car going down with it (pp. 100-01).  They catch it all on film, of course; however, the driver of the car is caught in the raging waters, so Flash risks his life to dive in and save the man.  As it turns out, the man is a wanted criminal, and when Flash gets him to shore, the police are there to arrest him - and to thank Flash for catching him before he could escape!  After that, Flash finds himself on the wrong end of an oar, and he is left by a villainous cretin (and I won't spoil the story by telling you who that is!) in a river that is surrounded on both sided by an out of control forest fire (pp. 136-39)!  As can be expected, he manages to swim under the water to avoid the intense heat of the fires and swim far enough downstream to get up on shore and get away - only to wind up kidnapped by the villain and held locked in an isolated house.  The poor kid just can't catch a break!

 

All of the stories tie into the aviator and his new type of parachute, and the government agent and the attempt to rob him during the train wreck.  It is one of Flash's photographs from the night of the train wreck, as well as his keen sense of observation and a fortunate find while locked up in that house that lead to the identity of the villain being revealed and his machinations put to an end.  And along the way, Doyle and Flash manage to earn one another's respect and let go of all the animosity between them.  But Flash is nothing but loyal, and despite both Joe and Doyle trying to convince him to join them on the newsreel crew, he sticks with his job at The Brandale Ledger.  However, he admits Doyle in the last paragraph of the book that "[t]aking ordinary pictures will seem pretty tame after this.  One of these days I'll probably be back" (p. 211).  Obviously, this was an open door for Benson to later have her photographer protagonist return to newsreel filming in a later adventure, had the series continued.

 

The cover art is the same as that on the first book - but after reading this, it becomes clear that the top and bottom of the four scenes are taken from this book, while the two scenes on either side of Flash's headshot in the middle were taken from the first.  I would be curious to know if this same cover art would have been continued to be used on future books, if more had been written and published.  The interior art depicts the scene of the car pile-up from the Indianapolis raceway.  With so many thrilling moments in the story, I am sure it was hard for the publisher to decide which scene to depict on the frontis piece!

 

And with that, we reach the end of this short-lived, two-book series.  One has to wonder if Benson had any other ideas for stories in this series, and whether it was her idea, or the publishers, to end it so quickly.  In any event, poor Jimmy "Flash" Evans was put on the series book shelf, a mostly forgotten character that only die-hard collectors seek out and read!

 

RATING:  9 nail files and rusty razor blades out of 10 for keeping the danger high, the mystery exciting, and the hero resourceful - all the great trappings for a fantastic read! 

 

 

 

Flash Evans and the Darkroom Mystery (Flash Evans #1)

This two-book series was one I honestly thought I would never own.  For whatever reason (limited print run, short series, scarcity of volumes), any time these books show up for sale, they are always very high prices, especially if you want them in dust jacket!  Recently, though, I lucked upon an eBay auction where a seller was selling both books in this series, no dust jackets, for only $15.99!  While I was hoping to one day own them with dust jacket, at this price, I could not pass it up.  After all, I can always upgrade to a dust jacket later, or even use a reproduction or photocopy dust jacket.  The important thing was, I now owned Mildred Wirt Benson's two book series about the hotshot newspaper photographer, Flash Evans!

 

Flash Evans and the Darkroom Mystery introduces readers to Jimmy Evans,  a "tall, slender lad with a thick shock of dark, curly hair and frank gray eyes" (p. 3) who is all of sixteen years of age (p. 4).  Having graduated Brandale High School, Jimmy has been trying to obtain a job with any one of the local newspapers as a staff photographer.  As this book opens, he is facing rejection again from Tom Riley, city editor of The Brandale Ledger.  His best friend, Jerry Hayes, tries to convince Jimmy to find another kind of work, but Jimmy is determined to follow in the footsteps of his father, who was "city editor on the Brandale Post ... years ago before the paper folded" (p. 6).  Now that is father was dead, and it was just he and his mother, Jimmy wanted to make a go in the newspaper field.  Fortune shines on Jimmy, however, for that very afternoon, while lunching with his friend at the local drugstore counter, they witness an accident outside, and Jimmy is able to snap some great pictures at the scene.  Not only are Jimmy's pictures important to the police, as the men who caused the accident are wanted criminals - but the photos prove to be Jimmy's way to get himself a job - at The Brandale Ledger!

