Josephine Lawrence (1899–1978)

This is the sequel to my childhood favorite Rosemary, and I'm very happy to report that it did not disappoint, that the characters of Rosemary, her younger sisters Sarah and Shirley, and big brother Dr. Hugh Willis all stood up to the passage of time (mine, not theirs...this story picks up very shortly after we left them all at the end of Rosemary), and that it wasn't just the favored place in my heart that made re-reading the original a satisfying experience over the years. The Willis family is fatherless; we are never told why. In Rosemary, they are motherless too, for the most part, as Mrs. Willis is away "resting" at a sanatorium for the entirety of that book. She has come home in the second installment, but the whole family will be spending the summer at a rented farm while renovations are made to their home in town to accommodate new office space for Dr. Hugh. Out in the country the girls meet many orphans: two boys from the agricultural college who are working under the farm manager for the summer, and a family of children, the oldest a fifteen year old boy and the youngest an infant, trying to run a farm and keep off the town's radar so they won't be separated and sent into care. There's an innocence to these stories, but underneath some fairly serious themes are explored, and so well handled that the reader never feels mugged by the "moral". Above all, Josephine Lawrence can make you love and believe in her characters in much the way Louisa May Alcott could do, with less saccharine and almost no pathos.… (meer)

Honey Bunch: Her First Little Mystery is my second favorite among the Honey Bunch books I have. Unless she wrote some of the later books, this is the last Honey Bunch book ghostwritten by Josephine Lawrence. The main mystery concerns a basket of the Mortons' laundry that's taken from their yard while Mrs. Morton is dealing with a mess Norman Clark made (magic act, Mr. Morton's hat, 3 eggs -- need I say more?).

Honey Bunch sees a young policeman, Peter Noble, and tries to explain what happened. Officer Noble is nice and likes to make jokes. He does take the theft seriously. (Honey Bunch is quite upset that her prettiest dress, a gift from her Aunt Carol, is among the missing.)

Officer Noble tells a couple of interesting stories about employees falsely accused of theft (I sure hope the person who bit into the cookie with the diamond ring in it didn't break a tooth). He also mentions a theft his family suffered when he was a child -- his great-grandmother's trunk full of valuables. It's never been found, but it is the reason he became a policeman instead of a doctor as his family wanted. He also tells Honey Bunch that she could be a police woman when she's older.

Mr. & Mrs. Morton are away for most of the book, leaving Mrs. Miller to look after Honey Bunch. Mrs. Miller is injured in an accident involving Lady Clare the cat. Doctors made house calls in those days so Mrs. Miller doesn't have to leave to be seen.

Honey Bunch and two of her friends, Ida Camp and Grace Winters, take care of the house and Mrs. Miller when they aren't trying to find the missing clothes basket. They form a Detective Club for this. Norman is huffy because he's not allowed to be the lead detective on the case. Still, Norman does something foolish that yields an interesting find: a very nice string of pearl beads and a letter.

Norman goes missing after an incident involving a public fountain. His mother is frantic, but Honey Bunch figures out the truth.

Honey Bunch, Ida, and Grace are tracing another clue and become very tired. The steps they decide to sit on belong to the very church where Officer Noble's sister, Ruth, is going to be married. The girls meet her and her fiance because they've come to talk to the rector. They like Ruth so much that they want to give her a nice wedding present.

Both mysteries get solved in the end. There's an unfortunate family met during the sleuthing, but DR. Wood, Officer Noble, and the Mortons are taking care of that problem. (I have to admit that my eyebrows went up a bit in the scene where no one can find a juice squeezer so Officer Noble cuts some oranges in half to be eaten with spoons. Why not just peel the oranges and eat the segments???)

By the way, Norman doesn't get into all of the trouble in this one. Klutzy cousin Stub comes visiting. Even those eggs and Mr. Morton's hat don't come close to what Stub does.

This is a charming little mystery for fans of children's series from the first half of the 20th century.… (meer)

If you're asking yourself, Didn't Honey Bunch visit the Central Park Zoo in Honey Bunch: Her First Visit to the City (book 2)?, her visit to the monkey house there is mentioned in this book. It is Honey Bunch's first visit to the Bronx Zoo, though.

Grace Winters' dog, Teddy, is chasing a monkey. Honey Bunch doesn't get to see it because she foolishly followed Norman over the back fence and got caught by her skirt,. By the time she's rescued, she looks like her klutzy tomboy cousin, Stub.

Still, Honey Bunch will be able to see monkeys at the zoo when her mother takes her -- and Stub -- to New York to visit their Turner cousins. In the meantime, the monkey Teddy was chasing belongs to a local businessman, Mr. Jepson. He's offering a reward for its return. Once Stub arrives in Barham (not in the way she was expected), she's eager to find the missing pet.

Stub is unfortunate in living at a time before she could hope to wear the toughest jeans available because she's notorious for ruining her dresses. How she manages to ruin each dress during her search -- not to mention what should have been quiet games, is a running theme in this book. If I'd been her mother, or Honey Bunch's, I would have just bought cheap dresses in bulk.

Stub and Honey Bunch go to New York alone because Mr. David Morton's Great-Uncle Eben and Great-Aunt Trotty have written they're coming to visit. The David Mortons haven't seen them in 10 years, which means the elderly couple have never met their little great-great niece. Aunt Julia is David's sister, so they're her great aunt and uncle, too, but she's not asked to be understanding.

Naturally, Stub gets in trouble on the train -- more than once -- and Honey Bunch has to smooth things over. She does the same for the new hall boy at the Turners' apartment.

Still, the little blonde isn't perfect. When they do finally get to the zoo, she manages to frighten quite a few adults. Furthermore, Honey Bunch is as ungrateful and unrepentant as Stub is when she's saved from a fall that could have killed or crippled her.

Darn! The monkey house is closed that day. Will Honey Bunch's wish come true?

If you like the good, clean fun of children's series from the first half of the 20th century, you'll probably like this entry in the Honey Bunch series.… (meer)