 

Written by Mildred Wirt Benson, the two Flash Evans books were published in 1940 by Cupples & Leon, who also published her Penny Parker series, as well as her Mildred Wirt Mystery Stories for Girls series of books.  Benson had just completed her Mystery Stories for Girls, as well as her Penny Nichols series, both of which concluded in 1939, and her Trailer Stories series had finished the year prior.  Her Penny Parker series was only in its second year, with books 3 and 4 being published in 1940, and she had books published in the Nancy Drew, Dana Girls, and Kay Tracey series that year, as well.  She had not yet begun her work at the newspaper when these books were written, but her husband at the time (Asa Wirt) had been working for the Associated Press for some time (meaning Benson was no stranger to newspapers, as as evident with her Penny Parker series).  This book (and presumably the second, also) is heavy with the inner workings of a newspaper office, and for this series, particularly with photography, the technical aspects of developing photographs, and the urgency and importance of the right photos for a rushed, important headline story!

 

As far as this first story goes, it does have an overarching mystery involving various incidents that happen in the darkroom at the newspaper - Jimmy, who gains the nickname "Flash" (p. 13), faces embarrassment at every turn. First, some photographs he is developing are damages by a wrong mix of chemicals; then, some photographs he takes of a fire disappear from the editor's desk.  Then, while he is developing an extremely important photo of some criminals he caught in the act trying to burn down a warehouse, Jimmy a/k/a Flash is knocked unconscious and his photos are stolen, getting him in trouble with both the police and his editor. His immediate reaction is to suspect his boss, Fred Orris, who has made it clear from the beginning that he disliked young Flash.  But, as the story progresses, he learns it is wrong to make assumptions about people, and it turns out that a very unlikely person was hiding a secret grudge against Flash, which resulted in all these actions.

 

Alongside this mystery, Benson fills in this book with a number of vignetttes - saving a man from a burning building (which is depicted in the frontis piece), fighting a competing photographer for photos from an out-of-state airline crash, saving a man from an insurance scam racket, flying out to a sinking ocean liner for daring photographs, and several other adventures that allows Flash to prove his worth over and over.  A couple of these scenes appear on the cover art (the burning apartment building and the sinking ocean liner).  Benson knows how to write fast-paced, exciting stories that keep the reader engaged, turning page after page to see what is going to happen next.  Benson's self-created stories are, for the most part, a far cry better than those she wrote based on outlines from others.

 

One can only assume Benson used the "Frank Bell" pseudonym for this series so that a boys' series was written by a "male" author (similar to how male authors used female pseudonyms when they wrote girls' series books). This, of course, is only one of several pseudonyms that Benson used when writing her own stories - including Joan Clark (the Penny Nichols series), Don Palmer (the Boy Scout Explorer series), and Dorothy West (the Dot and Dash series).

 

While I am not normally a fan of boys series, this book is a great opening story for a series, and it's a shame the Flash Evans series only lasted two books.  I am curious to see how the second book compares with this one.

 

RATING:   9 shattered photo plates out of 10 for a fun new character and an action packed new series about a newspaper photographer in the 1940s!

Kristie at College a/k/a Quarry Ghost - a Milderd Benson mystery story

For many years, I have heard about Mildred Wirt Benson's novel, Quarry Ghost, which was first published back in 1959.  It is not an easy book to find (especially if you want it in good condition), and when you do find it, the prices are likely to be quite high.  I never really held out any hope of finding a copy of the book, so it sat on my "want list" for quite a few years.  Well, one of the interesting things about this book is that one year after its U.S. publication, the book was also published over in Great Britain - the only catch, it was issued under a different title!  What's even more odd is that the British title does not even give one little hint of a mystery; rather, the title under which the book was published across the pond would make one think it is simply a typical girl's college-life book!  However, when I happened across a dust-jacketed copy of the British edition for under $20, I snatched it up - and FINALLY, I was able to read Benson's last novel written for young adults...

Kristie at College is an innocuous title that gives absolutely not hint of mystery whatsoever.  In fact, the cover depicts a dark-haired girl carrying her schoolbook, while behind her other college students mingle in front of a plain brick building.  The only way one would know this was a mystery story was to read the synopsis on the inside front flap, which talks about Kristie becoming "deeply involved" in a controversy with one of the college professors and a dinosaur relic that has disappeared under his watch.  Kristie, a journalism student at Hagers College, gets the scoop from a stranger who shows up at the office of the school newspaper late one night.  He informs Kristie that he has been sent by a Canadian museum to purchase the dinosaur egg that was acquired by members of the college from an expedition in the Gobi Desert (p. 13).  Kristie takes down the information, and her story makes it to the front page of the next day's edition of the collegiate newspaper - but that's where the trouble begins!

Benson gives her readers a well-crafted mystery, where the mysterious informant disappears, the college professor who is in charge of the dinosaur egg is acting shady, and Kristie's own aspirations to be editor of the college newspaper are put at risk because of her unvetted story!  To only complicate matters, Kristie, who is on one of the school's swim teams, is invited to join a scuba-diving club who make regular trips to the local quarry to explore - but her introduction to scuba-diving and the quarry quickly escalates to a situation of extreme danger when a "ghost" seems to be haunting the place.  The ghost not only frightens some of the club members, but it also sabotages some of the students' equipment and attacks Kristie when she is under the water!  Kristie begins to realize, though, the ghost seems thoroughly focused on a portion of the quarry the students have labeled "the black hole," as it is deeper than the rest and completely dark when one swims down into it.  She soon discovers that the missing dinosaur relic, the ghost, and the black hole are all connected - and the odd, rather large man who lives in the woods outside of the quarry is a part of it all!

To any seasoned mystery reader, the solution to the conundrum is not at all hard to figure out; but it is the getting there that is all the fun.  And Benson makes it fun, because not only do we have the danger and suspense surrounding the ghost and the underwater dangers, but we get the not-so-friendly competition between Kristie and the professor's daughter, Marcia Radcliff.   After all, every good protagonist needs a nemesis to keep them on their toes!  And along the way, Kristie learns a bit about good sportsmanship, priorities, and what really matters most.  Of course, as can be expected (this is a young adult story), Kristie does end up getting the editorship, largely due to her part in finding the missing dinosaur and revealing the true criminal in the matter, and she also wins the final swimming competition, mostly due to the amount of underwater exercise she got while with the scuba club.  Thus, all's well that ends well, and as Marcia so aptly concludes the story, "With either flippers or slippers, Kristie Coleman will never be out of her depth!"

I suppose it should not be surprising that Benson would integrate her career as a journalist and her love of swimming into this tale.  As most fans are aware, Benson spent a number of years working as a journalist, which, like Kristie in the book, began in her college years working as the yearbook editor and also on The Daily Iowan, the college newspaper (Mildred Wirt Benson: College Years). In addition, while in college, Benson excelled in swimming, as well as diving, becoming a member of the "Seals Club."  According to the University of Iowa, "a photo of [Benson's] beautiful swan dive into the Iowa River is often reproduced and has become on of the Iowa Women's Archives' iconic images" (Mildred Wirt Benson: College Years).  Thus, one might wonder if perhaps Benson imprinted a part of her own life and experiences into Kristie Coleman as she was writing this book!

And apparently, Benson's daughter took after her when it came to swimming, as Benson gives a dedication of this book: "To Peggy, champion swimmer, who lost a race and launched a story."  

Personally, I prefer the Quarry Ghost title, and the cover to Quarry Ghost is much more in line with the main plot of the story.  However, I am just happy to have found a reasonably priced copy of Kristie at College, so at least I have the story to have read and enjoyed.  Maybe one day I'll come across a copy of Quarry Ghost, and I can add that to my collection - but until then, Kristie will sit upon my shelf with my other Mildred Wirt Benson mysteries!

RATING:  10 lost license plates out of 10 for a great mystery and a nice book-end for Benson's children's book writing career!